Starting Your Engine & Leaving the Dock

Welcome to Sailing With Albie!

I love sailing, hiking, personal motivation, business and sharing what I love with others! Feel free to check out all my exciting adventures at my websites below!

Starting your engine:

Outboard Engines

Pulling the choke out higher at the start may be the difference between being able to start it and not!

Make sure the gear is in neutral and then pull the chord to start the engine. It’s exactly the same as the pull string for starting your lawn mower. It should start after 2-3 times. If it doesn’t, something is wrong and I would start finding out what that is before just wasting more time pulling!

When you got it started, leave the engine running for 5-10 mins to make sure everything is ok.

After five minutes you might notice that the choke can be pushed back in a little.

Undersranding that there is usually a lever that you can put your engine into Forward, Nuetral and Reverse.

Then by using the larger lever, it has a knob that allows you to turn it to low power, medium and high.

Engine tips:

On top of the carburetor, there is a lever that connects with the gas. This lever moves when you crank the power up or down.

Also on the carburetor, there are two tiny screws. One allows air intake which can be opened slightly if the engine needs more air. I would recommend using the choke instead and not playing with this screw but it is useful to know that it is there if you need it. Tightening or loosening this screw allows more airflow but be careful not to loosen it too much as you can lose the screw completely with all the motion of the engine when it is on. The bottom screw opens the gas chamber in the carburetor and allows you to drain out the chamber of gas if it gets flooded.

Inboard Engines

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Know how to Leave the dock:

Leaving the dock is probably the most intimidating procedure a new sailor can experience! It definitely was for me. The reason: fear of crashing into another boat. This is an accurate fear and the whole process should be done carefully. Four basic tips to steer you right:

1) Go slow always!

2) Know how to turn your throttle down and how to put your engine into nuetral quickly.

3) Realizing that a boat with a tiller steers the opposite direction then where you point the tiller. Point it left and the boat will go right and vice versus. With a steering wheel it is just like a car. Turn the wheel right and the boat goes right.

4) Have someone who knows what they’re doing come along with you. But YOU need to do the work and let them guide you when nessessary.

A story about bumping into another boat

I remember when I first left the dock and went out too fast and forgot to untie the tiller. Well I crashed into another boat and had to pay for hurting his navigation lights. The good thing is that we worked out a pay plan which included a few sailing lessons and I will never forget what I learned in those lessons!

How to get the boat ready to go before you set out. Getting sails, tiller and engine ready: