Hand Crank

[jpmarshall]

Greetings All,

I am new to this forum and have already spent hours searching through some of the threads and I am very impressed with the volume of experience and knowledge that is on this site. I am the proud owner of an Atomic IV that came with a 1979 C&C Mk III attached.

I noticed a hand crank for an Atomic IV on e-bay yesterday and was wondering if this is a common item and what the availability is and if it is practical. In theory, it would be a useful item to have aboard for those times when your isolator is switched improperly and batteries get run down.

Regards
Peter Marshall
Hotel California
Dryden Yacht Club

[Phil]

Peter,

Welcome to the A4 community. Moyer Marine sells the hand crank. It is useful not only for emergency starting, but also for setting the points, etc. when you only want to turn the engine a little at a time. You can check Moyer's site for list price, but it is a worthwhile item to have aboard and only lowers the water line a little more.

[Paul_NY]

Can a rachet be used to hand crank in an emergency?

Peter's question raises a question I've been meaning to ask:

In an emergency, say having a dead battery at sea, can a rachet be used to hand crank the A4?

Also, what are the steps for hand cranking the engine?

Paul

PS. Peter, welcome to the forum.

[marthur]

Crank it!

My hand crank is designed to "pop off" the shaft when the engine begins to run. Without this, I would think that the crank would rotate quickly into the back of your hands. This would be bad.

For this reason, I put a little grease on the crank so it doesn't stick.

Just in case you wanted a testimonial, I have used my crank to start the engine (the battery was fine, I just wanted to try it). It was suprisingly easy to do.

I also learned a trick from an old timer almost thirty years ago. This was common knowledge in the days of the Model T car. When using a crank to start the engine, put your thumb and fingers on the same side of the crank. If it backfires, your thumb will not be broken!

Good Luck,

Mike

[Jesse Delanoy]

I can't hand crank my A4, because its in a Catalina 30, and the front of the engine is up against a fiberglass bulkhead on the settee that goes athwartships in front of the galley -access to the engine is strictly from the top, starboard side, and a little access aft under the galley sink.

Has anyone with a Cat 30 opened an access panel in the fiberglass bulkhead for this purpose? I've been thinking about cutting one out and covering it with a teak hatch. Fortunately, I've never had battery problems that would prevent the engine from starting - at least not on this boat. I've had it happen in the past on other boats, and it's not a lot of fun.

[bayway27]

Hand Cranking

Does anyone know how many RPM's one must generate while hand cranking to effectively start the engine? My engine wouldn't start by cranking under battery 1 but did start immediately when selector was switched to BOTH.
Nothing else was done to the engine and battery 1 problem disappeared after charging. I don't believe that I could have been able to turn over the engine by hand cranking as fast as battery 1 was turning over the engine.

[Don Moyer]

As long as you can maintain 11 volts or so of battery power while cranking, the engine should start with very little RPM created by the hand cranking. I'm attaching a short technical note that may help.

Don

[tenders]

marthur's comments about the positioning of the thumb and forefingers, and the fact that his crank is DESIGNED to come off the shaft when the engine starts, cannot be emphasized enough.

Other devices like a ratchet might successfully initiate the internal combustion process but one cannot overstate the damage that can be wrought by a long piece of metal spinning hundreds of RPMs flying off in an uncontrolled fashion to visit your head, body, and hands...to say nothing of your woodwork.

[keithems]

my a-4 is installed at an angle in my C&C 30, so i cannot turn the crank all the way around without the handle hitting a wood support -- does the extension you sell for the fwc kit also solve this problem?

[Don Moyer]

Unfortunately, no. The cranking adapter only solves the problem of the fwc PTO covering the roll pin in the end of the crank shaft.

Don

[keithems]

well -- if i can extend the curve of the crank by an inch or so , it should clear the wood framing -- it looks like your extension will do that -- so will it? -- if not, what do you suggest?

frankly, my a-4 is running fine these days -- starts right up once it turns over -- but therein lies the problem -- lots of times i just get a click, but no turn over -- not sure if it's the battery, starter, or solenoid -- wasn't that big a deal till last nite, when it would not turn over or start after dark out on lake erie -- and as the wind was picking up, i finally had to get a tow in -- not much fun, though turned out ok -- [darn close call, though, with a yacht docked at the marina entrance] -- don't want to repeat that -- so even before i troubleshoot, i'd like to be able to crank and start a motor which runs so well, whether the starter or battery is working or not.........thx in advance for your help.......

[jhwelch]

I have been having the same problem with a hot engine -- sometimes I have to
hit the starter button multiple times, each time getting just a click. Even that
wasn't enough the other day, so I used my hand crank to turn the engine
over to a spot where I thought there was slightly less compression and
once I found it then it started right up.

It's not the starter, I'm on my second one, and I've cleaned all the
battery contacts, and the battery is fully charged (since the engine
has been running for a long time to get hot). Never have the trouble
with it cold.

So, I'd be interested to see what you figure out. Maybe my engine,
since it is newly rebuilt, just has too much compression?

-jonathan

[keithems]

in my case everything is old -- engine [bought used last fall], me , starter & solenoid [have 2 of each -- from the old engine and the current one], and batteries [one came with the boat -- also purchased used last fall; the other is from my previous boat -- bout 2 yrs old but a deep cycle house type instead of a starting model] -- and the click, click, click start thing seems to happen more often than not --

therefore, i'm thinking i need a new starting battery regardless, so that will likely be my next purchase -- first, though, i'm not going out at night again until i'm able to crank-start it -- i just don't want to ever have to depend on a vulnerable system --

i also may take the starters and solenoids in to be tested professionally...

[Don Moyer]

Our product number CFWC_11_186.1 is an "adapter" not an "extension". That
being said, it will extend the roll pin considerably further front than its
original location, but only if you have one of our fwc kits installed from
the past 7 years or so. The adapter attaches to the front of our fwc PTO
shaft using 7/16" left-hand threads (which we machine into the end of the
PTO shaft). Our adapter will not attach to the existing roll pin on a
standard crankshaft on a raw water cooled engine.

Back to your problem of cranking, on the assumption that you already have
one of our hand cranks and it only needs to be extended an inch or two to
reach the roll pin in front of the crankshaft to clear wooden cabinetry, I
suggest you take the crank in to a local machine shop with welding
capability and ask them modify the crank to your specifications. They
should be able to make the modification for $35 or so. Original cranks were
cast in one piece and would be a bit more difficult to extend, but it should
still be possible.

Back to your real problem; there is no reason for anyone to put up with
intermittent starter engagement. I recommend picking up a remote starter
button at your local parts store and connecting it between the big battery
cable on your starter solenoid and the small "S" terminal just below the big
battery terminal. This remote push-button switch bypasses the entire
starter circuit between the engine and cockpit. If your intermittent
starter engagement continues, the problem has to be in the starter, starter
solenoid, or (occasionally) in a faulty ground between the starter mounting
flange and the flywheel housing.

Don

[msauntry]

I can only get a half turn of the crank before I hit the sole, but its just enough to work. I put a pillow down, so I'm not slamming the crank into the sole. Sometimes takes a while, but it has always started.

I've just started hand-cranking my engine because my solenoid died. I suspect some other solenoids are on the way out from these posts I'm reading. If your starter starts fine when normal, and then you get the clicking, I'd suspect the solenoid or the ignition wiring (don't overlook the switch). If your batteries are good, but its drawing a lot of amps and sounding labored, then its probably the starter.