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Post by SS Shasta on Sept 22, 2008 21:32:08 GMT -8
I would suspect that was when the restriction was attached. The Holy Oly was probably grandfathered, or given a waiver, since there really wasn't much in the way of spare vessels until the JM2s were built. Although I don't remember the Olympic working out at Port Townsend anytime after about 1989, when a plugged fuel line put her adrift for about four hours. Every time I went out there to get boat photos, it was always the Klickitat and Illahee. I think the fuel line incident pretty much put the Oly on WSF's restricted list if not the USCG's. The Olympic headed for Point Defiance not long after that, with the Hiyu going up to the inter-island slot. I just checked my new article archives... Olympic appears to have last been on Port Townsend-Keystone in the summer of 1990. By fall of that year she was at Point Defiance-Tahlequah while work continued on the Rhody, which had been in mothballs since 1984. After the Rhody went in and out of service in 1991 the Oly filled in at Pt. Defiance until all the problems were fixed. She was officially mothballed in 1993. Does WSF maintain a archive of vessel logs, etc? MV Olympic was definitely working Port Townsend-Keystone sometime during the summer of 1993 or 1994. She was working the route with MV Illahee, I believe. I had taken my father to Fort Casey to see some of the sites he worked on during World War II. We looked out over the bluff to see MV Olympic in the distance, heading towards Keystone. We were both very surprised. I suggested we try to ride her to Port Townsend. We drove down to the Keystone dock where a very nice ticket agent said we would not be able to make her next voyage, but if we waited until she returned, she would board our car first so we could get a "front row view." We did . I remember the voyage well because the ship smelled like fresh tar. A group of workers were on board re-taring her passenger cabin roof. It was a voyage never to be forgotten.
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Post by Barnacle on Sept 23, 2008 7:57:07 GMT -8
There must've been a severe shortage of vessels if the Olympic was out at PTK after her fuel-line incident. I'd guess it was in 1993 because the Oly had lost her certification by May 1994.
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Post by SS San Mateo on Sept 24, 2008 6:48:08 GMT -8
There must've been a severe shortage of vessels if the Olympic was out at PTK after her fuel-line incident. I'd guess it was in 1993 because the Oly had lost her certification by May 1994. I believe someone else here mentioned that it was 1993 as well. As for vessel shortage... I know the Tillikum was out at that time (renovation). The Cathlamet got her side decks that year, but I don't know if she was out of service during that time (I have pictures (taken late March 1993) of her when she was at Martinac. From what I could tell, it looks like they were repainting her at that point). I'm not aware of any other vessels out during that period, but I'm going to assume the Klickitat was either out or was temporarily reassigned as she was the regular vessel at Pt. Townsend - Keystone.
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Post by old_wsf_fan on Oct 30, 2008 21:50:10 GMT -8
Just wondering how soon the Rhody will be back at PT. Defiance?
Has they maintenence on the Christine Andersen been on schedule?
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Post by SS San Mateo on Oct 31, 2008 5:57:26 GMT -8
According to the latest Pierce County ferry newsletter, the Christine Anderson is supposed to be back in service tomorrow. Lane painting is supposed to be completed today, but is weather dependant. If everything goes as planned, the Rhody will be back tomorrow.
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Post by old_wsf_fan on Dec 26, 2008 15:59:41 GMT -8
I see that the Rhody is going back in to the yard yet again for more steel work. Again the boat is 51 years old, but she was rebuilt in the 90's.
Is she in that bad a shape?
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Post by EGfleet on Dec 26, 2008 16:14:19 GMT -8
I see that the Rhody is going back in to the yard yet again for more steel work. Again the boat is 51 years old, but she was rebuilt in the 90's. Is she in that bad a shape? You're off by ten years. She's 61 years old. And anything steel that spends it's whole life with it's butt in salt water, it's going to have to have said steel replaced from time to time. ;D
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Post by SS San Mateo on Dec 26, 2008 17:35:56 GMT -8
The steel work is on the portside fender (I'm assuming that's the part of the car deck that touches the navigation dolphins). She's also supposed to get an automatic draft indicator system (are those standard?).
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Post by SS Shasta on Dec 26, 2008 19:39:21 GMT -8
It just makes good sense to have focused annual maintenance and repairs scheduled for each vessel every year. Such efforts require both funds and yard time. I believe that delayed/postponed maintenance was certainly as much, and likely more, responsible for the Steel Electric problems than age.
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Post by Barnacle on Dec 26, 2008 22:24:10 GMT -8
It just makes good sense to have focused annual maintenance and repairs scheduled for each vessel every year. Such efforts require both funds and yard time. I believe that delayed/postponed maintenance was certainly as much, and likely more, responsible for the Steel Electric problems than age. Not more responsible than, no. I won't argue against the notion that delayed maintenance played a factor, but at some point, like old cars that are used as daily drivers, they simply start falling apart faster than you can fix them. Otherwise we'd all still be driving those stylin' Model T's.
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Mill Bay
Voyager
Long Suffering Bosun
Posts: 2,886
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Post by Mill Bay on Feb 7, 2009 20:12:13 GMT -8
Apparently the Rhody has some staunch supporters, but she is beginning to test their patience.
Tacoma, WA - Saturday, February 7, 2009
Frustration in the Tacoma-Vashon Island ferry lines
With the smaller Hiyu ferry serving the Tacoma-Vashon Island run, islanders face long lines. They fear it might become a permanent inconvenience and want the larger Rhododendron back.
MIKE ARCHBOLD;
Tacoma-Vashon Island ferry commuters are in a sour, angry mood.
They started the new year with the 48-car Rhododendron ferry again out of service. It went into dry dock for extensive maintenance Jan. 6 and isn’t expected back until March 1.
Back on the route from Point Defiance to Tahlequah is the older 34-car ferry Hiyu. That means long lines and one- to two-hour waits mornings and afternoons.
Commuters are frustrated.
“It’s horrible,” Pat Smith, a 40-year island resident, said as she waited Thursday at the Point Defiance terminal. Smith said she’s had to use vacation time to make her commute to work and to be sure she’s back on the island to handle events for her children.
“It changes your life,” she said. “It’s a real hardship.”
Jean Bosch, president of the Vashon-Maury Island Community Council, recently gave Washington State Ferries officials an earful at a public hearing on the island. The gathering, to discuss a draft of the agency’s long-term funding proposal, was held coincidentally on the day the Rhododendron left.
“The Hiyu is essentially a poorly orchestrated floating toilet,” she said. “It’s really a rank boat. It’s horrible and it’s small.”
It also might be the way of the future for island commuters.
One version of the ferry system’s proposed long-range budget – known as Plan B – calls for the Hiyu to become the permanent boat on the south Vashon Island run. Gov. Chris Gregoire’s proposed 2009-11 budget also calls for the Hiyu to permanently replace the Rhody, as it’s known to ferry riders.
A petition to the governor and the Legislature is circulating on the island, asking that the Rhody or a similarly sized boat be kept on the Point Defiance-Tahlequah route. Its loss, the petitioners say, would be a hardship on island residents and businesses, as well as on businesses in Pierce County.
Beyond that, legislators and ferry communities say the state’s ferry system, the largest in the United States, is broken. It doesn’t have enough boats or those in the right sizes to meet the needs, critics say.
The system serves 20 ports of call using 22 vessels. (Another ferry is under construction in Seattle but it won’t be available until late summer.) Washington State Ferries’ operating budget for 2007-09 is nearly $429 million.
“Nobody is happy” about the Point Defiance-Tahlequah route backups but there’s nothing to be done, said Marta Coursey, the ferry system’s communications director.
“I get it,” she said. “They don’t like it (the Hiyu). They don’t want it there. They want a larger vessel. But it’s the best we can do with the limited resources we have.”
The lack of ferries and the shuffling of boats is “a systemwide issue,” Coursey said, adding that it happens in Bremerton, the San Juan Islands and Port Townsend.
State Reps. Sharon Nelson, D-Vashon Island, and Larry Seaquist, D-Gig Harbor, say island residents should be worried about the proposed change in ferries. Both are members of the so-called ferry caucus of legislators who represent ferry route communities.
Seaquist said the caucus is examining the ferry system’s draft long-term funding plan and working on an alternative because members don’t like it.
The state’s draft plan calls for $1.3 billion to $3.3 billion in new funding over the next 22 years to maintain the ferry system.
The plan defines two scenarios. Plan A would make minor improvements to the system and require $3.3 billion of additional funding over the next 22 years. Plan B would cut back some service and pare the system to its essentials, reducing the funding need to $1.3 billion.
When it comes to riding the ferry, Nelson, a 14-year resident of Vashon Island, said she knows first-hand the effects of the loss of the Rhody and other problems. They’ve prompted her to commute to Olympia through Seattle. She estimates she can save 45 minutes by going north to go south.
“On a Friday evening, with people trying to get home, you can end up in line for three hours,” Nelson said.
The Rhody started 2008 gone from the Point Defiance-Tahlequah run from Jan. 1 to Feb. 24. By the end of the year it had been away a total of 140 days for either repairs, maintenance or duty on another route, according to the ferry system.
When the Hiyu replaced the Rhody in 2009 a midday run was added. But riders say few vehicles use the run because it’s not a commuter run and doesn’t operate at a convenient time for most people.
Plus, unlike the Rhody, it has no elevator and isn’t handicapped-accessible. And it’s too small, they say. The Rhody handles 48 vehicles, 14 more than the Hiyu. Put a large truck or two on the Hiyu and the difference is even greater.
Though ferry officials say the Rhody will be back by March, Smith, for one, doesn’t believe it.
“I think they are liars,” she said, bringing up another sore point for island commuters:
Why is the Rhody, the main boat on the Vashon route, often shifted to the Anderson Island run, which is operated by Pierce County?
The move is part of the commitment Washington State Ferries made to the county when it leased the Steilacoom II ferry, which usually handles Anderson Island runs, Coursey said.
The Steilacoom II was needed for the Port Townsend-Keystone run after the system’s four Steel Electric ferries were taken out of service because they were deemed too old and unsafe, she said.
Pierce County’s backup ferry, the Christine Anderson, now serves Anderson Island.
“It’s a ripple affect,” Coursey said. “We have no backup.”
THE Rhody’s RAGGED record
Vashon Island commuters love the ferry Rhododendron. But it isn’t always there to be loved.
A look at the Rhody’s service schedule for 2008-09:
Jan. 1-Feb. 24, 2008: Out of service for repairs.
Feb. 25-March 1: In service on Point Defiance-Tahlequah route.
March 1-6: Out of service for repairs and annual inspection.
March 7-May 31: In service on Point Defiance-Tahlequah route.
June 1-June 14: In service on Pierce County’s Anderson Island route (replaced the Christine Anderson, which was out of service for repairs).
June 14-July 21: In service on Point Defiance-Tahlequah route.
July 22-July 29: In service on Anderson Island route (the Christine Anderson was out of service for modifications and repairs).
July 30-Sept. 23: In service on Point Defiance-Tahlequah route.
Sept. 24-Oct. 31: In service on Anderson Island route (the Christine Anderson was out of service for modifications and repairs).
Nov. 1-Jan. 5, 2009: In service on Point Defiance-Tahlequah route.
Jan. 6-present: Out of service for maintenance and annual inspection.
Originally published: February 7th, 2009 12:17 AM (PST)
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Post by SS Shasta on Feb 8, 2009 13:40:04 GMT -8
Seems like some folks will complain when vessels are not properly maintained. Some will also complain when a vessel is out-of-service for scheduled and needed maintenance. I would agree that complaints about MV Rhododendron being assigned to another route for long periods during busy times is a problem, but what is one to do? The regular Pierce County vessel has been filling in on a state route because vessels were not properly maintained.
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Post by SS Shasta on Mar 5, 2009 9:01:32 GMT -8
Anyone see the NEW Rhody since she completed maintenance? Is her brass still shining?
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Post by Barnacle on Mar 5, 2009 9:39:21 GMT -8
We don't have a "new" Rhody. It's still 62 years old. ;D
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Post by old_wsf_fan on May 3, 2009 9:14:59 GMT -8
Well the 62 year old boat has yet again been pulled from service. The Hiyu is now on the run. The bulletin does not say how long she will sub for the Rhody, this is probably a good thing.
Due to her age and recent need of repairs, is WSF getting caught up on more maintenance or is this a bigger issue?
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Post by Barnacle on May 3, 2009 9:45:51 GMT -8
Or is it something minor and completely non-sinister that never the less is easier to bring the boat to the shop rather than the shop to the boat? Stay tuned for the next episode of As The Screw Turns!
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Post by Kahloke on May 3, 2009 17:44:59 GMT -8
Stay tuned for the next episode of As The Screw Turns!Good one ;D
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Post by old_wsf_fan on May 4, 2009 16:49:07 GMT -8
Well another chapter for "As The Screw Turns", well not very well right now.
The Rhody has Variable-Pitch Propeller problems and she will be out of service for about a week.
This prop system must have been installed with her major rebuild circa 1990? Hopefully WSF can get her back soon.
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Post by Barnacle on May 4, 2009 17:26:02 GMT -8
That was when it was installed, I believe. I've heard snippets of what the problem is but I haven't said anything because I'm not entirely sure what the problem is. They're hoping to have her back for the weekend, though.
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Post by SS San Mateo on May 4, 2009 17:49:54 GMT -8
When she was rebuilt, they used the original propellers at first. After major problems occured during sea trials in 1991 (the engines were too powerful for the propellers, resulting in the engines stalling), they changed the propellers to variable pitch.
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Post by wrangler on May 4, 2009 19:57:28 GMT -8
Something to think about on the Island Home class too--controllable pitch propellers.
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Post by Barnacle on May 5, 2009 6:57:38 GMT -8
As far as I know that's what they're supposed to get. I still prefer diesel-electric, myself.
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Post by whidbeyislandguy on May 5, 2009 14:50:29 GMT -8
As far as I know that's what they're supposed to get. I still prefer diesel-electric, myself. I would have to agree with you Barnacle, diesel-electric.
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Post by wrangler on May 5, 2009 15:46:09 GMT -8
The new boats will have fixed pitch propellers with a reversing gearbox, similar to the Hiyu.
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Post by Barnacle on May 7, 2009 7:27:16 GMT -8
First I've heard of it. Not that I have any problems with the Hiyu's set-up, either. Of course, my complaint with the CPP set-up is (a) too many moving parts outside the boat and (b) waiting for the bow clutch to engage. Takes an eternity sometimes, especially if you desperately need it.
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