MIKE WHITEHEAD -- The Harbor Column

Ahoy.

This week I am flying north to the Tacoma Yacht Club in Washington,

where I will be the skipper aboard a private yacht cruising in the Puget

Sound and up to Seattle. It will be a nice change to be on inland waters

and not fighting huge seas like my recent voyage from Honolulu to Long

Beach. This is the same yacht I had a nice voyage on last September while

bringing her home from Desolation Sound, and hopefully something exciting

will happen on this voyage that I can tell you about in one of my

upcoming columns.

There’s good news for owners of Johnson and Evinrude outboard engines,

as Bombardier Inc. has brought the outboard engine lines and, to my

knowledge, will provide limited warranty work on 2000 models and up. By

now, everyone has heard that OMC filed for bankruptcy, leaving its

customers without any warranty coverage and unaware about the possibility

of future spare parts. These outboards also have the new Ficht fuel

injection system that has been plagued with problems and fires, and

industry insiders are hinting toward possible recalls for some of the

outboards. Bombardier is well known in the marine world for manufacturing

the Sea Doo personal watercraft.

In addition, Genmar Holdings has taken over OMC’s boat manufacturing

lines of Chris Craft, Seaswirl, Hydra-Sport, Javelin, Lowe, Stratos and

Four Winds. Genmar is the holding company for Carver, Hatteras, Wellcraft

and Trojan, just to name a few. If you own one of the boat lines from

OMC, then you should see Genmar’s Web site o7 -- www.genmar.comf7 --

for information about your warranty.

OMC’s bankruptcy has shocked the marine industry and consumer

confidence fell as many worried they would have to spend thousands of

dollars to cover repairs that were no longer under warranty. I still

think it is very strange there is no lemon law for boats like there is

for the automobile industry.

Last week, the Newport Harbor Area Chamber of Commerce held its annual

meeting and luncheon at which Newport Beach Mayor Gary Adams gave a State

of the City speech. Also, the chamber gave out volunteer recognition

awards. I received one for my years of work as the Marine Committee

Chair, and I was in good company as Lana Johnson of the Daily Pilot

received an award for her work on this fine newspaper.

Here is a test for all you boaters who venture out from Newport Harbor

to the Pacific Ocean: What is the flashing light mounted up high at the

Harbor Department that you can see when you are entering back into the

jetties, and how many colors are there, and what do the colors signify?

Do you use this light signal and has it helped on those moonless

pitch-black nights?

Let me know, and I’m off to Seattle where maybe I will be able to get

in touch with Eric Reeter, who was transferred to Seattle from his

command aboard Newport’s former Coast Guard Cutter Point Stuart that was

recently transferred (decommissioned), but to a new country.

Safe Voyages.

* MIKE WHITEHEAD is the Pilot’s boating and harbor columnist. Send him

your harbor and marine-related thoughts and story suggestions via e-mail

to o7 Mike@BoathouseTV.comf7 or o7 www.BoathouseTV.comf7 .