Almost everything that ruins a day announces itself here first. This is the only list where you have a dock, a phone signal and no time pressure.
Before you step aboard
How Open /conditions/8-2/ for home water and the area you are crossing into. Look at the wind trace, not just the peak number — 12 kt building through the afternoon is a different trip from 12 kt at dawn easing off.
Watch for A Small Craft Advisory anywhere on your route, or a barometer that has dropped more than about 3 mb in 3 hours.
How Who you are, the boat, where you are going, your route, who is aboard, and when to worry. "When to worry" is the part people leave out — give an actual time at which they should start calling.
How Slack water at the gate is not the same as slack at Everett. Work out when you want to BE somewhere, then back-calculate departure. Wind against tide is what builds the short steep chop that makes a 3288 uncomfortable.
Watch for An ebb against a westerly in Admiralty Inlet. That is the classic local trap.
Engine room round
How Boat level, engine cold or at least five minutes after shutdown so oil has drained back. Pull the dipstick, wipe it, reseat it fully, pull again and read. Record the level rather than just ticking it — a slow loss is only visible as a trend.
Watch for Milky or coffee-colored oil means water is getting in. A diesel smell in the oil means fuel is. Either one ends the trip before it starts.
How Same procedure. Compare the two — engines that have run the same hours should be losing oil at a similar rate, and a divergence is information.
How Check the header tank when COLD. Never open a hot pressure cap.
Watch for Oil sheen on the coolant, or a rising level, points at a heat exchanger or head gasket.
How Follow the manual for whether it is read hot, cold, running or stopped — gearboxes differ and getting it wrong gives a false reading.
How Close the seacock, open the lid, lift the basket, clear weed and jellyfish, check the O-ring is seated and undamaged, close the lid, REOPEN THE SEACOCK. The last step is the one that gets forgotten, and a closed seacock cooks an impeller in minutes.
Watch for Eelgrass after a blow, jellyfish in late summer.
How About half an inch of deflection at the longest unsupported span, pressed with a thumb. Look underneath the pulleys.
Watch for Black dust below a pulley means the belt is slipping. Glazed shiny belt faces mean the same.
How Feel the shaft log. It should be cool or barely warm after a run, and drip two or three times a minute underway, not run a stream.
Watch for Hot after running means it is too tight. Salt crust means it has been weeping.
How Look, do not just listen for the pump. Note how much water is there compared with last time.
Watch for A sheen means oil or fuel. Water that tastes salty is coming from outside the boat and you do not leave until you know where.
How Look at the clear bowl on each primary filter for water or black sludge. Drain off any water into a jar, not the bilge.
Watch for Water in the bowl after a fuel-up means you took on bad fuel. Sludge after a rough passage means the tank got stirred up.
How Check resting voltage before anything is running, and confirm the switches are where you want them for departure.
How A rag or a tool left on an engine becomes a projectile or a fire. Look before you close the hatch.
Safety gear
How One per person, the right size for the person wearing it, accessible not buried. Children's sizes actually fit the children aboard today.
Watch for Inflatables: check the cylinder is tight and the green indicator shows armed.
How Type IV, on deck and reachable in one motion — not in a locker under the cushions.
How Check each gauge is in the green and the pin is intact. Invert and shake dry-chemical units so the powder does not cake. Confirm the count and rating against current USCG requirements for your length.
How Flares expire 42 months from manufacture. Check the date now, not when you need them.
How Power on, squelch set, check 16. For a real check use channel 9 or a working channel and ask for a radio check — never call for one on 16. Confirm your DSC MMSI is programmed and the GPS is feeding it, because that is what turns a distress button into a position.
Watch for If DSC has no position feed, a distress call tells the Coast Guard someone is in trouble but not where.
How Check battery expiry and that registration is current with NOAA.
How Lift each float switch by hand and confirm the pump runs and water actually leaves the boat. A pump that hums but moves nothing is worse than none, because you will believe in it.
How Test before dark, not after. Include the anchor light and the steaming light.
Watch for If there is any chance of returning after sunset, this is a critical item, not a nice-to-have.
Deck and topsides
How Rig the lines you will need for arrival before you leave, not while approaching a strange dock in a crosswind.
How Anything that can take green water over the bow gets dogged down. Include the foredeck hatch.
How Open the fridge, the lockers and the cupboards in your mind at 20 degrees of roll. Anything that would come out, stow now.
How Breaker off at the pedestal first, then unplug. Stow the cord so it cannot go over the side into a prop.
Navigation and systems
How Electronics fail on the day the weather is bad. An offline chart on a phone counts, if the phone is charged and you have actually downloaded the tiles.
Watch for "I have it on my phone" is only true if the data is cached, which it will not be out of signal.
How Know whether your sounder reads depth below keel or below transducer. The difference is the whole margin.
How Third out, third back, third in reserve. Read the gauge and check it against your logged burn rate — gauges on a 40-year-old boat are a suggestion.
How Your log lives on the phone until it finds signal. A flat phone is a lost log as well as a lost backup.
The first thirty seconds after a diesel fires tell you most of what you need to know about the next eight hours.
Before cranking
How Diesel does not produce the explosive vapor gasoline does, so this is about clearing any fumes and confirming airflow rather than avoiding a bang. If there is any smell of fuel, find it before you start.
How This is the item that pays for the whole list. Confirm by hand on the handle, not from memory.
How Lines, the shore power cord, the dinghy painter, a swimmer, an otter. Look.
Starting and the first two minutes
How Go and look over the transom within the first 30 seconds. You want a steady flow, not a dribble.
Watch for No water means shut that engine down NOW. An impeller dies in well under a minute dry, and then the pieces go into the heat exchanger.
How It should come up almost immediately and hold. Note the reading at idle so you have a baseline to compare against underway.
How Voltage should rise above resting within a minute.
How A puff at start is normal. Steady color after warm-up is not.
Watch for Black = too much fuel or overloaded. Blue = burning oil. White = unburnt fuel or water in a cylinder.
How Stand in the cockpit and just listen to both engines for thirty seconds. You know what they sound like. New noises are cheaper to investigate at the dock.
Last checks
How Where the PFDs are, where the extinguishers are, how to call for help on the VHF, and what you want them to do with the lines. Do this even with people who have been aboard before.
Watch for If they have never driven the boat, show them how to stop it and how to press the DSC distress button. That is the whole lesson if you go over the side.
How Look at flags, other boats' fenders, and the water around pilings before you cast off. Plan which way the bow will blow.
How Say it out loud. Usually last off is whichever line is holding you against the wind or current.
How Time, engine hours both sides, log reading, fuel. This is the baseline for every number the log will later tell you.
A log kept hourly is a navigation backup: lose the electronics and your last position, course and speed lets you dead-reckon. It is also the only way you will ever know your real fuel burn.
Position and progress
How The app takes it from the phone's GPS with one tap. If there is no fix, enter it from the plotter — and if there is no plotter either, write down the bearing and distance to something you can see. A rough position beats a blank.
Engines
How You are looking for a change from the number you wrote an hour ago, not for a magic value. A climb of ten degrees with everything else the same is the start of a problem.
Watch for A steady climb means flow is dropping: impeller, strainer, or a plastic bag on the intake.
How Vibration that was not there, a note that has changed. Write it down even if it turns out to be nothing — the log is where a pattern becomes visible.
Weather observed
How What you SEE, not what was forecast. Whitecaps start around 12 kt; spindrift and streaks start around 20. Recording observed against forecast is how the forecast becomes useful to you specifically.
How Height trough to crest, and period. Short and steep is worse than tall and long.
How The number matters less than the direction and the rate. A fall of 3 mb in 3 hours is worth acting on; 5 mb is a get-home-now signal.
How Estimate by what you can and cannot see — a known landmark at a known distance. If it is dropping, slow down, sound signals, radar on, and get everyone visible.
Plan before you are committed
How They are often different from out in the channel. Watch flags, moored boats and the water at pilings.
Watch for Current sets you sideways without your speed through the water changing. Judge against a fixed object ashore, not against the water.
How Which side to, which line first, where to stand. Nobody jumps. Ever. Stepping is fine, jumping breaks legs.
How Know where you go if the approach is wrong. Going around and trying again costs nothing but pride; forcing a bad approach costs gelcoat or worse.
How The oldest rule there is. A 3288 carries way; use the twins against each other to hold position and let the boat settle.
Shutdown
How A few minutes at idle lets temperatures even out. Especially worth it after a hard run.
How Anything below the waterline that does not need to be open. This is what stops a failed hose sinking her at the dock.
How Plug in at the boat first, then switch on at the pedestal. Confirm the charger is actually charging before you walk away.
How Check the tide table for the biggest swing while you are away. Lines set at high water can hang a boat at low water, and lines set at low water can let her wander at high.
Watch for A spring range in Everett can be over 11 feet. Set for the extreme, not for now.
How Do this before you leave the boat, while you still remember what happened. Note anything to fix — that list becomes the maintenance record.
Choosing and setting
How Scope is calculated on depth at HIGH water plus your bow height, not the depth you see now. Anchoring at low water on short scope is how boats drag at 0300.
How 7:1 for overnight, 5:1 if crowded and settled, 10:1 if it is going to blow. Rode length divided by (depth at high water + bow roller height above water).
How Mud and sand hold. Rock, kelp and shell often do not.
How Walk a full circle around the boat mentally at full rode. Include what happens when the current reverses at slack and everyone swings differently — boats on chain swing differently from boats on rope.
How Let it settle, then astern gently until the rode comes taut and the boat stops. Increase power and hold. Watch a beam transit ashore — if it moves, you are dragging.
How Two objects ashore in line. Cheaper and more reliable than any alarm, and it works with the power off.
How Takes the shock load off the windlass and stops the chain from snatching.
Also where the log earns its keep: gallons against engine hours is the only honest burn rate.
Before, during, after
How Keeps fumes out of the accommodation and the bilge.
How Read the deck plate. They are close together and a diesel fill into the water tank is a very expensive afternoon.
How Take the numbers at the pump, not from memory afterward. Fill to the same point every time — usually to the neck — or the burn rate you calculate is noise.
How Any sheen on the water must be reported. Have the pad and a plan before you need them.
Every list on one page · expanded, with the how and the watch-fors, for printing the set.
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