Tom, James & I took Akimbo to fill up the fuel tank and were very surprised to only get 12.8 gallons in, when we thought it was only had 3-5 gallons in it, and every piece of documentation says it is a 36 gallon tank! Everyone always said to never let it get below half, which I thought was because we didn't have a gauge, or possibly due to some kind of condensation issue, but LO! It all adds up now! If we did have just a couple of gallons left on Sunday, it makes sense that the little hit of sediment at the bottom of the tank got shaken up and clogged the primary filter. We then added 3 gallons of Tom's rescue diesel, and changed the filters, and then it ran beautifully. So with the top up today, that puts us at ≈2+3+12.8 =17.8 AND, we crawled down into lazarette and measured the exterior of the tank which volume was a maximum possible total of about 26gallons, but we estimate the thickness of the tank, etc, would reduce that by 20%, which is very very nearly the 18 gal that came standard with the boat. I am so curious where this 36 gal number came from, and how many times getting below "half full" (hah!) resulted in a confusing failure. Anyway, now we know. And everything is clean and running great.
We pumped out the black tank as well so everything is good to go for the season. Tom straightened out the twisted wires behind the ignition and tighten the starter, so we thing the tachometer will stop flaking out now as well.