Spares & Tools Inventory Register PDFWhat Failed, What's Aboard & the Spanner That Fits It

A spare you cannot reach is a spare you do not have. So is one you cannot find at two in the morning.

Most spares kits are assembled from advice: somebody's list, a forum thread, a chandlery shelf at the end of a season. They grow, they cost money, and the morning something breaks the part is either not aboard, not findable, or not fittable with the tools you have.

This register replaces that with three columns nobody keeps: what has actually failed on this vessel, where each spare is physically stowed, and whether the tool that fits it is aboard and can reach the bolt.

What belongs aboard depends on your engine and its serial number, the systems actually fitted, the waters you sail, how far you are from a chandlery and how long you are willing to be stopped. No two of those are the same for any two readers.

So the item columns in Parts II, III and IV are blank, and they are blank on purpose. The system names down the left group the lines; they are not a suggestion of what goes on them. The legitimate source of a spares list is Part I, what has already broken on this boat, and model T1 scores your kit against it.

Every spares line carries a stowage description and a photo reference. A part that cannot be found by somebody who did not stow it, at night, at sea, in a hurry, is a part you are carrying the weight and the cost of without the benefit. Write the location as a stranger would need to read it, not as you remember it.

T1 scores coverage against your own failure history. T2 counts the parts you cannot fit. T3 turns the draw-down log into a consumption rate, T4 turns that into how long the stock lasts, and T5 into a reorder point using the lead time you have actually experienced, not the one the supplier advertises to a home address. T6 puts a figure on what is sitting in the locker, and on the share of it that expires whether you sail or not.

In the Fillable edition every line has a field. Tick what you could fix today against each past failure, and whether each tool is aboard and reaches; in Adobe Acrobat Reader, free on computer, iPhone and Android, the share of your own failures covered, the parts you cannot fit, the value of the kit, the use-by date and days left of every consumable, the rate, cover and reorder point of every item you follow, and a season sheet that gathers it all calculate themselves. The Pencil & Print edition is ruled for handwriting in GoodNotes or Notability, or on paper in the engine bay. Both come in A4 and US Letter and work offline.

The coastal owner with a chandlery an hour away. Your kit does not need to be deep, it needs to be honest. The tool cross-reference is your page, because for you the cost of a missing part is an afternoon and the cost of a missing tool is the same afternoon plus the tow. T6 is worth running once, too: most coastal owners are carrying more expiring stock than they would choose to.

The owner heading somewhere remote. Part I first, and be unsentimental about it. What has actually broken on this boat is a better list than any forum consensus, and T1 gives you a coverage figure you can improve deliberately rather than by buying more of what you already have.

The liveaboard or long-term cruiser. The draw-down log is the whole product for you. Filled at the moment of use, it turns into a consumption rate, and the reorder point built on your own lead times is what stops you either running out in an inconvenient country or carrying a chandlery you paid to ship.

The racing boat with a shore team. Somebody else usually owns this problem, and the day you sail without them is the day you discover which tools live in their van. Build the cross-reference around the jobs you actually do afloat, and mark what is normally ashore.

The owner handing the boat over. A delivery crew, a charterer or a buyer cannot use a locker they cannot read. Stowage descriptions and part numbers in one place are the difference between handing over a boat and handing over a puzzle.

This document recommends no spare part, no tool and no quantity, and publishes no shelf life. What a component requires comes from its maker and from the revision of the manual that matches your serial number.

It is not a repair manual and it is not training. Carrying a part is not the same as being competent to fit it, and nothing here tells you how.

Instant download. Your links appear on screen the moment payment clears, and a copy arrives by email, usually within a few minutes. They do not expire.

2026 Edition, Revision 2.1, AML-SAFE-2026-02. Apex Marine Labs designs the organisational process behind good seamanship. Our documents record and organise; they do not replace a qualified engineer, a manufacturer's manual, or the judgement of the person responsible for the vessel.