jburn25
Petty Officer 2nd Class
- Joined
- Apr 30, 2007
- Messages
- 104
THIS IS A LONG POST, BUT THE STORY IS WORTH IT AND I CAN USE ALL THE ADVICE I CAN GET. THANKS
I've grown up fishing and hunting so I'm not new to the outdoors. I am, however, new to boats and boat motors. I've fished with friends etc in their boats, but I'd never owned my own boat till about a month ago.
I found a 14' aluminum boat for a heck of a deal and bought a 1981 25hp Evinrude tiller handle motor to put on it. I was taking the MCAT during spring break a few weeks ago so my brain was completely shot. I decided to take a break and go run my new motor. I borrowed a gas can from my cousin and hit the road. The motor ran great, everything was beautiful. A few weeks later after school slowed down I decided to actually go fishing in the boat. Took it out to a local lake, fished for a few hours, grabbed a bite to eat, then went back out with two of my buds to find some frogs after dark.
The motor had run great that day, but after a few hours we noticed some oil (or so we thought) leaking from a joint in the lower unit just above the prop. I tightened up the joint and the oil (not oil) stopped leaking. We'd been looking for frogs for about an hour and we decided to leave. I pressed the start button once, twice, then after the third time it became hell on earth. My motor exploded, burst into five foot flames, and almost killed me when the cowling flew straight past my head about fifteen feet in the air and landed in the front of the boat.One of my buddies gave the mayday and jumped over board, the other yelled obscenities and helped me pour water on the motor. After about five minutes and 8 ice chest loads of water we got the fire out. We got back to the shore with the trolling motor and were speechless to say the least.
Long story short, the motor is (obviously being a 81) a two stroke and I forgot to mix oil. Evidently with the gas being more volatile than the gas/oil mix, the spark caused an explosion and since we had sealed the lower unit leak, all that oil from the earlier leak, which was actually gas, filled the entire lower unit and the whole engine case and caught fire.
Amazingly, the engine looks pretty darn good. All of the electrical cables are bubbled and melted, but the actual engine [outside] is unburned. I took the spark plugs out, one was broken in half, and turned the flywheel by hand with no problem. Then I ran compression tests and both cylinders were just under 150psi.
I feel that the consistency between cylinders is a good sign, but I feel sure there are other problems.
Any suggestions as to where to go from here would be greatly appreciated.
I've grown up fishing and hunting so I'm not new to the outdoors. I am, however, new to boats and boat motors. I've fished with friends etc in their boats, but I'd never owned my own boat till about a month ago.
I found a 14' aluminum boat for a heck of a deal and bought a 1981 25hp Evinrude tiller handle motor to put on it. I was taking the MCAT during spring break a few weeks ago so my brain was completely shot. I decided to take a break and go run my new motor. I borrowed a gas can from my cousin and hit the road. The motor ran great, everything was beautiful. A few weeks later after school slowed down I decided to actually go fishing in the boat. Took it out to a local lake, fished for a few hours, grabbed a bite to eat, then went back out with two of my buds to find some frogs after dark.
The motor had run great that day, but after a few hours we noticed some oil (or so we thought) leaking from a joint in the lower unit just above the prop. I tightened up the joint and the oil (not oil) stopped leaking. We'd been looking for frogs for about an hour and we decided to leave. I pressed the start button once, twice, then after the third time it became hell on earth. My motor exploded, burst into five foot flames, and almost killed me when the cowling flew straight past my head about fifteen feet in the air and landed in the front of the boat.One of my buddies gave the mayday and jumped over board, the other yelled obscenities and helped me pour water on the motor. After about five minutes and 8 ice chest loads of water we got the fire out. We got back to the shore with the trolling motor and were speechless to say the least.
Long story short, the motor is (obviously being a 81) a two stroke and I forgot to mix oil. Evidently with the gas being more volatile than the gas/oil mix, the spark caused an explosion and since we had sealed the lower unit leak, all that oil from the earlier leak, which was actually gas, filled the entire lower unit and the whole engine case and caught fire.
Amazingly, the engine looks pretty darn good. All of the electrical cables are bubbled and melted, but the actual engine [outside] is unburned. I took the spark plugs out, one was broken in half, and turned the flywheel by hand with no problem. Then I ran compression tests and both cylinders were just under 150psi.
I feel that the consistency between cylinders is a good sign, but I feel sure there are other problems.
Any suggestions as to where to go from here would be greatly appreciated.
