Re: 1968 Holiday Restoration w/pics
Well just when u thought u had things figured out, murphy visits. SO I went ahead & started to get the transom to fit, cut and shape when I started to think why dont I check the transom plate that came along with transom housing that I bought through craigslist. Well Im glad I did!! Wrong Transom Plate!!!
Dam you Craiglist!! I dont know if the seller knew , but this plate does not fit the housing unit he sold me as a combo. I guess thats what I get for not researching. But if u noticed the housing unit has a 5 bolt exhaust tube. This plate would fit my previous unit. As a matter of fact its the same. I need a plate that is alongated down so the exhast can fit. So after some reading (basically the weekend), I realised that I can get the transom online. But they were mostly alpha 1s. Theyr ads would say that they would also fit pre-alphas,,,, not so true!!! I noticed that the distance of the rear motor mounts on some of the advertised trasom plates were more narrow. After being disgusted of my mishap, i was not truly convinced that those were the right plates. Im glad I was becasue they were diffrent. All the Mercruiser inner transom plates for Alpha One Generation One, Alpha One Generation Two & Bravo should be 9.5? center to center on the motor mounts. But some pre-alphas have a lenthg of 12.5" & 14.5" on the motors mounts.
Mine is a 14.5" as you can see. SO in conclusion I need a pre-alpha transom plate of 14.5" motor mount length with a 5 bolt exhaust tube set up. PLEASE correct me if Im wrong.
With all the convulsions i was having I took comfort in the results of my encapsulation with "Max Bond". Let me tell you, this might be my first experience with epoxy resin, but I love this thing. It went on easy as thinned out honey.
The only thing that worried me was it did not get hot, or warm for that matter, while I was mixing it. It struck me curious because of the ad explaining to be careful of the thermo effect from combining the resin & the activator. But after 12 hours, its like a Hooter table! Love it. I almost dont want to paint over it, it looks so good. Well enough rant im gonna make best of whats left of this weekend, I know this is too much reading for you guys.
