emoney
Commander
- Joined
- Jul 19, 2010
- Messages
- 2,551
Ok, so I learn most things the hard way. A few of you may have been following my 'overheating/compression' thread(s) on my 1983 50hp outboard.
Well, as it turns out, the biggest problem I had was "self". Here's the scoop;
Doing what a lot of us do, I was using a rather large trash can filled with water to do driveway maintenance. I would fill the water almost to the top of the can, definitely covering the cavitation plate so I knew I was covering the water inlet screens. The motor was NOT pushing water. Bought another motor, had it moved to my boat today switching out my lower unit (I thought the other wa a dud)and went to pick it up. When I got there, mechanic was just finishing and hadn't had the time to test the motor. We proceeded to do just like I always do and put the motor in a large bucket/trash can of water. Sure enough, THIS motor was NOT pushing water. Both of us sighed, and then we felt the head, Yep it was definitely getting hot. Then, for some reason, he wanted to put even more water in it. We moved the can to on top of a cinder block, then filled it with water. At this point, water was going halfway up the middle section of the motor, not but a few inches below the exhaust. We restarted it......BAM, FLOODS of water pouring out! That's when we both realized that on these older Chrysler motors, the water pump is drawing it's water from literally half way up the mid section. When you're actually operating in the water, gravity is forcing the water up, when you on the hard, however, it isn't capable of it. Long story short, there's not been anything wrong with my water the whole time.
So, the same would apply to the 'muffs' according to his theory and it makes sense. I know there's a lot of you smarter/wiser guys who probably already knew this, but I hope this helps some of the newer to outboard maintenance/repair guys, like yours truly, and save them a lot of heartache.
On a positive note, he incidentally 'repaired' the other bad lower unit. Turns out corrosion had binded up the drive shaft. When he freed it from the other power head, corrosion broke loose and now I have a complete, spare, 50 hp motor. And, ftr, use a LOT, i mean LOTS of water to run your engine on the hard.
Well, as it turns out, the biggest problem I had was "self". Here's the scoop;
Doing what a lot of us do, I was using a rather large trash can filled with water to do driveway maintenance. I would fill the water almost to the top of the can, definitely covering the cavitation plate so I knew I was covering the water inlet screens. The motor was NOT pushing water. Bought another motor, had it moved to my boat today switching out my lower unit (I thought the other wa a dud)and went to pick it up. When I got there, mechanic was just finishing and hadn't had the time to test the motor. We proceeded to do just like I always do and put the motor in a large bucket/trash can of water. Sure enough, THIS motor was NOT pushing water. Both of us sighed, and then we felt the head, Yep it was definitely getting hot. Then, for some reason, he wanted to put even more water in it. We moved the can to on top of a cinder block, then filled it with water. At this point, water was going halfway up the middle section of the motor, not but a few inches below the exhaust. We restarted it......BAM, FLOODS of water pouring out! That's when we both realized that on these older Chrysler motors, the water pump is drawing it's water from literally half way up the mid section. When you're actually operating in the water, gravity is forcing the water up, when you on the hard, however, it isn't capable of it. Long story short, there's not been anything wrong with my water the whole time.
So, the same would apply to the 'muffs' according to his theory and it makes sense. I know there's a lot of you smarter/wiser guys who probably already knew this, but I hope this helps some of the newer to outboard maintenance/repair guys, like yours truly, and save them a lot of heartache.
On a positive note, he incidentally 'repaired' the other bad lower unit. Turns out corrosion had binded up the drive shaft. When he freed it from the other power head, corrosion broke loose and now I have a complete, spare, 50 hp motor. And, ftr, use a LOT, i mean LOTS of water to run your engine on the hard.
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