broke ventilation plate repair

[ziggy]

hi folks. my doel fin (stingray fin) broke a 2-3 inch piece of my ventilation plate off at one of the screw holes. <br />i tried to jb weld it and reuse the stingray fin. that didn't work. thought i'd do it right. took it to the welder. say's he's gonna tig weld it i think he said. i had the broke pieces to do that with. by pieces i mean 2 pieces. so he failed at his first attempt. ruined my broke pieces and has a nice, well sloppy bead on the ventilation plate now. says that my jb weld made the metals not want to fuse. i suppose that could be. next he says he's gonna cut my half moon shape into a recangle on my ventilation plate removeing the jb weld and try again. i thought it was a straight forward repair as my ventilation plate has been welded before. looks a bit rough but it's held for years. <br />question is should i let him try again? or is there any fix i could do with nuts and bolts. i was thinking perhaps if i remount the stingray fin and cover up the broke out piece. then cut off the stingray fin so i just have the part that mounts to the ventilation plate left. thereby covering my broke out piece. i have been thinking i'm gonna scrap the stingray fin anyways. i'm not sure i like the idea of how they work. sure wish i new how to weld and had the right tools, but i don't. any opinions?

 

[tommays]

Re: broke ventilation plate repair

you got to find a welder that knows how to weld which this guy does not <br /><br />i would try and see what you can find through a prop shop because they have to know how to weld on drives or there just going to turn it into junk <br /><br /><br />tommays

 

[ziggy]

Re: broke ventilation plate repair

thanks tommays, i guess i have to agree. the fella aint hip to doing my drive. i did think i was a pro welder as i found him in the yellow pages. oh well. i think i got other problems again now anyways. on the vent. plate i made a plate and bolted it in place. i wanted to go boatin this weekend. to no avail though. got my plate on, ready to go see how it works. i always pre-start my toy prior to goin out so that i can think all is well. well. at about 1000 rpms i'm gettin a clickin noise. gets worse with rpms. with a hearing hose, i'd say the clickin noise is from the upper. don't think i'm gonna run it till i find out what that noise is. bummer,,,,,,time to post over on the merc. board after a bit of research i guess. at this rate i'll be boatin next year if i'm lucky....olny good thing i can think of is that the more that breaks, the better i get at boat repair. good thing i got patience... and a jet ski that works so i can be on the water...... thanks again.

 

[dajohnson53]

Re: broke ventilation plate repair

My 2 cents: it is true that foreign material will prevent good welding. I've always been told by my (excellent) welder not to do make-shif repairs with epoxy or silicone unless I really have to because it will increase the effort (cost) of the final welded repair. On the other hand, often it's necessary to do something makeshift and just make it work later.<br /><br />All the stuff has to be removed. I'm very surprised that your welder didn't understand this going in - and take care of the epoxy removal thoroughly. Maybe he was trying to make the broken pieces fit.<br /><br />Anyway, I believe a good fabrication and aluminum welding shop could make the thing look like new (after painting, of course). Not that it is necessary, but the welded bead should be such that it could be ground afterward to nearly invisible smoothness. On the other hand, a professional bead won't be bad either. Call around and find a person with better experience with L/U repairs - they're out there, because many of us (mea culpa!) have damaged L/U's.

 

[Baldguy]

Re: broke ventilation plate repair

I broke the cav plate on my previous boat exactly as you did.<br /><br />I went to a welder recommended by a boat mechanic. I didn't have the missing piece, but he did a masterful job of fabricating the missing piece and welding it to the LU. Cost ~ $300 and he had the boat about 3 or 4 days.