Fired up today...

[nola mike]

Beautiful weekend, decided to try to get the boat running before september this season

I had a spare outdrive from my donor boat that I decided to put on this year, appeared to be in better shape than my other one, and I started low speed overheating at the end of last season. I changed the u-joints (managed to break a tab off the retainer getting the old ones out) and water pump/housing/seal. Couldn't get the halves back together, looked up into the housing and saw the remains of that #$!% shaft o-ring. Removed, cleaned, couldn't get together again, realized that somehow that lower shift seal got buggered. I for some reason had a spare on hand, so back in business. Alignment unchanged since last time the drive was pulled. Not 2 finger loose, but not terrible.

Jumped the fuel pump for a few seconds, and the thing fired up on literally the first crank. I don't think that's ever happened first thing in the spring ever to me.

Ran for about 45 minutes on muffs. No sign of overheat, no leaking, oil looks good. Cool, hopefully survived my first winterization.

@Scott06 kept on pestering me to check the timing advance last season. I tried, but my cheap timing light crapped out after 2k rpm or so. Set the idle using dwell meter for rpm instead of the gauge, realized my timing was only 5' BTDC. I doubt that this is enough to make a difference, but we'll see. I'll test it to make sure it's advancing correctly as well once I get on the water.

Hopefully I'll have time to pretty up the wiring, hook up the electronics, and clean the damn thing this year!

 

[Scott06]

@Scott06 kept on pestering me to check the timing advance last season. I tried, but my cheap timing light crapped out after 2k rpm or so. Set the idle using dwell meter for rpm instead of the gauge, realized my timing was only 5' BTDC. I doubt that this is enough to make a difference, but we'll see. I'll test it to make sure it's advancing correctly as well once I get on the water.

and Im still going to keep pestering you until you check it ...

seriously by 5 degrees i assume you mean inital timing? I don't recall which engine/ ignition you have, but would assume it should be either 8 or 10 degrees. Any less initial timing will reduce total advance at higher rpm 3-5 degrees could make if you are thinking you are not making full power. Not sure what you should have for full advance would think 24-28 deg total around 2800.

 

[nola mike]

4.3/tb iv. Initial timing should be 8, it was 5-6. Full advance at 2500 rpm should be about 20-23'. I'll check total advance when I get on the water, promise.

 

[Lou C]

Hope you get it up & going well after all the time you spent on the conversion last year. Looking back in my OMC shop manual for some reason the 4.3 was set up with a good bit less spark advance than the V8s. Not sure if this is peculiar to the pre Vortec engines with full dished pistons or what, but mine was specified to be set at 6* BTDC and full centrifugal advance of only 12 degrees at 3200 rpm gave a total of 18*. Maybe the OMC engineers were more worried about detonation who knows.

 

[Scott06]

I think in general the 4.3s take less advance than the v8s vortec and pre vortec. I think the vortec 4.3 that i pulled out of my boat was like 8 initial 24 total.

 

[nola mike]

Just looking at the manual, it appears that the points ignition used on the 4.3 has 12' base and 32' total advance, so that's odd.

 

[Lou C]

That sounds wrong but maybe the Vortecs can tolerate more advance than the pre Vortec due to the difference in the shape of the combustion chamber.