ricksonntag
Cadet
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2004
- Messages
- 15
1991 Force 50<br /><br />Embarrassed as I am to admit it, I have not been as diligent as I should at winterizing my Force outboard. I use it about 35 hours/year, all during a 2-week period in August. Before putting it away, I burn all the fuel out of the system to prevent varnish formation, replace the lower unit lube, and turn over the engine a few times by hand to get the water out of the impeller.<br /><br />But I have NOT fogged the carb or put any oil into the pistons before storing it for the winter (in my back yard near Philly, engine vertical with a tarp covering the entire boat).<br /><br />The motor has run reliably for 13 years, aside from a couple impeller replacements and a couple plugged carburetors (which I learned to fix myself last year). I think the inside of the carb is OK, but I am concerned about the piston areas.<br /><br />This really got my attention a couple weeks ago. For the first time last fall, I cleaned my nearly-new spark plugs just before storing them. But upon checking them a couple weeks ago, the top one was pretty badly pitted. Until then, I had not realized the possibility of corrosion inside the piston area.<br /><br />After reading dozens of messages tonight, and the horror stories of rods shooting out the sides of improperly maintained motors, I now know that I had better put some oil into the pistons (and fog the carb) each fall. My motor started up fine a couple weeks ago, and we're leaving this Saturday for our annual boating vacation (probably too late to have a backlogged shop check it out), but I want to be sure to do things right this year when we're done.<br /><br />So my question is: Are there early warning signs I can check to see if there has been corrosion damage? (Like a compression check, maybe?) Are these things I could easily do myself, or should I just take it to a shop when I'm done?<br /><br />Any suggestions - or links - would be appreciated.<br /><br />-- Rick (newcomer here)