I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

[bucknutjoe]

I have water in the oil of my 1983 Four Winns Marquise 170 with the (GM) Mercruiser 3.0 140hp I-4. The engine is mated to an Alpha 1. I had milkey oil, but flushed a few times and got clear, clean oil for the 4th weekend. I used the boat for two days, pretty heavily, and the oil remained clean and clear all throughout. A few days later, rain filled the bilge area above the oil pan level, and the day after pumping it out, I used the boat about 15 minutes before remembering that I should have checked the oil first and when I did it was full to the brim of milk, ugh!

OK, so I began flushing out water filled, milkey oil and found two things: a leak, and what I believe might be some sort of overflow. I have no idea what this part even is, so please help me identify what I'm dealing with here.

Pic 1 is a shot of the general area in the engine compartment I am dealing with. The grayish, downward arrow is pointing to what I believe might be an overflow. You can slightly see some of the milkey oil coming out in this pic, but there's another with more detail. The white, upward arrow is pointing up to where I found the leaking oil. In order to see it, I had to use a mirror, and the main picture of this is upside-down looking in the direction of this arrow.

Pics 2 and 3 are what I'm guessing is an overflow. Is that true? I don't know what part this is. I would love someone to help me understand what part of the process this is!

Pic 4 is oil leaking. The pic is taken from underneath, facing the sky. The oil is running down the face of the part that I have asked for the identity of. It is the side that faces the bow. I have no idea what the copper or brass colored tall bolt head thing is in this picture, so I would really like some help here too.

OK, I think this is a good start, please give me some idea what I'm dealing with here and what needs to be done to get this right.

Joe

 

[tschmidty]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

The hole you are pointing to is the flywheel cover and shouldn't have oil in it. I think you're main problem is that you are letting the bilge fill up with rain water over the oil pan. Automatic bilge pump? Better cover for the boat?

 

[oops!]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

edited.......

there is no oil overflow.

how does the dipstick oil look?

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

I know I need to go auto bilge and fix the cover, and those are both sitting in the on-deck circle as soon as I can get clean oil and no leaks. Ya know?

The dipstick oil looks tainted, but not as white as what is coming out of the flywheel cover.

 

[Bondo]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

I know I need to go auto bilge and fix the cover, and those are both sitting in the on-deck circle as soon as I can get clean oil and no leaks. Ya know?

The dipstick oil looks tainted, but not as white as what is coming out of the flywheel cover.

Ayuh,... My guess is, ya got a freeze cracked block...

Pull the little flywheel cover off the bottom,... I think there's 5 or 7 little bolts...
Donno where the sludge is coming from, but ya gotta get it outa there...
Probably oughta pull the starter while yer there, 'n clean it up...

 

[stonyloam]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Looks like you have two separate problems here, I suspect the flywheel housing filled with water and the water was blended by the flywheel with grease in there from the coupler. making the white emulsion. It also looks like your starter is full of water too, need to get it dried out and cleaned up or it will fail very soon. With the engine, just change the oil and cross your fingers, if it gets milky again, I would guess Bond-o is correct. Good luck.

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Looks like you have two separate problems here, I suspect the flywheel housing filled with water and the water was blended by the flywheel with grease in there from the coupler. making the white emulsion. It also looks like your starter is full of water too, need to get it dried out and cleaned up or it will fail very soon. With the engine, just change the oil and cross your fingers, if it gets milky again, I would guess Bond-o is correct. Good luck.

Wonderful! Haha, just kidding, all of this would certainly be better than the cracked head! Can anyone give me any advice necessary for removing the starter, etc? Is there anything I need to be careful of, or avoid doing?

Thanks!!!

 

[thumpar]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Wonderful! Haha, just kidding, all of this would certainly be better than the cracked head! Can anyone give me any advice necessary for removing the starter, etc? Is there anything I need to be careful of, or avoid doing?

Thanks!!!

Remove the battery cables first and it will be pretty straight forward.

 

[stonyloam]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Wonderful! Haha, just kidding, all of this would certainly be better than the cracked head! Can anyone give me any advice necessary for removing the starter, etc? Is there anything I need to be careful of, or avoid doing?

Yeah don't you just love boating LOL. Probably an oily mess inside the starter, so a professional rebuild is probably in order. The teeth on the flywheel probably acted like a blender and sprayed water and grease all over inside the flywheel housing. If you can get the cover off (this is what it looks like: http://www.mercruiserparts.com/Show....png&inbr=963&bnbr=330&bdesc=FLYWHEEL+HOUSING ) You should be able to clean a lot of it out and get it dried out. The only thing I would worry about is the potential for rust on the driveshaft where it goes through the coupler. There should be a grease fitting on it and you might want to give it a couple of shots of grease, I think Mercruiser recommends using their spline grease. The best of luck, 4WINNs are nice boats, hope you get to enjoy it.

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

I got the flywheel cover off tonight, and I found something that is REALLY bothering me. Is there any normal reason that the hole I've pointed out in the pictures should be there? I feel like someone drilled a hole there! Am I missing something here?

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

OH. One more thing... it's okay to leave this cover off overnight, right? Being exposed to outside air for a night isn't something that could add more problems, is it?

 

[81 Checkmate]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Bucknutjoe

Isn?t hidden valley lake full of cranberry?s? Maybe that?s what?s getting in your boat! Lol !!!!

You will be ok with leaving the cover off. Did ya pull the starter also?

 

[stonyloam]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

I got the flywheel cover off tonight, and I found something that is REALLY bothering me. Is there any normal reason that the hole I've pointed out in the pictures should be there? I feel like someone drilled a hole there! Am I missing something here?

Sure looks like it. The only logical reason would be as a drain. Is there a core plug back there that could be leaking?

 

[MSRTBUDWISER]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Another reason why you would have oil coming out of the flywheel housing is a bad rear main seal. The milkiness of the oil could be casued by several things, such as like Bond-o said, a cracked block. It could also be caused by a blown head gasket (compression test would most likely identify this problem) or a bad intake gasket. The intake gasket is easy to check, just mark the position of your distributor, pull it out and pull the intake manifold. If you see rust stain inside by the push rods, you've found your leak. As for the head gasket, like I said,a compression test would most likely rule this out... Both fairly easy to do. If it isn't any of those, it could be a bad pan gasket, which would allow oil to come out and water to go in if your bilge was in fact full. If its not that, the only way to check a rear main seal is to pull the motor (pretty easy to do with the right equipment). Hope this helps. Happy Boating!

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Hey Budwiser... more and more I am looking at that main rear seal. I don't have the ability to check compression, is there any other way I should check that?

Checkmate, forgive my noob status, but what does that mean? The cranberries comment.

 

[MSRTBUDWISER]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

The rear main seal is the only reason that I could see oil coming from the bell housing. There's no other logical way for oil to get there. As for the compression, the only way to check that is with a compression tester. You can rent one at Autozone. You just give them the deposit, use it, then when you bring it back you get your deposit back. It's very easy to do, you just pull all of the spark plugs. Then screw the tester into each cylinder individually. Turn the motor over a few times then note the pressure. Do this for each cylinder. If one is significantly less than the others, then "wallah", theres your culprit. ~Happy Boating!~

 

[stonyloam]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

more and more I am looking at that main rear seal.

Was there oil in the bilge? If you have a bad rear seal you should have had oil leaking out of that drilled hole. Once you get the oil changed, run it and watch that hole.

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Was there oil in the bilge? If you have a bad rear seal you should have had oil leaking out of that drilled hole. Once you get the oil changed, run it and watch that hole.

Terry, I didn't have anything coming out of that hole. The oil was leaking from above, coming down the face of this plate and where it meets the starter. The hole was not plainly open though either. After removing the cover, I was wiping off oil and other crap from both sides of it and the hole was "filled" with what appeared to me at the time to be metal shavings. Like burrs of metal from making the hole.

 

[bucknutjoe]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

The rear main seal is the only reason that I could see oil coming from the bell housing. There's no other logical way for oil to get there. As for the compression, the only way to check that is with a compression tester. You can rent one at Autozone. You just give them the deposit, use it, then when you bring it back you get your deposit back. It's very easy to do, you just pull all of the spark plugs. Then screw the tester into each cylinder individually. Turn the motor over a few times then note the pressure. Do this for each cylinder. If one is significantly less than the others, then "wallah", theres your culprit. ~Happy Boating!~

Hey Bud,
Do I need to have the boat hooked up to rabbit ears when I do this, or no since I'm not actually going to run the engine?

 

[stonyloam]

Re: I was wrong, found milky oil leaking now in my merc 3.0. Now what is going on!?!?

Do I need to have the boat hooked up to rabbit ears when I do this, or no since I'm not actually going to run the engine?

Yes you always need to have the water supply hooked when you run the engine for more than a few seconds. Without water the impeller (outdrive water pump) will be damaged, and you will not have water to cool the exhaust gasses and the shutter in the exhaust pipe will be destroyed. If you leave the flywheel cover off I would think you should see oil being slung from the flywheel down into the bilge if the seal is bad. Sorry misread that, No need for water if you are not going to start the engine:facepalm: