Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

[Spicy_McHaggis]

I recently put a froze up 3.8 mercruiser back together after many months of work. I took it out for the first test run, it was running great. Three hours later cruising around the lake slowing down to go through a channel and the engine quit with a bad noise. Tried turning it over and it would turn over just no signs of wanting to start. I removed the coil wire to find no spark what so ever. Got a tow back, tore into the motor to find the dist. gear stripped. At full throttle I could only get my RPM's to about 3400 - 3600. Am I getting something stuck in the oil pump and freezing up the dist? Is there any other explanation for this?

 

[Bondo]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Ayuh,.... Never heard of a Merc. 3.8l......

 

[Howard Sterndrive]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

How easy does the distributor turn?
otherwise, I think you're on the right track with the oil pump (unfortunately)

Ayuh,.... Never heard of a Merc. 3.8l......

Mercruiser MR185V6 is the 3.8L 229 Chevrolet

 

[Bondo]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Ayuh,... It must be a Rare 1 Howard,...
I know OMC used 'em,... Didn't know Merc did....

 

[tbear1964]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Ayuh,... It must be a Rare 1 Howard,...
I know OMC used 'em,... Didn't know Merc did....

Googled it and only 2 references....this thread and a BOC thread. Very rare.....

 

[Howard Sterndrive]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Volvo used the 229 V6 too (AQ175A)
was a weird engine for Mercruiser because it was the same power as the 224 cu in aluminum Mercruiser/Ford 4 cylinder. I guess it was for those that wanted chevy power.

it's in Manual #7, anyway

 

[Wingnutt]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Interesting

 

[scipper77]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Yes the OP is 100% correct. I have the rare MCM185 in my boat. 3.8L 229cid. Not OMC not Volvo. When I need parts for the boat I get parts for the 4.3 every time. Even the pros don't see this motor much. I think there were only 2 years of production for it before the 4.3 replaced it.

The good news is that pretty much every thing GM has a shared parts bin so this rare motor is not hard to get parts for (at least in my limited experience).

 

[Spicy_McHaggis]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

I was doing some googling and found a similar problem in the hot rod world. I replaced the heads with remanufactured merc. heads. Assuming they were milled, should there be a spacer under the dist. to make up for what has been shaved off?? which would cause extra downforce on the whole assemby causing binding?? Or more on track with the oil pump having soething getting caught in it??

 

[Howard Sterndrive]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

Is there at least 1 distributor gasket in there now? Should always be one.

you could get an oil pump priming tool for a few bucks and run the pump with a drill for a while and observe/listen for unusual pump sounds or loading on the drill.

interesting about the spacer- I hadn't thought of that, but the geometry would change *slightly*....but how's the sealant bead at the front and rear of the intake? If the intake was sitting substantially lower, I'd think the sealant would squeeze right out to metal on metal when intake was torqued down.

Would be easy to double up on the distributor gasket next time.

 

[GLENN M]

Re: Mercruiser 3.8 stripped dist. gear

camshaft turns dist,if oil pump siezed it would tear out one or two teeth.did you change cam or dist.rollar cam needs bronze dist gear,anyway check your cam gear i bet its chewed up too! could have been damagad during build,goodluck