My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

[sdilecce]

It's a 1966 Evinrude Lark. I'm getting it ready for the season and I notice this I replaced the one remaining scew with two brand new stainless cap screws, and some locktight. I ran the engine idleing in a bucket for a wile and it seemed to run fine.

I'm guessing it swallowed the screw last season. Am I going to be ok? Do I need to do a compleate teardown (I sure hope not)?

Why me....

 

[1946Zephyr]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I would pull the intake manifold and see if it is resting at the bottom. It most likely is.

 

[bob johnson]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

if you dont find it... and try to run your motor you might get a piston that matches mine.....

and I am sticking my neck out...but id say you wouldnt be happy
bob

 

[sdilecce]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

if you dont find it... and try to run your motor you might get a piston that matches mine.....

and I am sticking my neck out...but id say you wouldnt be happy
bob

Sad thing is it has run. How long I'm not sure. I ran it a good ten minutes before I noticed it. Who knows how long into last season it happened. Other than one of the plugs getting fouled, I didn't have any issues last year.

I've peered arround with a light, and turned it over by hand but I cant see hear or feel anything. My guess right now is that its either wedged in the manifold, or it has allready passed out the exhaust.

Would a tiny 4-40 screw even be able to fit pass the rotory valves (whatever they are called and make it into the cumbustion chamber?

 

[noelm]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

you will be very surprised where things can go inside a Motor when it is running, you may be lucky and it has long gone, or you could be very unlucky and all your searching and poking about has dislodged it, ready to wreak havoc next time you start it! your choice!

 

[jay_merrill]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I think I would pull the carb and intake manifold cover to see if it is anywhere in front of the leaf valves. If the scew made it beyond the leaf valves, it could be sitting in the bottom of the crank case, or it could have gotten into one of the cylinders. The difficulty in this situation, is that you could end up pulling half the motor apart, trying to find out where the silly ting ended up.

 

[Mas]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

Are you certain it even made it into the motor? I guess the lesson here is loctite those plate screws!

MAS

 

[5150abf]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

A buddy called me last year and said that plastic box fell off the front of his motor, I told him to bring it over, opened up the air box and found 2 of the 6 bolts, pulled the intake and the other 4 were resting against the reed valves.

No wonder it wouldn't run right, he got very lucky.

Pull it apart as far as you can andse if you can find it, I would be really uneasy untill I had that screw in my hand.

 

[F_R]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I also wonder where all those pieces from the plastic screen went. You say you are having plug fouling problems. The plastic probably wouldn't hurt the pistons, but the screw certainly will.

My advice is, at a minimum, pull the intake manifold and see if anything is lodged in the reeds. Then pull the bypass covers and see if there are any gouges in the pistons.

If all is ok up to this point, it depends on how much of a gambler you are. That screw may or may not still be in the crankcase. Who knows??? And it may or may not have gone all the way through without hitting anything.

 

[crb478]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I would pull the intake covers also and have a good look around. I would also get a magnet, the extendable type, and poke it around all the nooks and crannies as well as in the spark plug holes. Hopefully the screw will show up somewhere even if it is just for peace of mind.

 

[Rick.]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

This is to bad for sure. One thing worth mentioning though. For all those who are about to remove the choke plate screw(s) to put loctite on you should know they are normally peened at the factory to prevent this from happening. I wrecked a carb. trying to remove the choke plate screw and later found out about the factory peening. Rick.

 

[sdilecce]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

Thanks for all of the responses. I decided to pull the intake, and to my suprise:

Not only was the screw I lost in there, but there was another one in there that looks to have been in there for a long time! I wanted to put it all back together, but there looked to be some damage on the "Leaf Plate"

Here you can see the damage caused by the screw getting wedged in the valves. It also explaned why once without warning the motor lost power, and after liping along for 15 minutes or so came back to life. The previous owner told me that it had done that to him a few times as well but no-one could figure it out.

I called my dealer about ordering a new plate, and gaskets, but he told me it would take weeks to get them, if he could get them at all. He would have to track down the parts. I am trying to fill in the gouges with JB weld, then I am going to sand the plate flat again. I've also bought a roll of Felpro cork-rubber gasket material, and I am going to try to cut my own gaskets. Hopefully I'll have her running again soon.

 

[jay_merrill]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

My advice is to forget the JB Weld - it won't last. You might be able to find the plate and leaf valves at EBay, or at a local outboard boneyard. In fact, entire powerheads can sometimes be purchased for very little money, especialy if they are "frozen."

Glad you found the screws before they did even greater damage!

 

[jbjennings]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

Just wondering-----
You said it seemed to idle fine in your first post, right?
Seems to me it wouldn't idle worth a flip if there was a problem with the leaf plate sealing well. I'm thinking I'd just put it back together making sure the leaves were sitting right, covering all openings, and see how it ran. I believe the reeds don't do squat on high speed operation, so if it is idling fine, you should be in good shape.
I could be totally wrong........
JBJ

 

[crb478]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I agree with JB, I would put it back together and see how it ran. You will just be out a little time, but if it was running good before I see no reason it should not run good now.

 

[sdilecce]

Re: My engine swallowed a choke plate screw. Am I ok?

I was able to fill the damaged area with JB weld, then I lapped the whole plate flat. I cut new gaskets using the cork rubber gasket paper I bought. That was a tedious task for sure, and the cork rubber gaskets are less than Ideal but it seemed to work well enough.

Once I got it all back together she started right up, and idled great (as great as a 43 year old motor can).

Success!