New to me 1990 Mercruiser 3.0 / Alpha 1 -what maintenance to do?

[BF]

Hi All,

I just bought a new to me 1990 Sea Ray 160 bow rider with a 3.0 mercruiser and alpha one drive... The unit supposedly has very low hours, and the condition of the boat supports this.

The previous owner changed the engine and gearcase oil every fall and did his own winterizing (it was a Minnesota boat). The engine oil looks brand new. In his paper work there was the receipt for oil and filter from last fall.

The boat runs good... maybe a bit of rough idle, but not awful. This is my first I/O boat, and I can hear minor bearing type noise when the engine is running. This noise changes a wee bit when the drive is turned stop to stop, but there is no clicking or clunking or anything like that. Maybe the sound is completely normal (?), but I'm concerned it could be either a worn or under-lubricated gimbal bearing (?).

The previous owner said the drive had never been off the boat in the 5 years he owned, and he didn't know about before then. My guess is it's had oil changes done but nothing else.

So here's my Q:

Given the info I've given you, what should I do to the boat maintenance-wise before I take it to the lake for the summer holidays? (which we start in 3 weeks)

My thoughts are:

1) Replace impeller for sure
2) Probably would be wise to pull the drive and inspect the gimbal bearing and U-joints. They would be replaced if necessary, or at least would get greased.
3) If I pull the drive, I think I'd change out the bellows.. this boat will be moored for the summer.
4) New set of spark plugs.

What do you think about 2 and 3? Absolutely? Good idea? or am I too uptight?

FYI, I plan to do all work myself... I've done significant work on outboards before (rebuilt lower units etc)... but this would be my first real wrenching on an I/O. My Dad had one until a couple years ago and had replaced U-joints and gimbal bearing on his mercruiser more than once... so it can't be that bad. (famous last words )

thanks for your $.02

 

[BF]

Re: New to me 1990 Mercruiser 3.0 / Alpha 1 -what maintenance to do?

already tried that... but it appears the links to those manuals are no longer alive. The link in the adults section only goes to the cover / table of contents page... haven't yet found any actual service manual section that pertains to my Alpha 1 drive anywhere there.

I will likely buy a seloc or clymer manual in the mean time. It would be nice to have a the merc manual, but I'm not keen on paying dealer prices for it. Maybe one will turn up online somewhere.

 

[BF]

Re: New to me 1990 Mercruiser 3.0 / Alpha 1 -what maintenance to do?

BTDT... the workaround instructions that were there before (last week?) are no longer there. The link to the service manual I need (# 6) only goes to the cover page, and I can't get anything else from there.

---edit---

OK... FYI, I figured out the downloadable manual thing in the "adults only" section... Even though there is no real indication in the cover section pdf, the table of contents sub headings (on pg 7) are clickable links... each of those subsections opens as separate pdf that can be saved.

Now back to my original Q's....

Would you grease up the gimbal thru the zerk (which may not have been done for a long time) and see if it quietens the drive down? Or would you just pull the drive anyway to inspect/replace the bearing and U-joints?

Also, should the bellows be changed on a 19 year old freshwater boat that has seen little use, even if the old ones seem OK? My guess is yes. Particularly since the boat will be moored on the water for about 6 weeks.

 

[BF]

Re: New to me 1990 Mercruiser 3.0 / Alpha 1 -what maintenance to do?

--update--

After doing some reading but before starting wrenching, I greased the gimble bearing and ran the boat on muffs. The bearing noise I heard was definitely the gimble bearing... with greasing the bearing noise went away completely. Without the bearing noise, I could hear a different noise... not loud and not "bad sounding" but there... it's a very soft "whir" sound if the drive was turned in either direction while running.

So, my diagnosis was that since the gimble bearing was dry, the U-joints prob haven't been lubed either. I pulled the drive. There was no play in the gimble bearing, and it turned freely, but didn't feel as smooth as I thought it should... probably scored from being dry I think... so I pulled it. Got a big slide hammer puller on loan.. worked great. New bearing and seal are on order and should be in today or tomorrow. U-joints feel great. No play at all and move smooth. There was a table spoon or two of water sitting in the bellows, but the bellows themselves look to be in very good shape. They're soft and pliable with nothing appearing troubling about them. It looks like the big O ring (square profile) sealing around the drive may have had a small spot that I could imagine having a trickle leak. Likewise the top of the paper gasket had a small spot (a couple mm's) that looked like it may have failed. There is very minor amount of light rust on the U-joints (just wiped off with a rag).

I changed the impeller last night.... wasn't bad to do... Hardest part was figuring a way to use my work mate to hold the outdrive securely. Thanks to reading on iboats I knew about the "quad ring" or oil seal ring between the housings. It was notable that the impeller was REALLY toast.... it was missing the tip of one vane and another was badly cracked. Had some sand in the pump base. I've changed impellers in my new-to-me outboards probably a dozen times before, and have never seen one this bad. I had test driven the boat before buying it, and it didn't overheat or anything, but it was a catastrophe about to happen.

I made up an alignment tool today, so if/when I get the bearing I should be ready to check alignment and reinstall the drive.

Plan is to put in new gimble bearing and seal, grease U-joints and put the drive back on. I'll use it for our holidays through August, and after the summer season's over (Sept or so), I'll pull the drive again to make sure there hasn't been any water intrusion into the bellows (and will change out U-joints at that time if they are not fine after greasing). If there's water in there, then I'll go after it... but with the spots on the seal/gasket, I'm pretty sure it was them and not the bellows that let the trickle in there.

Anyway, moral of the story is... don't assume that the impeller on a "new to you" boat is OK. This all fits with being a boat that has had the basic maintenance neglected (not greasing all the zerk's on the housing and the u-joints, not changing the impeller) probably because it was rarely used.

Q: how quiet should the drive be on an alpha one? Should there be ANY discernible noise ("whir" or otherwise) from the U-joints when the drive is turned? I know now that the gimble bearing doesn't necessarily make any noise if all is well. BTW, the soft "whir" may not have been obvious I had been running it on the water (?).

thx..

 

[BF]

Re: New to me 1990 Mercruiser 3.0 / Alpha 1 -what maintenance to do?

--update 2--

Had boat out this weekend and it ran great. No drive noise with new gimble bearing/seal and greased U-joints. Impeller was toast, so it was good that I replaced it.

Even though I didn't get many responses to this thread, I want to say thanks to all the regular posters to the I/O forum... I used the search function A LOT, and found many threads that helped me (with the manual)... usually it was the same posters who had responded in the other threads, so thanks for the indirect help. Now I know what a quad seal is.

BTW, I made up an alignment tool that worked well. It's a bit different than an OEM alignment bar, but reading the thread about a new alignment tool with a sliding sleeve got me thinking... I turned down a piece of steel pipe so that it fit snuggly in the coupler, and then used a plastic sleeve that could slide down the pipe into the inner gimble race. It was then very easy to tell which way the engine needed to move to align things. Worked great and the drive slid back on easily (well, as easy as it could be for a rookie working alone).

I still intend to pull the drive again and make sure the bellows have remained dry, and re-grease or replace U-joints (if they start making some noise)... that will wait until Sept unless something comes up before then.