New to the forum question

[mrm24_86]

Alright... I have aquired a boat, my first one. It formally belonged to my fathers friend. About all I currently know about it is that it has a 58? Merc Dockbuster? (hope thats right) It has sat in his back yard for the last 4 or 5 years. Before that he and my father did some work on it. The boat is in good shape, we did total repair on the body and painted it. The engine is where the trouble is. They did alot of work, and we had it in a 55 gallon drum and it ran like a bat out of hell but when we got in the water it bogged down and just putted about. I have read that it might be the carbs or fuel issues... anything else you can help me with. I am TOTALLY new to boat motors. Other than that, if I wanted to replace this motor, what would it be worth? Any help is greatly appriciated.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: New to the forum question

Running in neutral in a barrel is not a good test of an engine other than -- hey it runs. With no load, an engine running on half its cylinders will rev like nuts. Load it up and as you learned, you will quickly find it does not run as well as you thought. Start with a compression check, fuel system check which will include disassembling the carb(s) giving them a thorough soaking, cleaning all passages and then assembling with new kits. Fresh gas with proper oil mix and then see if it runs better. An engine stored that long undoubtedly has severe carb issues from gum and varnish.

 

[mrm24_86]

Re: New to the forum question

First, all this running and work was back when it was freshly rebuilt, we havn't messed with it recently yet, but also I just talked to the guy that has it right now and he says that it dosn't have a neutral.. I forgot the work but you have to start it in drive or reverse, and to switch gears you have to shut the motor off. So when we had it in the barrel it was in gear and running. I plan on going out there in the next couple of days to tear it down.

 

[tashasdaddy]

Re: New to the forum question

i remember those, you right about the age range. i know nothing about them, sorry.

 

[Laddies]

Re: New to the forum question

Mrm, firstly if your engine is a dockbuster it has no neutral so we need to know a little more about it the model and serial would help. Those engines were a little complicated to repair and you need a manual but we should be able to help. The ign, system is dual points, condensers and coils so start by ck for spark if you only have spark on ever other cyl. then you have ign. problems, if you have spark on all 6 then you probable have a dirty carb. if the engine has set a while the they probably need to be cleaned anyway and the fuel pumps rebuilt