88FW200Horizon
Cadet
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2007
- Messages
- 16
OK, OK, I am new and overly cautious and now a bit paranoid. I have a 1988 OMC Cobra 5.0L. I have the real OMC service manual, operation manual and parts catalog. I actuall read them too! Here in Fort Collins, CO last week we had one beautiful 75 degree day, I went out one last time (tears......) as a 1st season freeze was due that night. I put stabilizer in the gas, filled it up and had a great day on the water. Came home and after changing motor oil and filer and starting again for a few minutes on water muffs I fogged it and shut it down and opened both block petcocks, took rubber caps off manifolds, removed plug on power steering cooler, removed and drained water from large hose at water pump and long hose to thermostat neck, all water came out fine. Now to the outdrive. I removed top dipstick for gear lube and removed bottom plug, no water came out at all (I had seals, gimbal bearing, and drive bellows replaced and u-joints lubed this season and gear oil was pretty new anyway) and I allowed a few ounces of lube to leak out before I replace bottom drain plug and dipstick plug. For water, starboard side has two plugs and port side has one. Water came out fine on starboard side and slowly leaked out on port side. with drive up as manual says. There is no obstruction (other than the close-to-the-hole internal parts). The hole is pretty small and water can't "run" out, it needs to exchange air for water to leak out. I even used a paper towel to "wick" water out of the hole. I thought I got it all out and put the drive up and down a couple of times, wicked again and went to bed. Got up the next morning after a 24 degree overnight temp and after the air temp went back up, I noticed water leaking out of the port side water drain hole (I left the three outdrive plugs out overnight for further draining if there was anything left inside). OK, with that said, my guess is abut 2-3 teaspoons of water may have leaked out by evidence of the size of water stain on the concrete. I see no cracks in that upper housing. Did I do any damage? One guy told me that nothing bad happened and it takes a deeper longer freeze to cause damage and that since almost all of the water was out, he suspects no damage. What do you think?
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) It sucks to find that tell tale hairline crack! When I bought my 4.3L the previous owner didn't winterize it properly and I had to get a new short block.
