From your earlier post, I thought of clogging as well, like when I remove the stopcocks on the block, water flows much better if I stick a screwdriver in there to break up the rust particles. In this case, I took a wire a little narrower than a clothes hanger and poked around. A few drops of water but no noticeable debris. I took a more flexible 14 gauge wire and poked around further into the hole and I got the same thing with no obstruction. Then, I took a syringe and flushed it out with biodegradable antifreeze 4 or 5 times. Most of the antifreeze washed right out - more white then purple, maybe with it had some salt from the seawater mixed in - and I hope what antifreeze remained will protect the outdrive through the winter. I have to add that step to my normal winterizing process.
A more troubling issue I had when fogging the engine was the sound of something randomly bouncing in the outdrive, maybe once every minute or two, like a small piece of metal or plastic. It wasn't in gear so I don't know what could have caused that except the impeller. I'm wondering if a fin of the impeller might have chipped off. the water was flowing normally through the system and coming out both drain holes with good flow. I'll have to see if it's still happening when I de-winterize it - in only 170 days from now - The impeller is just 1 year and 30 hours run time old so I'd hate to replace it already. But that's got nothing to do with this original posting.
Thanks again for your help.
