Knotlost

Messure from the transom to the bottom of the boat, and ask the dealer armed with the numbers and he will tell you, or look it up on the manufactures web site, most of them will tell you what motor will do it.

You want the cavitation plate above the prop to be at or below the bottom of the boat.

Remember though a "kicker" is a little different design made for trolling and it dose work better than just the normal motor. They normaly put a larger lower unit and prop on it. So the lenghts can very.

That all depends on where and how your mounting it.

The number one reason boats catch on fire, and burn is because of shorts in wiring, and insulation being burnt off is the number one reason for that.

What happens when the insulation is compromiseded, then the bear wire or a wire thats not insulated properly heats up because of normal use that well within its range; melts the plastic that its now near,or sets the wood on fire that its touching (very common in this type of failureur) because of a little normal movement that would nonormally be a problem, moves it into contact with its surroundings, and you have a fire.

Bear wire will cause a short, and shorts = heat (lots of it), and sparks, all a wonderful source of fire. With a fuse, you hope you have it fused properly so it will blow before the fire, thats why there are fuses; to prevent a fire.

But you have to make sure your fuses are all the right size (alot of fires start when a fuse blows and "dingle berry brain" just puts a higher rated fuse in to keep it from blowing). Fuse size based baced on wire size and load absolutely expecting the insulation to be in perfect shape. A fuse will blow long before the insulation starts smoking if its sized properly. Insulation thats not perfect on wires should be replaced.

Remember a fire is the worst problem on a boat even worce than a hole in the bottom.

Remember its your boat, if you invite a friend out and they go with you expecting to have a good time and some one gets hurt or worce; its totaly your fault becasue you didn't do diligents to find what burnt up. You will have to live with that, and thats not worth it, just find the wires thats smoked.

You really need to check the wires on everything very carfully. You could have bear wire in several places, or the insulation on the wire may be crispy and easly broken off and cause problems when you dont want them.

The fact is you made someting smoke, so it burned or came close enought to count it as burning, and you need to find out what it was or dont use the boat. If you get out on the lake you could have big problems depending on your boat, and right now the water is too cold to bail into if your boat catches fire.

Get some red electirical tape and start taping the hot wires red, all of them. Idiot proof that aspect of the wiring or it will get repeated by some one. When you find the burnt wires replace them with marine wire.

There is a soulution you can buy that will help. Its made for tile removal, you will have to see if it will work in your application, but I believe it will becasue the glues are very similar. You pour it on, or in the case of tiles you mop it in, and it seeps in and breaks down the tention of the glue. You can mop it onto the carpet soaking the carpet being careful not to get it everywhere and I will be the next day it will come right out without much problem.

http://bluesea.com/files/resources/refe ... cerpts.pdf

These standards came out in 2010 and most dont know about them.

Chicken or the Egg, if your sure the alt went first then what Pap said is a start.

Clean the ground and be very fussy, they are more important than thpositiveve. When you loose positive things just stop working, when you loose ground things are more likely to melt and catch fire. You were very close I would guess to having a fire.

It's possibleable that internaly your battery broke apart on the neg causing the damage, imagine hooking a 6 volt batter to a 12 volt system.

Make sure you have fused everything right. On your positive side you should have a fuse between the battery and everyelseg elce. Many times pdon'te dont then if they ever have a problem they get a fire. I do admit though most of the time they burst solenoidsonoids or starters before they get fires but not all the time.

I got the new raymarine as well X5 and its awsome, no problems at all. It works great and its easy to install.

Believe it or not but drain the gas run the motor dry then put Transmission fluid threw the lines from the fuel pump and fill the carb with it. If you really want to preserve everything this will do it. Its a pain when you start it up again as you will need to drain out the carb and that means possably taking it off, but it will be in perfect shape when you do. All your seals and orings will be as good as you left them.

I know of guys who winteriz the boats this way every year and although I think its extreem they never have a problem with varnish, rust, corrosion, or dry rot.

The worst dammage it can cause is fouling your plugs if you dont drain it perfect so not a big deal. One guy just starts turning it over and dumps all the training fluid into the cylinders and when it all out and gas is comming through the carb he changes the plugs and starts it! It smokes like crazy and cleans the valves and exhaust out like new each time, and the boat has run good for 5 years of this treatment so far.

I know this is perfect for long term storage.

That is cool, an it opens up some options. Could it be NEMA wired or hooked up into a autopilot in some manner?

There is nothing as good as welding, where do you live? (I weld).

Interesting I wonder how the physics of broken rings is overcomming the fact that with broken rings you can not make compression but you can make suction? How come water dose not come into the cylinder on the non compression stroke?

Im not saying it isn't true, just that don't understand how that would work.

My motor died one time at the end of a long hard because of ignition problem with distributor, and when I went to start it after fixing the distributor, the motor "seized" up. I pulled the plugs one cylinder was loaded with water. The motor guy said when it was shut off hot like that it made steam out of the cooling water that pushed passed the valve. It didn't hurt anything but a plug, as I found it before damage (not even water in the oil) so it was interesting as well.

Yes stainless will work great the same way.

Your going to be using a 3m 5200 or 4500 or something of that type I would assume. That will insulate it enough so its not an issue, use the sealer on the outside and rubber washer under the locking nut on the inside (cut inner tube). I have done the same and there are no issues.

I would never trust anything else, especially zinc. Unless you and find an alum fitting (maybe McMasters has them) .

A was down pump it a great thing, but put a valve inside a brass fitting. Your boat will sink quick if any of the plastic breaks. A brass strainer fitting with a gate valve inside that then plumbed to a wash down pump is doing it right. Also not sure if you have the paint or not but.... I called Interlux about the bottom paint on my boat and talked to a tec. And what he recommended was the VC performance epoxy right over the sand blasted alum. Just blasted enough to clean and not erode it though so that means a quick sweep over any bear metal. I was quite surprised, but talked to him quite a bit about it and he assured me I could spend piles of money if I wanted to or do it this way and have a job just as good. I also found out that its one of the cheapest bottom coatings and its one of the best. It has a Teflon it it and they use it on racing sailboats (it was on the Americas Cup when it won).

Full disclosure though; I have not done mine yet but I do have the paint. I though I would let you know..

If your time is worth more than $1.00 and hour they are not that expencive any more. Check harbor freight I believe they have a cheep one that will last a while for less than $20. $60 will buy you a pretty good one now.

It depends on the reel, if you have a big reel and can spool a 100 yards of power pro, then thats great, you dont need to but if you can its a plus. When you use wire eventualy you will be cutting chunks off, your 1000 feet will get shorter, but it will not matter untill your down pretty short.

If your reel is small your choices are limeted just spool the wire on some tape like suggested.

I use Malin 7 strand as is a old proven standby that has worked for a long time, so its as close to a sure thing for me so I stick with it.

I have heard some guys try some of the other wires and had fits with it, but dont ask me what ones I cant remember becasue I dont have to know all the bad, just one good one.

Spool 100 yards+ of 50# power pro and 1000 of wire on a big saltiest reel and you will be real happy.

Hey its looking nice, I have done a few myself. Its alot of work but worth it in the end.

Last year I got the raymarine X5 and its great. I have a 350 with power assist and it works good even when the main is off, and im running just the kicker motor. It still has enough umph to steer it fine. I did get the nicer computor for it and its nice not sure its worth the $ or not, but the unit definitly is.

It is a bit noisy but its not to big of deal to me.

The next step would be...

2. Water is not circulating. Go ahead and replace the tstat. You will also need to pull every cooling hose off the engine 1 by 1 and check to see if there are any restrictions in the fittings. Common items would be broken impellar blades from a failed water pump, rust, sand, dirt, ect. It is rare, but the water circulating pump on the front of the engine can lose its own internal impellar.

3. Water is not getting out. If water gets in the engine, but can not get out, it can not take the heat with it. Water exits through the exhaust risers. What you would have to do is pull the risers and inspect the cooling passages in the risers and inspect the discharge side fo the risers. They do get clogged up, and they are a maintainence item. In saltwater, most risers last 3 to 5 years before they need to be replaced.

4 . Heat is not exchanging - This is if you have a closed cooling system with a heat exchanger. Heat exchangers can and do get clogged up. If you have one, pull the end caps off and make sure the tubes are clear. Also, in rarer circumstances. If you boat in a muddy area engine blocks can get filled with silt/mud.

5. Cooling system is getting airbound. If you have gotten to this point and have not solved it yet. Time to see if the system is getting airbound. This would happen if the seals on the water pump are leaking air into the system. It will also happen if the engine has a bad head gasket.

1. The first is to do a volume output test on the water pump. To do this you need to remove the pumps output side hose, and if necessary, replace it with a longer one to do the test.

What you need to do is put the boat in the water (this will not work on a flushing device) and with the engine stone cold start it up. Bring the rpms quickly up to 1000 exactly and take the output hose and put it in a bucket to collect the water. After exactly 15 seconds remove the hose and shut the engine off. You do not want to run the engine any more than a minute as it will have no cooling water going to it.

The ability of this test to detect a problem is dependent upon the accuracy in its preformed use a shop tachometer with an error of less than 5 % . The new digital timeing gauges/lights will do this as well. The boat tach is not accurate normaly. A stop watch should be used as well.

Now you need to measure the water in the bucket,

Alpha stern drive pump output for 15 second period

Drive unit 1.98:1 is 3 us qts, 1.84:1 is 3.3 qts 1.65:1 is 3.6 qts 1.50:1 is 4 qts and 1.23:1 is 4.5 qts

If it is under, the pump, and everything on the inlet side of the pump needs to be checked.

Through hull fittings, seacocks, and sea strainers can all clog up an limit water input to the seawater pump.

Here is what will work great.... Having done now 6 boat floors here are a few things I have learned.

1. buy the Arauco plywood, this is almost the same as marine. It is I think 7 ply 1/2 inch and has great exterior glue just the same as Marine. I boiled a piece in water for 2 hrs and it was just as good as when it went in and thats the test for Marine grade as well. It is almost void free and has a great finnish and is much cheaper and available localy and its stocked in most Lowes.

2. Get epoxy from US composits and give it 2 coats each side. Then do what ever you want it will not matter, it will last a very long time. Use the fast cure unless your not in a hurry, the medium takes at least 1 full day in warm weather to harden up decent.

3. Use a pvc pipe condit to run anything under your decks and over size it about 2X of what you think you need.

4. use pool noodles or the blue foam board to replace the pour in foam, and try to keep if up off the aria where water will run or lay.

those are a few to get you thinking...

First sticking rings will cause blow by, of gas/oil but not water. Water is not in that loop anywhere, unless its comming in though a broken manifold back through the exhust valves. But you would foul out plugs if that were the case.

It definite isn't rings but the big problem is anyone that is remotely familure with these motors would never say that. So either he is preparing you for a good "cheating" or he honestly dose not understand how they work.

You have water In the oil in a bad way, It seems if you didn't drive your boat long you have a large leak, that would almost lead me to believe its not a head gasket although it could be, but if this much water is from less than 4Min'sns of running you would almost have to have a crack somewhere.

Your biggest problem is now you know your "guy" is either a lier or ignorant, and thats why the guys on this list want to know who he is so they can avoid him. An honest guy would have said "Oh no" and then not much untill they pulled it out to look for it.

I have added a 4 foot piece of bungi cord to my planer boards, this bungi in normal opperation should streach about 12 to 20 inches, when you get the "stuff" going on that takes up alot of the slack problems. In my situation it has fixed about 70% of the problems and every bit makes a big difference in operation.

I bought some heavy stuff (bungi) from McMaster Carr and used hog ring crimps to make the ends up with split rings and downrigger snaps.

I Highly recomend it.

Hey look at the bright side, the new cables out now are great! The slide like oiled glass so you have that to look forward to!