Post: #51

(06-24-2017 01:53 AM)porscheguy Wrote:  

Found it on Craigslist. Got it for next to nothing because the engine block was cracked. Already purchased a replacement engine and working on the install this weekend. Aside from the engine, it has some of the usual issues for a boat of this age. Faded and oxidized gel coat. A few tears in the vinyl. A previous owner covered the original floor with plywood so I suspect there may be a few soft spots underneath, but as it is now, it's pretty solid. Transom is solid also. I'll get a few seasons out of it before I have to look into any structural repairs, at which point I may just discard it and find another.

Boats get a bad rap for the perceived cost to own, operate, and maintain. I will say this much. Prices on some boat stuff is ridiculous. But you can work around much of it if you're willing to turn some wrenches. The majority of problems that boats suffer from are lack of use coupled with a failure to adequately prepare the boat for long periods of inactivity. Case in point, my cracked engine. This could have been prevented. You don't even have to fully winterize, all the previous owner needed to do was spend five minutes to pull the engine and exhaust drain plugs.

It's been 17 years since I last had a boat. Will update pics once new engine is in and I've spent some more time cleaning it up with the buffer.

Sorry I missed this.
What engine and when were the risers last changed?

Post: #52

(06-24-2017 03:52 AM)Cattle Rustler Wrote:  

(06-24-2017 02:29 AM)Suits Wrote:  The happiest days in the life of a boat owner are the day he buys the boat and the day he sells it.

I'm sure El Mech would disagree with that.

I do but also I don't buy I/O even for a flip.

Post: #53

Dudes can have their fat-bottom boats full of water and other dudes with fast boats like Porcheguy's are gonna basically use them as floating truck stops.

Post: #54

Mech, it had one of the early mercruiser 4.3s with no balance shaft and no vortec heads. That block was actually cracked because some failed to properly winterize it. This is an issue up here. When I bought it, the seller said the block cl was potentially cracked, but he wasn't certain. The price reflected a cracked block. I bought new risers and manifolds preemptively. When I took off the old ones, I discovered the crack in the block. Shed no tears as that was the worst 4.3 they made and I knew that was a risk.

When I bought the manifolds and risers, the guy at the store showed me a 2002 4.3 he had taken out of another boat. This was a vortec engine with a balance shaft. It's also a mercruiser TKS. So even though it's a carb, it starts like it has fuel injection. It's also a serpentine drive. Included everything. It was plug and play, low hours, and CLEAN. I looked at several options, and took the best one.

The outdrive is a gen 1 alpha 1. Minimal corrosion as the boat wasn't stored in the water. The boots in the gimbal were intact. Skeg isn't broken. The prop is a 21 pitch aluminum POS. It's been too rough out to get a good high speed run to determine which direction I'll go with a stainless prop.

I know I/O boats have fallen out of fashion in the past 10-15 years, and down in florida, they're almost unseen. With the high salt content and warmer weather I understand why. And I also understand that the newer OBs are way better than most of the I/Os in terms of sophistication, weight, economy, noise, corrosion resistance, etc. But I don't need to tell you the price on a 200hp Yamaha or mercury OB these days.

The manifolds and risers on the replacement engine weren't too bad, but since I had the new ones, I put them on anyway. The "new" engine had about 180 hours on the clock, and we did a compression test on it. 185 on all six cylinders. The engine seller even gave me a newer one piece steering actuator that had fittings to match the steering hoses on the new engine.

I'd like an Everglades CC in the 28' range with a pair of 300 verados, but I'm content with what I've got now.

Post: #55

I've got 4 or 5 hours on it so far. I will be buying and installing trim tabs this weekend to correct the inherent boat balance issues of the I/O drivetrain.

Post: #56

(07-03-2017 10:49 AM)porscheguy Wrote:  That will draw out the women just like a turd in a swimming pool.

Should have used sarcasm font.

Post: #57

Owned a boat once. Got it for next to nothing as well. But after paying for all the things that needed to be replaced and repaired, and all the lost weekends doing cleaning and maintenance, I sold it. Figured out that ration was 10 hours of work for 1 hour of enjoyment. Not a good formula for fun.

Post: #58

(07-11-2017 11:38 AM)porscheguy Wrote:  I've got 4 or 5 hours on it so far. I will be buying and installing trim tabs this weekend to correct the inherent boat balance issues of the I/O drivetrain.

Why? Try to balance the weight in the boat first meaning the gas and batteries.

Post: #59

(07-11-2017 09:41 PM)el mechanico Wrote:  

(07-11-2017 11:38 AM)porscheguy Wrote:  I've got 4 or 5 hours on it so far. I will be buying and installing trim tabs this weekend to correct the inherent boat balance issues of the I/O drivetrain.

Why? Try to balance the weight in the boat first meaning the gas and batteries.

Don't do it until you figure out the problem!!

Post: #60

The problem is the front/rear weight distribution that's the result of the design. You've got a 1000lb power train in the back and a 42 gallon gas tank right in front of the engine. Can't do anything about the engine unless I swap to an outboard for massive costs and structural mods. The gas tank can't be moved with tearing out the floor.

The boat is a bow rider and much of my problem could be solved if I were regularly carrying passengers who would most likely sit up front and add a few hundred pounds of weight to balance things out. I don't normally carry passengers, so the only way to get weight on the front would be to carry sandbags for ballast which has its downsides. The alternative is trim tabs.

I'm going to try the nauticus smart tabs to start. They're cheap and easy to install. They get a lot of positive reviews from people who own boats similar to mine. If they take the boat in the direction I want to go, I'll step up to some lenco tabs over the winter.

Post: #61

I have never used the automatic trim tabs but i have the electric ones with actuators and like them. On your boat I bet you would like them a lot. They are easy to install and some 3m 5200 will keep it water tight. I use the trim tabs when going into choppy seas, but for you they should be useful for keeping that bow down. Totally agree with elmech on the I/O but that is what you have so run it.

Post: #62

Just sold a boat for my dad recently, "boat people" are usually total faggots. Must have shown it 10 times, spent so many hours with these douche bags. It was a 10 year old boat with cosmetic wear, which is too be expected, but for some reason they expected it to look like a brand new boat.

Would love to have another boat but couldn't justify owning one for the amount I'd use it.

Post: #63

Just repped deerhunter for knowing about 3M 5200 sealant. You don't know boats unless you've bought a tube or 20 of the stuff.

Im going to try the automatic "smart tabs" to start. Even if I replace them with electric lenco tabs in the future, it's just a matter of sealing the old holes and drilling new ones. I got a bit annoyed when looking at the prices for the lenco hardware. The tabs and actuators are about $500. This is reasonable and about what I'd expect. But then you've got to buy switches to control them. To get the switches with LED indicators is $350. Almost doubling the price. I'm not looking to spend almost $1000 in this area at the moment. I've still got trailer repairs to make, and want to address some other issues.

While I agree that modern outboards are vastly superior and more desirable, they are expensive. I came up a time when I/Os were considered the better option. 30 years ago, most outboards were shit. They were all 2-strokes, noisy, fouled plugs if you idled for more than a few minutes, and only made power at or near redline. Honda changed all of that when they introduced 4 stroke outboards to the us market in the early 90s, and ever since, there's been a development race among the outboard makers.

In the I/O market, Volvo Penta is the only company that's really developing new products, but people aren't really paying attention. They're building I/Os based on the current generation direct injection LS engines from GM. Mercury has introduced a few diesels, but I think their main focus is racing and the outboards.

Post: #64

(07-15-2017 12:34 PM)porscheguy Wrote:  Just repped deerhunter for knowing about 3M 5200 sealant. You don't know boats unless you've bought a tube or 20 of the stuff.

Whatever floats your boat.

Post: #65

Volvo Penta is a fucking shitshow, they consistently do dumb shit like improperly ground ship big heavy things like outdrives, resulting in them getting banged up and puking fluid everywhere and having to be sent back, or sending the wrong part over and over again because someone at the warehouse put the wrong part number on a whole batch of parts, or continuing to manufacture and sell faulty expensive parts with no warranty like a common $1100 fuel pump (that has no aftermarket equivalent) that dies after a season or two. Everyone I know in the marine industry hates Volvo.

Merc is better, but they also do wacky shit from time to time. The Verado outboards are badass, but they obviously aren't cheap to buy or maintain. They recently made a diesel outboard that the coast guard is buying a ton of.

The import outboard market on the other hand really has its shit together. Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki are efficient operations, a lot of the engines are generally bulletproof, easier and cheaper to maintain, most parts are affordable (compared to merc and volvo) and available.

Obviously if you have deep pockets the sky is the limit and you can pay other people to deal with the headaches, but these days for most peoples purposes outboards are the superior choice.

Post: #66

The trimtabs were a step in the right direction. Unfortunately they highlight a new problem. My prop is shit. It's a basic 3 blade aluminum, 14 1/4 X 21P. It can't hold the water. With the tabs on the weakest setting, the prop blows out and ventilates whenever you trim the drive out more than a little. Forget about sharp turns as well. It's hitting redline at 45/46 on the GPS.

Obviously a stainless prop is in the cards, but there are many to chose from and finding prop reviews on runabouts isn't easy these days. The other issue that's related is that the early 4.3 engines (which my boat had) all had 1.84 gearing in the alpha 1 drive. My new engine is rated 15HP higher than the early engines. I think this is conservative. The newer 4.3s were available with 1.62 or 1.81 gearing. Boats like mine would have gotten the 1.62. Something a little bigger would have gotten the 1.81. It may not seem like a huge difference, but that's like changing 2-4 inches in pitch. Changing prop pitch to compensate for a gearing shortcoming is like putting large diameter tires on a care because the axle ratio is wrong. To an extent it can work, but it's not the most efficient way to solve the problem.

Props are expensive. You don't know how a prop will perform on your boat until you test it. None of the dealers around here offer demo props. So I have to make as educated of a guess as possible l, and hope I get it right:

Post: #67

Update:
I used the Mercury prop selector which is really just a glorified prop slip calculator. I did have the chance to run it on smooth water and confirmed my top speed was 45mph, and that was with it hitting the rev limiter and the throttle open to 75%. FWIW, my prop slip is 15%. That's not terrible, but I should be able to get it down to 9-10% without too much trouble. under 9% is race boat territory.

Anyway, their prop selector recommended 15 different props. To make a long story short, I opted for a Quicksilver Lightspeed 23" pitch. Quicksilver is part of Mercury. It's like AC Delco is to GM. It's a way to sell factory parts through retailers that aren't official Mercury dealers. The lightspeed prop is also sold as the Mercury Laser II, and sometimes as the Quicksilver(QS) Laser II. The QS variant in in the midst of being discontinued and Mercury may also phase out the Laser II. The Laser II retails for $550. I got the lightspeed on clearance for $300.

Due to this being a high rake prop I also had to change the trim tab anode for extra clearance.

Will update with performance data once I get it back in the water.

Post: #68

(06-24-2017 07:55 AM)Cobra Wrote:  Good on you that you didn't buy a Zebra instead.

A nice aquarium could be fun to own, and could be a nice way to reel women home, "I have to go home to feed my exotic fish, oh, hey would you want to feed my fish?"

No problem really until you have to move to a new apartment. just feed them once a day and they are good.

Post: #69

So a quick lesson about Mercury performance props. Mercury sometimes utilizes a prop ventilation system (PVS). This is a series of 3-5 holes drilled at the base of the prop barrel. Boat exhausts tend to exit through the prop barrel/ hub. These holes allow the exhaust to exit in front of the prop blades. This ventilates the blades, which lowers the resistance, allows the prop to spin up faster and once the boat is underway, the water outside water pressure prevents further gas from escaping. The ventilation stops, and the prop works efficiently.

The idea is similar to a high stall torque converter on a car. It theoretically helps smaller boats that may have two stroke engines to accelerate better. For everyone else, they're a hindrance, as you wind up spinning your wheels for a long time and not go anywhere.

So on Saturday, I ignored the coast guard small craft advisory, picked up some friends, and headed over to the Potomac. We traveled from several miles south of DC, up to about one mile north of the Key bridge. Other boats that were bigger went further but I declined since this was new territory, and we were late in the afternoon under an advisory. I didn't want to be out in poor conditions late, nor did I want to have to recover my boat on an unprotected ramp at night with the wind.

One the way back the wind had died down a bit and we were in following sea conditions. When the seas are really big, a following sea is dangerous, but when they're small, they're more comfortable than heading into the waves.

Back to the prop. Mercury has tried different sizes and shapes for their vent holes. Early lightspeed/laser props had larger rectangular holes. Now most all models use a round hole. Mine is a bastard and has a square hole. Mercury makes plugs the can completely seal off the rectangular plug holes on the old style. On the round holes, they have plugs with smaller holes, or those that can seal completely. On mine, they don't offer a solution. The prop seller sent me a pack of the rectangular plugs.

On Saturday, when I went out, I used no plugs. Acceleration was awful. Too much ventilation. Top speed was 45. Trim tabs in #2 position. Prop would ventilate with the slightest addition of trim. Water conditions were kind of rough even late when I made my attempt.

Woke up early Sunday. Removed trim tabs. Removed prop to install rubber vent plugs. Installed plugs after shaping and modifying with razor. Back in the water. Very smooth conditions. Little traffic. Acceleration improved. Top speed 51.3 @ XXXXrpm. My tach isn't providing accurate readings. It was within the specified full throttle rpm range.

Subsequent attempts to improve did not yield desired results. Acceleration got slightly worse as well. As usual, conditions deteriorated with an increase in afternoon traffic. I pulled the boat to head home. When I got home, I discovered, as I had expected, one of the vent plugs was missing.

Sunday night I picked up some jb weld. I used a series of files and sandpaper to rough up the edges and backsides of the prop vent holes. I masked off the outsides. Cleaned the area with acetone thoroughly. With an epoxy syringe, I was able to squirt the jb weld into the vent holes from the inside and build up enough beyond the edges to prevent future blowout.

Will reinstall trim tabs and do more testing in another day or two.

Post: #70

Hi, Nice boat.

Post: #71

Been a while since my last update. Since August, I have purchased three more props, rebuilt the back to back lounge seats, replaced the wood in the bow cushions, overhauled the trailer brake system, replaced the wheel bearings, and towed this thing 1000 miles to Florida and back. I had initially planned to stay in Florida for the winter, but plans fell through. I was also able to run it on the Gulf of Mexico. Running a boat I bought inoperative on Craigslist just a few months prior, in open, blue water was a sense of accomplishment. Towing it 2000 miles with a 22 year old truck and suffering no mechanical issues was also pretty impressive. I used overdrive and got 12mpg as well.

Running in 2’-4’ swells on the gulf provided a better ride than the 1’-2’ chop I frequently encounter up here on the Chesapeake.

The seating was repaired with ACX plywood from Home Depot. It was a little time consuming, but the results are decent.

Shortly after my last post I was at the marina where I keep my boat and up on a shelf I spotted a 21P mercury mirage plus prop. $250. They let me test it. I was so pleased I bought it. Although not as fast as the previous 23P Laser, acceleration and handling were much improved. The mirage plus is an evolution of the mirage. The mirage was mercury’s original high performance prop for large, high performance boats. My boat is not large, nor is it high performance in the strict sense. It’s large and high powered in terms of weight and length. It’s on the cusp of being high performance which allows it to take advantage of high performance equipment like mirage props.

When I was in Florida I picked up a quicksilver Q4 which is a rebranded Mercury Revolution 4. I wanted to try a 4 blade. The Rev4 is the most sophisticated 4 blade on the market. It was one of the first props designed on a computer first. I haven’t had enough time with it to formulate a solid opinion, but overall, it’s as good as the mirage. Need more to time to really sort out its pluses and minuses.

The other day, I picked up a second mirage plus. This one in 23P. This should be the fastest prop in my collection. But this one was used on Craigslist for $100. It looks like it’s been banged around and repaired previously. I’ll run it this weekend and decide if it needs to go to a prop shop for better repair. Now that the weather has changed, I think this weekend is it for boating. A week from now I expect to have it winterized and in storage until April.

Post: #72

Here's a good option for someone wanting to retrofit an older I/O.

These Hyundai Diesels http://www.hyundai-seasall.com/html/main/

I was at store and they had them in the show room, a lot of them are designed to fit in the space of a 4.3 or 5.7.

Post: #73

What’s the cost on that? Is it compatible with mercruiser stern drives? Even if it could, you’d still have to change the outdrive to one with a better gear ratio. You can only rely on prop pitch so far to offset the difference in rpm.

Post: #74

(06-24-2017 04:52 AM)Leonard D Neubache Wrote:  Now you get to test out the implication theory.