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Went to the boat this week to fix all kinds of undone chores.
I decided to re-commission the engine for summer. Before starting, I looked it over pretty good—what a save that was. I noticed a little green antifreeze on the engine bed under the carb. I looked around and saw coolant dripping out of the choke plate shaft. What the#&*!!. So I pulled of the air horn and about half a cup of coolant spilled out. "This is bad news" I said(not really what I said).
Sitting and thinking the worst ie. blown head gasket, cracked block, etc., in my mind I was getting ready to start pulling off the manifold. I picked up a screwdriver and stared to loosen a hose clamp–the one that is on the hose from the t-stat housing. It turned way too easy. I said "hmmm?"(not really what I said).
I got a bottle of water and dripped it on the hose right at the clamp. I watched the water track down and over and drip off the manifold right where it would drop into the flame arrester on the carb air horn. It also had a second track that went on back and down to the carb flange. This second track is how I discovered the loose carburator bolt—the threads were stripped.
So I finally installed the MMI PCV spacer plate that I had still in the bag, and used the longer studs to through-bolt the carb to the manifold. I put 'er back together and had it running in two revolutions of cranking with full choke. That's after it had sat since October. No brag just fact.
The moral to this story is that if I had just given in to temptation and tried to crank it up with out looking carefully at the engine, I would have missed the evidence of the hose clamp leak. It would have sucked coolant into the engine cylinders and it would have taken a good deal of effort to get started after that. I also would most likely miss-diagnosed the source of the antifreeze and spent way too much time in a funk and maybe even torn down a perfectly good sealed head gasket. I do think I would have gone for the pressure test first, but still, what a drag the whole week would have been.
Who says staring at an engine won't fix it!
I got my new gas tank in and fixed a hundred things last week that were actually broken. I hope someone else can learn from this.
Happy spring all,
Russ
I decided to re-commission the engine for summer. Before starting, I looked it over pretty good—what a save that was. I noticed a little green antifreeze on the engine bed under the carb. I looked around and saw coolant dripping out of the choke plate shaft. What the#&*!!. So I pulled of the air horn and about half a cup of coolant spilled out. "This is bad news" I said(not really what I said).
Sitting and thinking the worst ie. blown head gasket, cracked block, etc., in my mind I was getting ready to start pulling off the manifold. I picked up a screwdriver and stared to loosen a hose clamp–the one that is on the hose from the t-stat housing. It turned way too easy. I said "hmmm?"(not really what I said).
I got a bottle of water and dripped it on the hose right at the clamp. I watched the water track down and over and drip off the manifold right where it would drop into the flame arrester on the carb air horn. It also had a second track that went on back and down to the carb flange. This second track is how I discovered the loose carburator bolt—the threads were stripped.
So I finally installed the MMI PCV spacer plate that I had still in the bag, and used the longer studs to through-bolt the carb to the manifold. I put 'er back together and had it running in two revolutions of cranking with full choke. That's after it had sat since October. No brag just fact.
The moral to this story is that if I had just given in to temptation and tried to crank it up with out looking carefully at the engine, I would have missed the evidence of the hose clamp leak. It would have sucked coolant into the engine cylinders and it would have taken a good deal of effort to get started after that. I also would most likely miss-diagnosed the source of the antifreeze and spent way too much time in a funk and maybe even torn down a perfectly good sealed head gasket. I do think I would have gone for the pressure test first, but still, what a drag the whole week would have been.
Who says staring at an engine won't fix it!
I got my new gas tank in and fixed a hundred things last week that were actually broken. I hope someone else can learn from this.
Happy spring all,
Russ
.
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