Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

[imported_John_Galt]

I have a 1988 Celebrity 181 bow-rider
It has A Chevy 4.3L V6. and alpha one out drive.


I de-winterized my boat yesterday evening.
I hooked up my muffs in the driveway and after a couple of tries she fired right up.
Everything ran good but engine ran a little hot.
I had the motor cover up and noticed a good deal of water in the bilge and it appears to be pouring out under the engine. I could not see where it was coming from.

Is this a cracked block? Freeze plugs pushed out? Some other malady that I am not mechanically inclined enough to understand?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[heatseaker1]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

its hard to tell unless you do some more investigating. Hopefully it is just a freeze plug.

 

[imported_John_Galt]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

That would be the "cheapest" thing to fix but still expensive as there is ZERO room to work under there so I have to pull entire motor or take apart from top down. Argghhh!

 

[carcraze]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Can you get your hand or finger down there to try and feel the source of water. Core plugs (freeze plugs) should be easy to feel, but I sure I would not hopefully want to find one pushed out, may be a lot more expensive than just popping one in to repair.

 

[allingeneral]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

a telescoping mirror would be helpful to look up under things as well.

 

[dannyual767]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Yes, grab some light and a mirror and get down in there to find where that water is coming from. Then come back and let us know what you find.

 

[bds85466]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

After the block was drained in the winter, were the screw in plugs retightened? There should be one on both sides on the underside of the engine. This might be a good place to start.

You definately want to locate the source of the leak to figure out if it is just a plug or a crack of some sort.

Makes sense that your engine is running a bit hot if you're losing water through the cooling system somewhere.

Not sure how your engine looks, but there may be plugs on the exhaust mani's which were pulled to drain for winter as well.

 

[imported_John_Galt]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Thanks all.
I looked up there with a mirror and it looks like Plugs popped on both sides of block.
I cannot tell if it is cracked too.

I talked to my local Marine Repair and he told me that in 15 years he has never seen a 4.3l V6 Chevy that wasn't completely shot even though the Freeze plugs popped. My 20 year old, $4000 boat will require 5k in repairs if this is the case.

That's what you get for a DIY winterize when you are a rookie boat mechanic. Expensive lesson!

 

[bds85466]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Questions remain:

When the boat was winterized, were the plugs opened and the block drained? If not you may in fact be SOL as the plugs may have pushed out and cracked things along the way. If the block was not drained, I'd find it difficult to believe that there's not more damage than simply around the plugs.

Are the plugs actually pushed out? When I summerized my boat, I didn't screw mine in completely and when I started I had some leaking. Might they just not be tight? Did you try tightening them?

Is the water coming from both of them and only them? 'Frost' plugs won't save your block in a freeze, but I'm not sure if both would pop simultaneously and nothing else would happen to the block.

 

[bjcsc]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Put new plugs in and pressure test it. It's the only way to know. The lifter valley is where they usually go...AND you can get a marine short block for a lot less than 5K...

 

[madurodave]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

5k repair my *****. do NOT pay that! do some research and save some $

 

[imported_John_Galt]

Re: Uh Oh Water pooring from Motor

Trust me madurodave I will not pay 5K for a 22 y/o boat. I bought the thing 12 years ago for $4400 and have about 2K in it.

I did find that there are 2 Freeze Plugs out. Both on either side at the front of the motor.
The only place I couldn't get to with my mirror was the rear near the out drive. But I saw no water anywhere at the rear of the motor when I ran it. I also did not see any cracks but there was no pressure to allow any cracks to be found.

I dropped the boat at a nearby marine repair (which I don't trust very much but that's all I have available at present). They are going to look at it and give me a price to fix it. I am going to see what the price is to replug the block and see if there are any cracks.
I am assuming they will tell me I need a new block but if that is the case I will just bring her home. Hell, at least I will learn how to Change out a block by myself.