Corrosion...how screwed am I?

[Slice of Life]

After taking my boat out last season I noticed that the drive was very dirty and white but did not think much of it. Before last season I decided to let the current anodes last another season. Perhaps this was a mistake. Providing a new drive is not required, I will definitely be replacing them before it goes out this season (I have a new aluminum set but apparently magnesium is required for fresh water). Here are a couple pics of said of my Alpha One Gen II. Most of the paint is chipped off or can be taken off as a thin layer like a scab that's peeled off.

 

[Bt Doctur]

Do you use shore power? does your neighbor use shore power? Does someome use a household battery charger?
Is there electric on the docks? Amy and all contribute to electrolsys

 

[Slice of Life]

No to all of the above. The slip that it was in for a few months does not provide any shore power to any of the boats that are there. No battery charger was used, and no electric on the docks.

 

[Benny67]

It only appears in the areas that are filled with oil. missing ground wire on the drive? I would assume there is a grounding issue that caused the damage.

 

[tpenfield]

Looks totally screwed.

 

[Bt Doctur]

fresh or salt?
Do you paint the bottom? what type of paint? Did you use this type of paint on the outdrive?

 

[Bondo]

Ayuh,.... Scrape it off, 'n clean it abit to see just how bad it is,... Could be sealife on it, rather than loss of base metal,..??
Mine looked much worse comin' out for the season, but it was zebra mussels,....

If not stray power at the dock, Something is very wrong to cause that,....

My boat sits in sweetwater from this weekend to October, 'n don't corrode, with a battery charger hooked to it,.....
'ell even my anodes look new sized, just grey,...

 

[Slice of Life]

It's only ever been in fresh water. Yes there was a lot of nasty algae or some life form all over it and the bottom of the boat and it rubs right off for the most part. Also, I personally have never painted it and to my knowledge the previous owner did not either.

 

[gm280]

WOW I thought you were boating in some freaky acid lake seeing it. Something is surely wrong there. I've never seen a boat do that in fresh water. But like stated above, scrap off some of it to see what real damage is there. Could be bad looking but not really much damage to the metal. However, it is going to take some real prep work to get it ready to prime and paint again, and you really should prepare for that effort as well. Because if you don't, it will get worst.

 

[Slice of Life]

No Title

I looked at it just earlier and discovered that there's a metal wire that's screwed onto the drive itself on the port side, and the other side of the wire is supposed to be on the gimbal ring. It looks like it's completely cut off in half. I don't know how long it's been like other than remembering it was not cut when I first got the boat two seasons ago. Here's a pic of the the wire.

 

[Slice of Life]

Is repainting the entire drive really necessary? I'll clean it off as best I can but if it requires that much prep and work I'm not sure. I already have an oil leak that though I'm almost certain is that damn quad seal again that caused a leak last year, I still have to fix that also. The SEI-116 with the three year warranty is starting to look very tempting.

 

[Lou C]

Now you know why some people hate I/Os with a passion and will not have one no matter how expensive outboards get. You need to do two things, one get a marine electric expert to figure out why you had that corrosion, and two it needs to be taken off the boat and professionally refinished.

 

[Slice of Life]

Would this grounding wire being snapped off affect the gimbal ring and bell housing also?

 

[Bt Doctur]

What would affect it more is a trim sender wire at the housing cracked or corroded away putting 12v directly into the water inside the housing.
Does your trim gauge work and are the wires at the housing in good condition?
A way to avoid these kinds of problems is to install 2 diodes and slightly modify the wiring so that the power to the gauge is applied ONLY when the trim button is used.

 

[Slice of Life]

The trim limit/sender units with new wires were replaced OEM last season and work fine. The drive is already getting replaced due to finding the gears in bad shape in the upper unit and problems with the lower unit also. My main concern now is the transom plate, bell housing and gimbal ring. Included is a pic of the area.