Shift Cable woes, and winterizing engine

[BlueLightSpecial]

Ok, this is my first boat, and my first post. I purchased my Galaxy in the begining of november. The next day I had her out on the river to try her out. I only was out for like 30 minutes, and when trying to liner her up with the trailer, my shift cable broke. needless to say i had to row to get it close enough to winch it back on. My real question is this. How do I identify the cable length. The local marina said that the length is printed on the cable housing. I looked at as much of the cable housing that i could, and could not find any numbers. Im really hoping that I dont have to pull the cable to measure, as i was hoping to use the original cable to pull the new one through. Is it possible to figure out the length by boat length? My boat is 19'. Maybe i would need something like a 15' cable? My other question is this. Did i winterize the engine enough. After reading the "Adults only" thread, i decided to winterize NOT using the muffs. My boat has the AQ225D, which im sure you know is a chevy small block. I drained each side of the block, one drain per side, and both manifold drains. While the drain plugs were out i pulled hoses, and started dumping -50 af into the hoses until the af started to come out of the drains. Then i reinstalled the plugs and continued filling with af until the hoses were full. I also pulled the thermostat housing and filled the block to the top of the intake. I used 5 gallons of af, total. I also made sure to fill the hoses from the raw water pump too. I fogged the cylinders individually, and put the spark plugs in after fogging. Did i do enough?

Sorry for the long post, sometimes i have a habit of sharing info that isnt exactly important to the actual question. My appologies

 

[captmello]

Re: Shift Cable woes, and winterizing engine

Welcome!

Re: winterizing, it sounds like you've overkilled it plenty. If you read the winterizing info posted by Don, you should be in good shape.

RE: shift cable, I found numbers on mine at the outdrive end of my old shift cable. If you need to pull the old one out to measure, maybe you could tie a piece of rope to one end so you still have something to pull the new one through after pulling out the old one.

 

[BlueLightSpecial]

Re: Shift Cable woes, and winterizing engine

Thanks CaptMello! I was thinking about taping some mechanics wire to the old one if need be. Plus I like the overkilled comment! I guess I am worried because it seems the number one problem I was seeing with alot of used boats I was looking at, was boats with cracked blocks, or the previous owners look at you funny when you ask if they winterized every year... kind of a deer in headlights look. Thanks again!

Josh