JeremyJudd
Recruit
- Joined
- Aug 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1
Hi all - this is my first post. I'm new to the forums and new to boats. I picked up a 1960 Reinell runabout a couple of weeks ago, took my boaters safety course (longest four hours of my life) and hit the water.
The good news - both the motors seem to run!
Not so good news - the 18 HP 1964 Evinrude fires up easy, and purrs like a kitten. But no water circulation!
So, determined to learn a thing or two about boat motors, I looked around on the threads here at iboats and realized the most likely candidate was the impeller. I set about removing the five bolts necessary to replace the impeller, and, unfortunately, one of the heads broke off of the upper bolt (the four lower bolts came out no problem). Several hours and one broken easy-out later, I decided that if I was going to replace the impeller, I was going to need some help from a machine shop.
So I started thinking, well, what if it ISN'T the impeller??? So I dug around upstairs a bit in the motor, and realized that (contrary to my neighbors well intentioned advice), these old fellas do have a thermostat. And this one was old, worn, and completely toast. I pulled the thermostat, fired it up again and waited about a 30 seconds and water ran through. Hurray!
So I ordered up a new thermostat and put her together. Fired up the motor in the trash can, ran it up to operating temp, and WHALLAH! water started circulating. But it didn't seem like very much to me. Same neighbor said to me, "hey, it's fine, it's got water coming out. You are good to go!". So I took it out on to the boat launch, puttered out to the bay with the larger motor, fired up the 18 HP Evinrude, and it ran great... until I saw white smoke start rolling out of the engine compartment. So I immediately killed the engine and came home a broken man...
So, next thought is to get the bolt removed and a helicoil inserted by the local machine shop and replace the impeller. My best guess is that while water is circulating, it's simply not circulating enough to keep everything cool.
Any other thoughts or suggestions? Would love an easier fix...and of course this assumes I don't have much larger problems now to due overheating earlier today....
The good news - both the motors seem to run!
Not so good news - the 18 HP 1964 Evinrude fires up easy, and purrs like a kitten. But no water circulation!
So, determined to learn a thing or two about boat motors, I looked around on the threads here at iboats and realized the most likely candidate was the impeller. I set about removing the five bolts necessary to replace the impeller, and, unfortunately, one of the heads broke off of the upper bolt (the four lower bolts came out no problem). Several hours and one broken easy-out later, I decided that if I was going to replace the impeller, I was going to need some help from a machine shop.
So I started thinking, well, what if it ISN'T the impeller??? So I dug around upstairs a bit in the motor, and realized that (contrary to my neighbors well intentioned advice), these old fellas do have a thermostat. And this one was old, worn, and completely toast. I pulled the thermostat, fired it up again and waited about a 30 seconds and water ran through. Hurray!
So I ordered up a new thermostat and put her together. Fired up the motor in the trash can, ran it up to operating temp, and WHALLAH! water started circulating. But it didn't seem like very much to me. Same neighbor said to me, "hey, it's fine, it's got water coming out. You are good to go!". So I took it out on to the boat launch, puttered out to the bay with the larger motor, fired up the 18 HP Evinrude, and it ran great... until I saw white smoke start rolling out of the engine compartment. So I immediately killed the engine and came home a broken man...
So, next thought is to get the bolt removed and a helicoil inserted by the local machine shop and replace the impeller. My best guess is that while water is circulating, it's simply not circulating enough to keep everything cool.
Any other thoughts or suggestions? Would love an easier fix...and of course this assumes I don't have much larger problems now to due overheating earlier today....
