Hello fellow boaters!
I am the (not currently proud) owner of a 1985 27' Sea Ray Sundancer with twin 5.0ltr 230hp engines and Alpha 1 Gen 1 Drives.
I realize not everyone will want to hear my personal boating story and what got me to this point so I'll save that for further below and just come to my question:
I think I have a leaking y-pipe on the starboard engine. I've looked all over for a replacement but I keep coming up with P/N 807130A 4. This is apparently for newer vessels though? and Mercruiser doesn't make my y-pipe any more (so I've been told).
Can I purchase this as a replacement and will it work in my vessel? From just looking at it, it doesn't seem to angle forward as much as my current pipe and I'm wondering if I need to purchase new elbows or if I can just use my current ones?
Any help on this is greatly appreciated!
___________________________________
And for those willing to hear the whole story:
I'm a first-time boat owner and bought this vessel from a marine mechanic guru type in my yacht club who had purchased the boat boat from an auction site. He got it cheap because it had "partially sunk." I never got a clear answer on why it had taken on water the first time but this mechanic replaced starters and alternators (clearly the water had come up a ways) and some wiring, did some work on the drives, and certified it repaired and sea-worthy.
The first season we owned the boat we kept it moored on a lake and got good use of it with only some problems with the electrical system... engines and drives worked well.
The 2nd season we nearly sunk on the Puget Sound when a leak developed in the y-pipe. That's what the marine mechanic shop I took it to told me anyways. I pulled the starboard engine and replaced the starters/alternators and coupler plate myself (what an experience, learned a ton). Paid the shop to do the rest of the work which included a u-joint in one of the drives, a lot of seals and gaskets, new gimble tiller(?) on the starboard side... the list goes on and on.. to the sum of about $6K. I feel pretty good about all that though as I really think the boat needed this work done.
And of course, there's the original reason we took on water in the first place.. the corroded y-pipe. The mechanic that was working on my boat told me that it could be welded and that it would be "good as new" and a hell of a lot cheaper than the $780 to buy a new replacement. Not knowing any better, I agreed.
Skip forward a couple more seasons (last summer) and I'm taking the wife out to test new controls/cables we had just installed. The boat had been sitting over the winter and this was it's first voyage out after a lot of work. I took everything slow while testing the new cables/controls and then when it all looked solid and running well, I put it up on plane. This went beautifully and I was really pleased with the performance.
I distinctly remember giving the wife a high-five and saying something like "I'll be damned, looks like we've got a fully operational vessel here!"... again, first time boat owner
I've since learned to keep such statements to the dock at the end of the day.
I'm watching the gauges carefully while on plane and suddenly notice the port engine's RPM coming out of sync with the starboard and losing power... then I notice the temperature gauge climbing. I pull both throttles to neutral and the port engine dies before I can even shut it off. At no time did I see any smoke or anything but it won't even turn over. The starter engages click click but doesn't seem to be turning over at all.
The whole way back to the dock I'm thinking I've just seized my engine and am angry/scared, feeling stupid, double guessing my actions... did I shut it down quickly enough? Was I pushing it too hard? You probably know the drill.
We get back to the dock (dry-dock storage facility) and I lift the engine compartment cover and see a ton of oil in the bilge. This scares me of course but what really caught my attention was all the water! Water is streaming in from the exact same location as last time (near the transom assembly plate area).
It's hard to put into words the anger and frustration both the wife and I felt at that moment. Let's just say I walked away from the boat that day with the intent on selling it cheap.
Right after that voyage, I had to travel for business and called a new mechanic (the old one had mysteriously gone out of business!) and asked that they inspect the engine and see what they could uncover while I was gone. Well, they called me on my trip and said the oil pan on the port engine "had come off" and that's the reason for losing all the oil. They also said, that's as far as they went with it.
And so the vessel has sat like that for a year. I know, there's a lot I should have done but I refer you to the part about being incredibly angry and frustrated. Again, I'm learning more and more with every problem I encounter and one of the big lessons I've learned is it's better to keep the emotions out of it. A clear head will solve problems, a hot one will cause them. Learning.
So now I'm facing up to the boat and getting someone to look harder at the port engine to determine if I need to replace it or what. I got a lead on a long-block for only $1,300 or so but I need more information and don't have the knowledge to analyze the situation properly. So I'm talking to a new mechanic soon I think.
As for the y-pipe and leak... I think I'm just going to pay the new mechanic to diagnose that as well and if it is the same pipe, fully replace it... which leads to my earlier question about the 807130A 4 replacement part.
Any other advice is greatly appreciated (sell it!). I don't see any way out of spending thousands more to get this boat operational again... but I've already invested so much that I'm at that point where I need to decide how far down the rabbit hole I'm going.
I am the (not currently proud) owner of a 1985 27' Sea Ray Sundancer with twin 5.0ltr 230hp engines and Alpha 1 Gen 1 Drives.
I realize not everyone will want to hear my personal boating story and what got me to this point so I'll save that for further below and just come to my question:
I think I have a leaking y-pipe on the starboard engine. I've looked all over for a replacement but I keep coming up with P/N 807130A 4. This is apparently for newer vessels though? and Mercruiser doesn't make my y-pipe any more (so I've been told).
Can I purchase this as a replacement and will it work in my vessel? From just looking at it, it doesn't seem to angle forward as much as my current pipe and I'm wondering if I need to purchase new elbows or if I can just use my current ones?
Any help on this is greatly appreciated!
___________________________________
And for those willing to hear the whole story:
I'm a first-time boat owner and bought this vessel from a marine mechanic guru type in my yacht club who had purchased the boat boat from an auction site. He got it cheap because it had "partially sunk." I never got a clear answer on why it had taken on water the first time but this mechanic replaced starters and alternators (clearly the water had come up a ways) and some wiring, did some work on the drives, and certified it repaired and sea-worthy.
The first season we owned the boat we kept it moored on a lake and got good use of it with only some problems with the electrical system... engines and drives worked well.
The 2nd season we nearly sunk on the Puget Sound when a leak developed in the y-pipe. That's what the marine mechanic shop I took it to told me anyways. I pulled the starboard engine and replaced the starters/alternators and coupler plate myself (what an experience, learned a ton). Paid the shop to do the rest of the work which included a u-joint in one of the drives, a lot of seals and gaskets, new gimble tiller(?) on the starboard side... the list goes on and on.. to the sum of about $6K. I feel pretty good about all that though as I really think the boat needed this work done.
And of course, there's the original reason we took on water in the first place.. the corroded y-pipe. The mechanic that was working on my boat told me that it could be welded and that it would be "good as new" and a hell of a lot cheaper than the $780 to buy a new replacement. Not knowing any better, I agreed.
Skip forward a couple more seasons (last summer) and I'm taking the wife out to test new controls/cables we had just installed. The boat had been sitting over the winter and this was it's first voyage out after a lot of work. I took everything slow while testing the new cables/controls and then when it all looked solid and running well, I put it up on plane. This went beautifully and I was really pleased with the performance.
I distinctly remember giving the wife a high-five and saying something like "I'll be damned, looks like we've got a fully operational vessel here!"... again, first time boat owner
I've since learned to keep such statements to the dock at the end of the day.I'm watching the gauges carefully while on plane and suddenly notice the port engine's RPM coming out of sync with the starboard and losing power... then I notice the temperature gauge climbing. I pull both throttles to neutral and the port engine dies before I can even shut it off. At no time did I see any smoke or anything but it won't even turn over. The starter engages click click but doesn't seem to be turning over at all.
The whole way back to the dock I'm thinking I've just seized my engine and am angry/scared, feeling stupid, double guessing my actions... did I shut it down quickly enough? Was I pushing it too hard? You probably know the drill.
We get back to the dock (dry-dock storage facility) and I lift the engine compartment cover and see a ton of oil in the bilge. This scares me of course but what really caught my attention was all the water! Water is streaming in from the exact same location as last time (near the transom assembly plate area).
It's hard to put into words the anger and frustration both the wife and I felt at that moment. Let's just say I walked away from the boat that day with the intent on selling it cheap.
Right after that voyage, I had to travel for business and called a new mechanic (the old one had mysteriously gone out of business!) and asked that they inspect the engine and see what they could uncover while I was gone. Well, they called me on my trip and said the oil pan on the port engine "had come off" and that's the reason for losing all the oil. They also said, that's as far as they went with it.
And so the vessel has sat like that for a year. I know, there's a lot I should have done but I refer you to the part about being incredibly angry and frustrated. Again, I'm learning more and more with every problem I encounter and one of the big lessons I've learned is it's better to keep the emotions out of it. A clear head will solve problems, a hot one will cause them. Learning.
So now I'm facing up to the boat and getting someone to look harder at the port engine to determine if I need to replace it or what. I got a lead on a long-block for only $1,300 or so but I need more information and don't have the knowledge to analyze the situation properly. So I'm talking to a new mechanic soon I think.
As for the y-pipe and leak... I think I'm just going to pay the new mechanic to diagnose that as well and if it is the same pipe, fully replace it... which leads to my earlier question about the 807130A 4 replacement part.
Any other advice is greatly appreciated (sell it!). I don't see any way out of spending thousands more to get this boat operational again... but I've already invested so much that I'm at that point where I need to decide how far down the rabbit hole I'm going.
