1990 V4 runs on two cylinders at low RPMs

goodmariner85

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The motor is tilted all the way up. I lowered it into the water. A good amount of fuel trickled into the water from gaps in the bottom of the the engine housing. I had not started the motor.

Start motor and idle at dock. I have to idle quite high or it dies. Did a drop cylinder test. Removing either top cylinder causes motor to die immediately. Removing either lower cylinder makes no difference in how the motor runs.

I wrote a post earlier stating that the motor runs very rough with a lot of white smoke at low RPMs. But above about 3000 RPM it suddenly runs smooth with just as much power as I ever got.

90 HP. compression 120-122-125-120
 

jimmbo

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May 24, 2004
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Do you have a Spark at Cylinders that can jump a 3/8" gap?
Since the 2 lower Cylinders are affected, and they share a Carb, I would start there. Since it seems to run better above 3000 rpm, start by checking the Fuel Level, and all the Idle Circuits. Likely clogged with dirt/gum/varnish
 

jimmbo

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Don't run it too much, cause if it isn't getting Fuel at low speeds, it isn't getting Oil, which becomes a real problem with a fast running Hot motor suddenly going to Low Speed
 

goodmariner85

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Thanks for the pointers. I hope I didn't damage it. I thought maybe the cylinders were getting too much fuel. But yeah maybe it's too little. I got carb kits. I'll start with the lower one. I'll measure the compression again when I put it together. Don't know if any damage I might have done will show up there anyway.
 

jimmbo

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The Carb Kit should have those 2 silver discs #2, You need to remove the old ones to get any crap out of the passages. Your carb has fixed Jets for both High and Low Speed.
Float Height needs to be checked and adjusted too
 

goodmariner85

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The hose attached to the air silencer was not attached to the motor. I see what is probably the fitting that it attaches to at the bottom of the motor. The hose is split for 1/2 or more on the loose end. I wonder what caused it.

I could trim the split part and try to reattach it, but I don't know if it will be long enough. May have to buy some fuel hose. Does it require a zip tie? would it harm anything if I put a zip tie on the hose at the fitting on the motor?

I rebuilt both carbs with kits, but have not yet reinstalled them. I did not notice anything that looked dirty or damaged at all. But even when I could see a smooth round passage with light coming through, I used carb cleaner and compressed air. Even ran some carb cleaning wires through. Really it all looked perfectly clean. The floats and needles looked fine. But, I've never looked at them before. Replaced them anyway. I was hoping the lower carb would show some sign of a problem.

The vro is disabled, but it looks the the pump is still being used somehow. It has not been replaced with a different fuel pump.

It looks like there are some normal zip ties in use in some places to secure hoses to fittings. I ordered some made specifically for hoses. I don't know how important it is, but I thought better play it safe.

I broke one of the small outlet fittings on the primer solenoid. Ordered a maintenance kit online. Many people say they are poorly made. I only need the cover with fittings. Hopefully good enough.

I'll post again after I put it back together.
 

racerone

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The cover is plastic.----Plastic is not a permanent material.----Easy fix with a new cover.----The electric primer valve was a wonderful item first came out in 1980 and could not be improved in my opinion.
 

goodmariner85

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The cover is plastic.----Plastic is not a permanent material.----Easy fix with a new cover.----The electric primer valve was a wonderful item first came out in 1980 and could not be improved in my opinion.
Maybe I wasn't clear. The electric primer seems well made. It's the particular aftermarket replacement parts (I think not Sierra in this case) that have a bad reputation in the reviews I saw. But people mostly complained about the valve and the o ring leaking. The only part I need from the kit (I think) is the new cover.

When I disassembled, I pulled off one of the small outlet hoses on the primer. That worked, but took a lot of force. The second one I tried to push off with a screw driver. The screw driver was to big and heavy. Broke the little fitting right away. I'm thinking in the future, I would slit the hose a bit to make it easy to pull off.
 

racerone

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Those primer valves are very reliable / simple.-----They have not changed the design in 25 years !!
 

tphoyt

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A little twist back and forth to break the bond before pulling on the hose usually works. If not a squirt of Wd-40 helps make it a bit more slippery.
 

goodmariner85

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I rebuilt both carbs, put it back together, and tried to start it. Mostly won't run, but finally got it to stay running, but shut it off after 20s or so because it is leaking a lot of fuel. I had the air silencer cover off. There is a fair amount of fuel pouring out of the two brass tubes pointing out of the lower part of the carb. There are two big holes on the air silencer (not the cover, but the part that bolts to the carbs) that are not threaded for bolts but are instead connected to somewhere on the carb. When running, fuel poured out of one of these holes. Also when I squeeze the priming bulb, fuel pours out of either the brass tubes or the hole in the air silencer or both.

This all happens on the lower carb. On the upper carb, the barrels, brass tubes, and hole through the air silencer are dry.

There is so much fuel pouring out, it's difficult to tell where it's coming from because it spreads. It looks a good amount of fuel is leaking out of the upper carb as well. Maybe around the gasket on the bowl. Maybe screws are too tight or too loose. I wouldn't know which.

Looks like there may be fuel leaking out of other places on the lower carb too, maybe gasket on the bowl. But everything is pretty wet.

I put a new cover on the primer solenoid. I don't see any leaking there. I don't see signs of leaking around the fuel filter, or fuel pump, or fuel manifold.

I put my finger in the fuel leaking from the hole in the air silencer. Seemed like it might have water in it. I'm not sure. I don't see how water from the cooling system could make it in there. Maybe it's not water, or it was splashed up from the exterior.

I did the same rebuild to both carbs. Replaced float, seat, and pin. Checked float level and drop. Replaced o rings. On youtube Brandon's Garage has a video of rebuilding a carb that is exactly my carb. I did more or less what's there. But, I used a set of carb cleaning wires. I also took ideas from four or five other videos of rebuilding similar carbs. I also read the OMC manual section.

If anyone has I ideas, I'd like to hear it. I plan to take the carbs back off, take them to the bench and try to find out what might be wrong.

I did not knock out the core plugs out of the carb to check the two small holes. But I did check that carb cleaner flows down. I also bent a wire and ran it through the small holes from the barrel side. I did not get any resistance or notice any junk. I'll probably knock them out this time because I'm running out of idea.
 
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Willyclay

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Sounds like "flooding" to me. The inlet needle valve is not closing properly and stopping the flow of fuel into the carbs. My first suggestion is check to see if the "floats" are set for the proper height and the needle valves are properly installed. FYI, I have seen floats become saturated with fuel and sink to the bottom of the float chamber which allows fuel to flow continuously.
 

goodmariner85

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I was wondering what might make a float go bad. I sort of assume they were hollow. But they look like a solid. Becoming saturated makes sense. But I put new floats in when rebuilding. I don't have a tool to check the height, but I did check that the top is level and that the drop is 1 to 1 1/8 as per OMC manual. Took me a while to figure out that the tab on the back of the float at the hinge can be bent to adjust drop. In the mean time I had bent the metal strip very slightly several times to adjust the level... Still in the end it was level and the drop was correct. I could buy another carb kit and start fresh.

I will check by eye to see if it looks like the needle is seating correctly. I wonder if there is a way to check if the float and needle are working correctly before I reinstall in the motor.
 

jimmbo

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Some Floats were Hollow Brass, some were Shellacked Cork, and others were like like Structural Foam. On most OMC Carbs, inverting the Carb Body, putting a Bowl Gasket on the Body, then adjusting the Float so what would normally be the Top of the Float, is even with, and parallel to the Bowl Gasket.
 

goodmariner85

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> even with, and parallel to the Bowl Gasket
Looking at my carbs and recalling what they look like and looking at videos of identical carbs, I'm guessing that my carbs don't follow that rule. It looks like what is normally the top sits about 3/16 inch below the top of the installed Gasket. It would take a good bit of bending to get it to obey this rule. But, if I can't stop the flooding, I might try anyway.

I think flooding because the needle valve does not shut seems like a good candidate. Here is a photo with red arrows pointing to where the fuel trickles out when the motor is running.
crooked_float3_show_level-reduced.jpg
When it turns over trying to start, or runs for a couple of seconds, fuel leaks out of the two brass tubes denoted by arrow (what are they called?) When I managed to get it running for several seconds, it also began to trickle out of the larger hole pointed to by the lower arrow. The red rectangle drawn at the top shows that my float was tilted around the axis of its motion. I since fixed it, but did not try in the motor.
I squirt carb cleaner into the location of the arrows in the next photo:
carb_intake_for_leaks_arrows-reduced.jpg
If I squirt carb cleaner at the red arrow it comes out of the big hole in the previous photo. If I squirt it at the white arrow, it comes out of the brass tubes shown in the previous photo. This is consistent maybe with what I saw. If the bowl is overfiling, it will first pour in at the white arrow, and later at the red arrow. And when it was running, I saw fuel first trickle out of the brass tubes and later out of the big hole. (If I understand what i have read, then that is a vent hole to make sure the surface of the reservoir in the bowl is at atmospheric pressure.)

I may have messed up the top carb already just during the rebuild since those cylinders seemed to be working well before, but now none seem to be working well. The top carb seemed to be leaking, although not flooding. I see a bit of a gap at the gasket:
gap_gasket_upper_carb_arrow-reduced.jpg
I see that gap no matter how tight or loose the screws are. Maybe it's not enough to cause a leak.
I did readjust the float on the lower carb. It now looks like this (with rectangles drawn over float):
new_adjust_side_closer_level_bar-reduced.jpg
newadjust_front_close_draw_bar-reduced.jpg
The last picture was taken after I readjusted the twist around the axis, but *before* readjusted the level seen from the side. You can see that the front is tilted up above the edge of the bowl.
I don't see how any of that would affect flooding, anyway; The pin should still shut the flow when the float rises.
One last thing, on the lower carb there is a click every time i lift the float with my finger. It doesn't feel at all the float is catching or its motion is hindered. But there is no click like this on the upper carb. I could try swapping the pieces to see what happens.

I'm thinking of rechecking the floats one last time and reinstalling and seeing what happens.
 
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tphoyt

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What did you get for kits?
I had a couple guys ask me to use the cheap kits they bought and found the needle and seats didn’t match.
 

racerone

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The float bowls are warped.-----There are aluminum replacements.-------Torque on those 4 screws is about 10 INCH LBS ---or the same as not very much.
 
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