Head is brown on white block...

[Mark42]

The head on my 85hp Force is brown. The engine is originally white. Do the white heads brown from normal use? I know from the previous owner it overheated back in 2004 and the head was milled with new gasket. Do you think the head is brown from the overheating or is it normal for the white paint to discolor over time.

 

[Frank Acampora]

Re: Head is brown on white block...

That's pretty typical on overheated white heads. He must have heated the hell out of it to turn so dark though. Does the engine run well? Overheating for any significant time can score the cylinder liners. Although lightly scored cylinder liners will deliver adequate compression and performance, heavy scoring requires a re-bore job.

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[Mark42]

Re: Head is brown on white block...

The previous owner had a Seloc manual where he documented eveything. Seems he overheated in 04 and had the head worked on, new gasket and impeller changed.

So its been a few years since that work, and I just got 130 psi on all 3 cylinders with a compression check (without adding any oil to the cylinder). I fired up the motor, ran about 5 minutes on the muffs, the shut off, and did each cylinder compression check at that time. So it is a fair run-time compression check.

I am leaning towards thinking the paint burned when he motor overheated.

Thanks,

Mark