how much water is too much ??

[Gods Favor VIP 1800]

I have a question for those who have I/O 3.0 litre mercruiser outdrive .
When we first got our boat we took it out to a local lake for about 2.5 hours .
After we pulled the boat out of the water I opened the drain plug and from what I observed at least 3 to 4 gallons of water drained out . It this much normal when no water entered the boat through any other means ?
I wondered if I might have a leaking bellows ? If I put the boat back in the water can I shine flash light in the engine bay and transom area and possibly see if it is leaking .
How do you know if you have a bellows leak ?

Any help would be awesome !!

thanks

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[UTgws]

Re: how much water is too much ??

If you started out with the bilge dry and no one was getting in the water and then back into the boat there should have been no water come out when you pulled the plug. There could be several ways for the water to get in, bellows, open petcock on the engine block, plugs out on the exhaust manifold or elbow, etc. You can open the engine dog house and visually inspect when the boat is in the water, just use caution if the engine is running.

 

[Gods Favor VIP 1800]

Re: how much water is too much ??

If I have the motor hooked up to bunny ears to run it on the water hose
would this show me any of the problem spots you suggested? Or do I need to
have the hull in the water? If it was only 3 or 4 gallons in say 2 1/2 hours it
must be fairly slow or small leak. It may be hard to locate ....
Is it difficult to install the bellows kit yourself?? I know the out drive has to be removed,
but other than that 1 to 10 difficulty??...

Thanks for the help

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[JUSTINTIME]

Re: how much water is too much ??

dip the boat on trailer and look for leaks and listen for leaks
then start motor and look and feel

 

[Gods Favor VIP 1800]

Re: how much water is too much ??

I took the dog house cover off last night to just look around for anything obvious. I found a few questionable spots to investigate further. A few around
the rear hull area that look like someone had run silicone caulking around .
My speedo does not work so I was looking at the water pickup . It does not looked plugged up but the hose going thru the hull could be my culprit here.
A real good go over with the water hose from outside, then inspect the inside
close. If that comes up dry then I will run it on the ears and look around with all the covers removed to see if it is a mechanical leak and not in the hull....
If still no luck I'll drop it in the lake and repeat last steps ....

Thanks for the input

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[Gods Favor VIP 1800]

Re: how much water is too much ??

Luckily I found the leak! It was coming in very slowly around the depth finder
mounting bracket on the lower right side hull . I made a new gasket and installed
new stainless hardware and silicone caulked the whole deal ... Dry as bone now....


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