Re: Merc 3.0 carb cost?
I found a couple older posts that MAY be the answer for both Johny12 and me (if Johny12's "carb is weak" issue pertains to acceleration), and perhaps for many others who have the "bogging" on acceleration, or hesitation issue. It seems to be a major problem & frustration for many boaters, regardless of engine model (can't count the hours I've spent reading dozens of posts on this one issue), and people end up spending lots of time and money chasing their tails trying to solve this issue. Would like your opinion, Walt, or that of any others who may have knowledge of this particular recommended "cure."
In a 3/27/11 post, a poster stated that Mercruiser tech support recommends drilling out the accelerator pump ports (the two ports where the accelerator pump shoots gas into the carb venturi) to 1/16" (0.0625"). On another, older post (if I remember correctly), someone reported success drilling out those ports to 0.040" and said that helped. This is supposed to compensate for use of gas containing ethanol. And then in two later posts, 4/12/11 and 3/16/12, success was reported by 2 dif. individuals using this modification. (I presume these numbers, 0.040" and 0.0625" refer to just the 2GC models, and other carbs may require different size port mods?).
Two questions: 1) If I use ethanol-free "marine" gasoline, should that negate the need to do this carb modification? And 2) If I do this modification, or have a carb shop do it (my preference - take it to a pro), do you think it will actually work, if all other variables have been accounted for (ignition point gap, dwell, timing, distributor advance, good ethanol-free gas, etc.)?
I'm just about to try ethanol-free gasoline for the first time since the rebuilt of both engine & carb. I want to see how the performance improves, before I launch into more down time, waste $$, and maybe destroy an otherwise perfectly good pro rebuilt carb.
