BF50 w/kidney stone

[argonaut]

Someday I'm gonna shock you and post something about sailing.
My BF50 has a stone.

Just rebuilt all three carbs, reassembled, and she started first crank and purred like a kitty again.
But-
Now there's no telltale (peeing) going on. Carumba.
This engine was at the shop before I ran into the starting problem having the impeller replaced, I haven't used it since it came home, so unless I toasted it when I was trying to get it started it's not that.
I'm using thouse round earmuffs... lots of water spraying out around the edges, but none from the pee hole after 3-4 minutes. Engine running about 800rpms.
Did I wait long enough? How long should it take to start peeing?
Maybe I just dont have enough water pressure?

When you use muffs on the BF50 do you tape over the flat grating just underneath where the muffs go?
How hard it the lower unit to pull?

[kmclemore]

I haven't worked on the Honda, but on the Tohatsu (Nissan) if I have the muffs on and I push normal water pressure I get water out the 'pee' tube on mine, even when she's running at normal idle. So... not that you want to hear this... it could be that even though your motor is running great you still need a water pump impeller. (If the motor was run 'dry' for any period of time, like while it was being tuned up, you could have a damaged impeller.) They aren't that expensive, but can sometimes be a pain to change.

Of course, the other alternative - and I've see this happen lots of times - some sort of bug gets up inside the tube, makes a nest, and clogs the darned thing. See if you can run a very thin wire up through it while pushing water and the motor's running.. it may suddenly clear.

[Moe]

If there is an auxiliary water intake besides the ones you put the muffs on (as there is on the Suzuki DF50), you probably need to tape it up when using the muffs. That's what the Suzuki manual says.

--
Moe

[msshene]

put a piece of duct tape over the plastic water intake above the prop on the bottom side of the horizontal part of the lower end, then use your muffs and it should pee. If not I would say you ran it dry and damaged the impeller. Good luck.

[Tom Spohn]

On my Nissan 50 the peeing stopped one day. Turns out that there is a rubber hose inside the case that connects the water jacket with the external pee hole that had come off. It was peeing all right--inside the case! Trimmed the rubber hose, reconnected and it ran perfect.

[kmclemore]

On my Nissan 50 the peeing stopped one day. Turns out that there is a rubber hose inside the case that connects the water jacket with the external pee hole that had come off. It was peeing all right--inside the case! Trimmed the rubber hose, reconnected and it ran perfect.

Ha... same thing happened to mine too, Tom... I suspect that's a Tohatsu/Nissan inherent flaw.

[Catigale]

My BF stopped peeing because I had twisted the pee hole putting the hose on it and had kinked the internal plastic hose..

Have to take the cover off to see it, but it was simple to fix.

[argonaut]

I was about to give up & drop the lower unit when I tried one more time and the dang thing peed. ??!!
Used muffs and unpulgged the little hose that used to run from my lower unit to a cruddy old rusted speedometer. I'd junked the gauge, and plugged off the hose with a tie-wrap.
But trying again, using a tank instead of muffs, unplugged, it refused to pee.
Just slightly touched the throttle and it started peeing again.
Plugging & unplugging the hose has no affect on the stream and I cant feel and pressure or suction on the old speedo hose.
I thoroughly chased out the pee hose several times, but never found anything up there. I even ran some wire all the way up into the block. It's like some weird priming problem.
What's the tube up to the block like, does it have anything that could get clogged or seals that could be leaking air?

To bad a bilge pump can't be tapped in an emergency.

It's not just the exit pee hole on top being plugged because when it doesn't work the two little pee holes under the stabilizer fin also don't pee.

Aggggghhhhhh!

[PeteC]

Did they check the thermostat when the engine was serviced?

It is possible it is salted up and not passing enough water to "pee".

Mine had a fair amount of salt with only light use.

[argonaut]

They didn't, I did today and though it looked cruddy It also didn't pee with it taken out.
Probably replacing it anyway though. I'm not convinced it completely blocks the path to the engine block.

[Don]

You have to put tape over the water intake above the prop as described by msshene above, to get it to pee at idle.

[argonaut]

Thanks Don.
I'd taped off that grating with duct tape but maybe it wasn't a tight enough seal.
I have a big plastic rubbermaid container that I filled to tank test it.
Same problem with water 3" over the fins, but with a little throttle it starts to pee.
I think there's a slight air leak somewhere making the priming not work very well.
I'm gonna drop the lower unit & have a look.

[Catigale]

Before you rev that engine up to check the water flow, check your manual for recommending operating procedures.

The Mercury BF manual says to run the engine at idle only when using either muffs or the hose to water your engine.

[Mark Prouty]

Of course, the other alternative - and I've see this happen lots of times - some sort of bug gets up inside the tube, makes a nest, and clogs the darned thing. See if you can run a very thin wire up through it while pushing water and the motor's running.. it may suddenly clear.

I haven't seen it with bugs but with sand. On my Mercury 70hp, this has occured numerous times. I poke a wire up the pee hole and it takes care if it. I shut the engine off and restart it a couple of times and she pees good as ever.

[Paul S]

I have put earmuffs on our honda 50. Water pees fine. When we got the motor, it did not pee. the impeller was damaged (it was run dry before we took delivery).


Paul