MacGregorSailors.com

I second that.

Thanks for all your help and advice Mike.

G


I was pages 3-5

the motor is a suzuki 50 4 stroke....good motor as far as i know, and i have NO idea what rpm's i'm hitting...like i said we mainly putter around....i thank you for the reassurance...i was begining to wonder LOL....

ohhh the suz 50 well that will run for 10000 years at part throttle.

you guys are to kind (blush) but Im the peon I sit at my desk at the computer and make 0 dollars at it. But its fun. Shade tree mech. thats what Iam. No warrenty no money back no skoolin no problem.

I just washed the M, we need the rain, and decided to flush the Merc 50bf - new engine very low hours - because the hose was there and a cicada might have crawled into something somewhere (d@mn things are everywhere). Anyway, I threaded the hose into the port just below the cowling, turned on the water 1/2 way, started the engine, lots of water running out the lower intakes but just sputters coming out the p** port, is that normal when using the hose connection and not rabbit ears? When it was last in the lake (about 2 weeks ago), it had a good stream running there.

TANG.
Just run a wire into the pee hole to clear it out. One of the reasons
I just changed my water pump on the suz yesterday, it had weak pee stream when I flushed it last time I used it.

To tell you the truth I dont know about using flush kit instead of the cups.
My guess is that your still flushing the water system and yes it should come out the pee hole too. But I really dont know. Put some cups on it and see if things improve...But ill bet others know that post here.
How about it who uses the flush kit instead of cups?

For what it's worth...... I have the Yamaha 50 4 stroke with flush kit installed. I've put the cups on to flush the 'old fashioned' way and also got a weak stream from the pee hole. The cups I have you have to apply pressure to them to get any kind of strong stream going. When I attach the hose to the flush kit it delivers a strong stream from the pee hole as well as the water intake area.
I've beeing using the kit exclusively for a while now.

There you go answers so I guess the pee hole does have water coming out if you use the flush kit.

I use a vice on the new pair of flush cups to make the cups tighter.
but some work better than others. The square ones seem to be the worst.
as they dont seem to seal as well as the round ones.

Thanks compromise...

I was told by a lifetime johnnyrude mechanic do not apply full water pressure to your outboard during flushing, it can actually blow gaskets on your motor! As to if the new built in flushing attachments protect against this I don't know.

sleepy
I also heard this but I think it would depend on the water pressure and how much leakage around the cups. Turn it on 1/2 way and see from the pee hole the stream, if its weak turn it up. If you get steam its not good. steam means the heads very hot. That could also be the thermostat
not opening all the way either.

The thermostat should be checked when you change the impeller. It will
clog with salt.

Some people ask about how long do you flush the engine? well where I wash the boat and flush there are two bibs off the same water pipe.
so what I do is flush and wash at the same time. When Im done washing
I stop flushing. This is at least 20 min on a quick wash.
But a few mins seems to be the norm.


Water pump: when I was a kid about 10 I took a friend up into the
25 foot cabin boat my step dad had in our drive way. I wasnt allowed to play on it. But you know kids. It had twin outboards and was to tempting to not play on. I showed my friend how you start the engines. I just wanted to turn them over, but they both fired up instantly at about half throttle. I panicked and couldnt stop them. Make a long story short I fried
both water pumps. Back then killing kids when they were bad was ok, and I worried about that for a few months as my step dad didnt say a word
to me for a long time, but that look wow. I actually ran away from home
for about 6 hours when it happened. I was grounded for about 25 years
but I didnt get beat. But I heard the story about how much it cost to fix
them for years, every time the story was told to others about that stupid kid and what he did. Ever since then I loved boats, hated step dads.

On my 2003 Merc BF the hose connection covers up the pee hole so in hose mode you dont get a telltale - is yours different?

One silly thing you can do is twist up the pee hole hose under the cover when you are threading on the hose - then you get no stream of course.

Open up the cover, make sure the hose runs straight from the fuel cooler right to the pee hole assembly without any kinks....

Mine is the same as yours Stephen.

When flushing with hose hooked up, no pee stream.

G

Hey Mike I sent you a PM!

Brian

im in vegas right now and ill be back thursday night. promise...

Earlier in this thread, Frank posted an image of lights seen at night, my youngest is getting to the point where he can be left at the helm with minimal (but continuous) monitoring and we are planning to do some night fishing. So I would like to prepare him for night operations, has anyone seen a source for images of lights at night? Fishing boats, tugs and barges, waterway markings, boats at anchor, power and sail, etc. The ones I have seen always show the boat with its lights, the ones I used eons ago, just showed the lights and then the boat/mark was on the flip side with the cautions etc.

Tangentair -

For Navigation Lights basic information and pictures, I recommend going direct to "the source" - in this case the Coast Guard rules book. It is Commandant of the Coast Guard Instruction M16672.2D. You can buy the book at West Marine or Amazon, but the Coast Guard also provides it free online for download in .pdf format, here is the link:

http://www.navcen.uscg.gov/mwv/navrules/download.htm

You want section "C" for the lights and shapes rules, that is where the pictures are. But I also strongly feel that all of us on the water should be familiar with rules 1 through 37.

There is also a nifty little piece of freeware called "NavRules" available at the following link, however it does not appear to have been updated in quite some time as it cites version C of the rules (the current version is D). However, the changes between versions C and D do not have much effect on the basics of lights and shapes, except that a fishing vessel can no longer use a basket hanging from the yardarm as a dayshape for "I am fishing". It also cites Windows 95 as the required operating system. Still, if you get it to run it has good pictures and you can run a "quiz" where it shows the lights at night and then asks what boat it is.

http://www.navrules.com/index.html

I've got years of experience with these rules, including teaching them, so feel free to send me any questions.

- Andy