"Greg" wrote in message
...
I have become a big fan of a water pressure guage. I would have seen my
overheating problem coming on long before the beeper went off.

Yea same here Greg - it can help you the other way too - it can reassure you
that the water circulation is adequate when you otherwise might not be able
to tell.

Recently, I was "kind of stuck" in some shallow mucky water with the wind
picking up and being against us as we tried to get back into the channel.
We weren't getting the job done pushing and delay would make the situation
worse - not dangerous, but just more and more difficult to remedy,
eventually impossible. Really had no choice but to use the motor in a
situation where we normally wouldn't. Luckily, the bottom was marshy mud
stuff, nothing that would cause damage. I did however get an over heat
alarm and when it sounded I saw the pressure was very low, nearly 0. So I
quickly shut down and cleared the intake as best I could (this was an
exciting time - wind getting stronger, situation getting worse, wife
excited, trying to get into deeper water). I started and really had to run
the motor in spite of the alarm continuing. But I saw that the pressure
gauge was indicating normal pressure, so I took the leap of faith that
circulating water was the best remedy for a hot engine - and ran the engine
in order to get out of the shallows.

Within a few very short moments (less than a minute), the alarm quit. This
was the greatest feeling - the pressure gauge really paid off in a real life
situation where I otherwise would have just had to shut down for fear of
serious overheat. Also, a situation where the pressure gauge was probably
more useful than a temp gauge would have been.

For some reason, even though the pressure gauge is T-d off the same water
source as the tell tale, it hasn't gotten clogged like the tell tale and has
been much more reliable.