Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

Not sure that the subject explains much. When I stop my boat in the water
and just sit still you can hear a stream of water coming into the boat. The
boat has always taken on water but its enough that running the bilge pump
for a minute every 10-15 minutes drains it all out.

In the back of the boat there is lots of metal plates with bolts coming
through them that the outboard is attaching to, hoses attached to stuff,
etc. In this picture I have circled one small hole/puncture in the metal.
It does not appear that anything used to be connected here cause the metal
is bent around it. The opening is smaller than your pinky finger and water
just pours right in.

I can put my finger back there and stop it from coming in and I dont hear
water pouring in anywhere else. It is terribly hard to get back there to
that area, so I cant see into the hole to see what is on the other side. I
will try to take a better picture of it tonight.

Any ideas about what could have causes this? Should I just patch that hole
up with something? What could I put into the hole and then put caulk aorund
it to seal it up. My only worry would be that I would plug the hole and
that water would go somewhere else, like into the transom!

http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/leak1.jpg

Thanks,
Cameron
1987 Sea Ray Seville

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

"Ree-Yees" wrote
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/leak1.jpg

It's kind of hard to tell what we're looking at in that photo. Is that the
inside of the gimbal housing? We're talking about a 165/pre-alpha, right? (I
thought I remembered that from a previous post.) What direction is the
camera looking toward and where is it looking from?

Off the top of my head, I can think of five penetrations to the outside
through the gimbal housing: You have the exhaust and u-joint passages, the
shift cable, the trim wiring, and the cooling hose. This doesn't look much
like any of those.

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

Yeah I know that the picture is garbage. Its so far back in there that it
was hard to even get that shot.

It is a 165hp Alpha One I/O. The camera is looking from the inside the boat,
on the right side of the engine to inbehind the engine. The exhuast is
several inches down lower than the circled hole. At the same level as the
hole on the outside of the boat would be about 2 inches the top of the
outboat peice of the motor.

The hole does not look like anything ever connected there or went through
there. If something did go through there it would have been a bolt maybe
but that wouldnt explain why the metal all around the hole is bend up. It
looks like someone took a big screwdriver, crammed it through the metal and
worked it around a bit or sometihng.

I will try to get a better picture of it and the surrounding areas when I
get home so that you can tell whereabouts it is.

--C

"Joe Blizzard" wrote in message
...
"Ree-Yees" wrote
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/leak1.jpg

It's kind of hard to tell what we're looking at in that photo. Is that the
inside of the gimbal housing? We're talking about a 165/pre-alpha, right?
(I
thought I remembered that from a previous post.) What direction is the
camera looking toward and where is it looking from?

Off the top of my head, I can think of five penetrations to the outside
through the gimbal housing: You have the exhaust and u-joint passages, the
shift cable, the trim wiring, and the cooling hose. This doesn't look much
like any of those.

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

Here is a view from up high with some points labels for reference in the
closer in pictures.
http://home.comcast.net/~reeyees/hole3.jpg

Here is a view where you can start to see the hole and the points of
reference labeled
http://home.comcast.net/~reeyees/hole1.jpg

And here is as good a shot as i can get of the hole
http://home.comcast.net/~reeyees/hole2.jpg

Either some bolt used to go through here, or some tube used to go through
here, or somehow someone busted a big hole in thick metal.

I appretiate any input,
--Cameron

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

"Ree-Yees" wrote
pictures.

You left a hyphen out of your urls. These should work:
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole3.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole1.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole2.jpg

If I have my bearings correct, we're looking at a hole in the inner transom
plate, in between the water pipe and the port side stud at about the same
vertical height as the pipe. Does that sound about right? Has anybody been
shooting at you recently?

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

Darn those hyphens! Thanks for catching that.

Yeah that description of the location sounds pretty accurate.

I sure wonder what is behind the outboard peice of the motor. Does that
hole go all the way through? I need to get some kind of peice of plastic to
try to snake into the hole to see how far it goes.

Does anyone see any harm in taking something and patching that hole? Maybe
some of that stick of epoxy crap would work.

--C

"Joe Blizzard" wrote in message
...
"Ree-Yees" wrote
pictures.

You left a hyphen out of your urls. These should work:
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole3.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole1.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~ree-yees/hole2.jpg

If I have my bearings correct, we're looking at a hole in the inner
transom
plate, in between the water pipe and the port side stud at about the same
vertical height as the pipe. Does that sound about right? Has anybody been
shooting at you recently?

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

"Ree-Yees" wrote

Does anyone see any harm in taking something and patching that hole?
Maybe
some of that stick of epoxy crap would work.

That might indeed work. I've always had good luck just shooting a glob of
silicone sealer/caulk into minor stuff like that - especially if "looks"
doesn't factor into it and it's not real high pressure. For example, I have
a hole in the transom where a cable for a depth sounder (I think) went
through that just has a glob of silicone to patch it. It is below water
line, at least occasionally, and it is tight. If you think that there's a
chance in the future you might have to remove it, you can probably
scrape/drill/ream it out enough to get something through. If you get the
silicone deep into the hole or even through to the other side so it globs up
on both sides, unless there's real high pressure, that will probably be a
satisfactory, permanent fix. For welded boats, a caution is that if you
think a welded fix might be in the future, silicone can be very difficult
for the welder to clean off and therefore can prevent good weld. I don't
know how this would a apply to a fiberglass boat if a glued or glass fix is
possible in the future. This might be a vote in favor of your epoxy idea.

I've also seen holes on aluminum hull transoms semi-permanently closed
(semi- as compared to welding a patch; permanently in that they aren't a
temporary fix but intended to function indefinitely) with variations of a
bolt and nut with rubber and metal washers on each side (rubber inner/metal
outer). I have no idea if this is feasible on a wood/glass type boat.

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

"Ree-Yees" wrote
I sure wonder what is behind the outboard peice of the motor.

You should be able to see that area from the outside if you turn the drive
hard starboard (I love using these nautical terms) and look in between the
gimbal ring and the gimbal housing. It should be near the top of the u-joint
bellows. The water hose goes over top of the bellows from left to right, er,
I mean port to starboard, so you might need to try to wrestle it out of the
way to see the housing. Also, if your bellows is old and has been stored in
the trailer position a lot, it will probably tend to bunch up toward the top
and block your view.

Leaking water through the outboard of a I/O
 

Yeah the view must be blocked. I stuck some speaker wire quite a ways
through the metal but I could not see it coming through on the outside of
the boat. It could bee bunched up behind the hoses that are up at the top.

Anyways, I could get a peice of cable wire crammed in there, so I cut a
small peice and crammed it in there and put sealant all aorund it to keep
it in place. This way if I need to remove it I could just pull out the
cable wire.

I look forward to putting it in the water today to see what happens.

--C

"Joe Blizzard" wrote in message
...
"Ree-Yees" wrote
I sure wonder what is behind the outboard peice of the motor.

You should be able to see that area from the outside if you turn the drive
hard starboard (I love using these nautical terms) and look in between the
gimbal ring and the gimbal housing. It should be near the top of the
u-joint
bellows. The water hose goes over top of the bellows from left to right,
er,
I mean port to starboard, so you might need to try to wrestle it out of
the
way to see the housing. Also, if your bellows is old and has been stored
in
the trailer position a lot, it will probably tend to bunch up toward the
top
and block your view.