You can get the manifolds welded. Some welding shops can.

I would replace. As a past poster said if there are internal cracks
affecting the water passages and you get water into the engine you will be
replacing a little more then the manifolds. The welder can only weld cracks
he can see and/or get to.


"James" wrote in message
hlink.net...
I have not heard of anyone brazing them. There is some success with epoxy.
It will eventually crack off but them you just do it again.

"GSS" wrote in message
ps.com...
I finally pulled my boat out of storage (way late for the summer, I
know), and discovered that I had two freeze plugs pushed out of the
block and my 1 year old exhaust manifolds had tight freeze cracks at
the back of the log. This is on a Mercruiser with a Ford 302. I
pounded the freeze plugs back into the block, and started the engine
which ran fine, but the exhaust manifolds are leaking water into the
bilge through through the cracks-not much, just steady drip. Can these
cracks be brazed shut? They are Barr Marine Cast Iron Manifolds.
Don't know if there are any cracks on the exhaust side of the manifold,
but I'll figure that out when I take them off...I know Cast Iron is
highly durable in compression and terrible in tension...the exterior
cracks are certainly tension induced from the ice expansion, so I'm
hoping the exhaust side didn't suffer any damage because it would have
been in compression.

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