Mercury 4hp 4str gets 'dunked'

[Refueler]

Pal of mine leaves his dinghy at my place for access to river via my channel. His wife presented him with a brand new Mercury 4hp 4str motor for his dinghy ..... OK - his money - but thought was there.

Today - it was only second trip with the outboard .... and about 2km upriver he fell in .... engine was swamped twice .. once falling in ... second getting sorted back in dinghy.

Now if it was one of my 2str's .... I'd stand it ... let it drain - plug out ... give it a few pulls to clear cylinder etc. Then plug in and fire it up ... let the Petroil mix do its stuff ...

But what with this 4str ?? Should he have service look at it before use again ??

 

[DownWest]

This happened after a capsize with a friends Merc 3.5. 4T
Incident on Friday, we recovered the boat on Saturday. Best chance getting it to an agent would have been Monday, so I pulled the powerhead off the leg and stripped it down. There was a lot of sea water in the crankcase.
The insurance coughed up for the rebuild, as they agreed with me that waiting another day or two could have written off the engine. Cost was only gaskets and time. This was even though he had not told them that the engine was new to replace the Tohatsu 2T that was on the policy.

Edit: Engine was not running at the time.

 

[Steve65]

Whip the powerhead off, remove sump and rocker cover, give it a good degreasing, re oil put it back together and give it a good run getting it up to temperature

 

[QBhoy]

Time is crucial. As soon as possible it needs the cover off it. Oil out it…diesel in the sump to flush…Empty that out…more diesel in sump…plug out…some 2 stroke oil or a 2 stroke petrol mix down the plug hole into cylinder. Take the carb off her next…spray or get some lubricant or 2 stroke into inlet manifold where carb was…with plug still out…pull her over a few times to expel any water. More 2 stroke Petrol mix down there again turn her over a few times. More again if you need to and let it sit in there. Pull her over often for a while after that. The diesel in the sump should get around about the bottom end and keep her lubricated.
leave her like that for a while and turn her over often. Clean out carb in the meantime and wipe her all down and cover the whole thing with something like rock oil inhibitor spray. Best of luck.

 

[jamie N]

As above, I did 'repair' a Yamaha 2.3 a few months ago which had suffered this fate. The owner had cleaned out everything fairly swiftly, but not the carb, which had become irreparable very quickly.
I fitted a new carb for about £40, which worked perfectly straightaway, and the engine seems to be none the worse for its dip.
Speed of cleaning the seawater out is the secret I believe.

 

[Refueler]

OK ... thanks guys ...

Engine has sat on transom of dinghy for approx 24hrs .....

Guy was in thermal shock ... my wife is nurse so we did all possible ... his wife \collected' him ..... (she was NOT happy about his incident).

I have spinal injury so could not take engine of dinghy ... it has sat for ~24 hrs on back of dinghy.

I have a 'private' guy who services O/Bds ............ so passed his number etc ...

Fingers crossed all ok ...

Wife of course has told him his fishing days are over !!

I of course liking fishing and boats will sort something !!