sterndrive noise again

oGaryo

oGaryo

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May be my mind at play but pretty sure the sterndrive jas an unusual noise after hitting a wave today with a thump. Slightly more pronounced with the drive trimmed down. No noise at displacement speed. No noise increase when turning the wheel. Gimbal bearing dislodged slightly? Will keep an ear out the next few trips out
 
Are you sure you not being paranoid? Displacement speeds are good....
If you need too, Im about tomorrow, we could tug her out and pull the leg off, won't take more than a couple of hours.
 
If you mean drive trimmed right in hard, then there may be a little more noise as it's hard up against the stops. Trim it out a little. If it stops, it's purely your drive has hit the limit and the wave pushed it hard in.
 
" Gimbal bearing dislodged slightly? "

There is more chance of you winning the lottery ?



More probably a classic case of "LEGAPHOBIA".
Symptons are...

A constant worry that any faint and hardly discernable "new" noise (which probably has always been there) is going to result in the boat having to come out of the water ...again and the nagging feeling that something was not put back right during rebuild.

This afflicts ALL boat owners at some point.

The cure...get out there and USE the ****** thing and DARE it to break cos one way or the other your going to get some boating in this season . :)
 
Last edited:
oldgit said:
" Gimbal bearing dislodged slightly? "

There is more chance of you winning the lottery ?



More probably a classic case of "LEGAPHOBIA".
Symptons are...

A constant worry that any faint and hardly discernable "new" noise (which probably has always been there) is going to result in the boat having to come out of the water ...again and the nagging feeling that something was not put back right during rebuild.

This afflicts ALL boat owners at some point.

The cure...get out there and USE the ****** thing and DARE it to break cos one way or the other your going to get some boating in this season . :)
Click to expand...

+1 :D

Easy to get paranoid. One where in the diesel trade we say "let it develop". In other words ignore it until it the fault has developed to the point of total un-ambiguity.

I guarantee the noise will not be present when someone comes to give a second opinion and you will look a berk. :D

The number of times I have heard a punter say "well it WAS making the noise until you came for a listen".
 
Hopefully the others are right Gary! Over sensitive ears maybe? Fingers crossed.

We're you on the hamble yesterday afternoon? Saw one like you at the harbour masters pontoon yesterday???
 
oGaryo said:
unusual noise after hitting a wave today with a thump.
Click to expand...
Did you "follow" the boat with the throttle a bit, while hitting that wave?
As I understand, you were NOT actually re-entering after a jump, right?
Because that's the typical situation where you can break stuff inside an outdrive, if you don't play correctly with the throttle: release it upon take off, and ALSO re-accelerate exactly when landing, to avoid extreme peak loads on the transmission. The logic is that you should always try to adapt the engine power to each sudden loss/gain of prop speed.
Also when hitting a wave badly, the boat looses speed, and if you don't release the throttle, the net result is a peak load on the transmission.
Mind, actually I've always heard of these damages happening when the outdrive goes out/in the water - which otoh doesn't necessarily take a jump to happen...
Good luck!
 
MapisM said:
Did you "follow" the boat with the throttle a bit, while hitting that wave?
As I understand, you were NOT actually re-entering after a jump, right?
Because that's the typical situation where you can break stuff inside an outdrive, if you don't play correctly with the throttle: release it upon take off, and ALSO re-accelerate exactly when landing, to avoid extreme peak loads on the transmission. The logic is that you should always try to adapt the engine power to each sudden loss/gain of prop speed.
Also when hitting a wave badly, the boat looses speed, and if you don't release the throttle, the net result is a peak load on the transmission.
Mind, actually I've always heard of these damages happening when the outdrive goes out/in the water - which otoh doesn't necessarily take a jump to happen...
Good luck!
Click to expand...


Rubber insert on the alpha prop so it would spin on the bush rather than overload the transmission.
 
Nah, the hub protection isn't always good enough.
Truth be told, most of the damages I was talking about are more common with Bravos (whose props also have the hub anyway), but that's just because they're mated with big blocks.
Believe it or not, a friend of mine on the lake experienced exactly what I was saying with a 5.7 engine+Alpha.
Jumped a ferry wake, got scared while flying, and didn't accelerate again upon re-entry. The result was a pretty expensive repair bill... :(
 
thanks for the advice guys.. back home oooop north now so will see what the next few run outs bring.. probably as said, me being paranoid, could even be a simple case of something getting dislodged in the aft locker and vibrating when the leg was hard in.. the boat didn't leave the water and rather than a wave, it was the wake of the red funnel ferry in the southampton river.

Howard, may have been us buddy, but were on the Port Hamble fuel berth with the harbour master rather than warsash jetty (a ship was on that one with lots of sticks and canvas).

cheers Gary
 
Think it musta been someone else cos it was over by the pump out station on the Warsash side about 3 ish on saturday afternoon.

just as we went out of the river the two sail training vessels were coming in acompanied by the harbour master and plenty of little boats too!
 
Hey Gary we're in a Parallel Universe! almost...

Hi Gary, firstly congratulations, I have been reading your threads and must say I am very envious but very happy for you as well.

The reason I started reading your threads is that I am looking at a 1990 Bayliner Capri for my first boat and the one I've found has upper drive/gimble bearing issues, the guy who is selling it lists the problems as "gimble bearing, bellows, shift cable, uni-joint and upper drive unit, are all in need of attention!"

After speaking with him he said he was out on the water and when coming back in heard a noise from the upper drive unit, he had someone look at it and they advised the above due to a bellow giving up and sea water ingress.

The boat looks superb for the year, everything intact and in good clean condition, the engine (3.0L Mercruiser and Alpha One leg) has just been serviced after having the head reconditioned and new battery and starter fitted.

Would you say it was worth buying? I have a strong mechanical background and have been through your thread on this problem and feel very confident that I can tackle this with out much grief, I already own every tool required or motortrade equivalent BUT have to say I wouldn't be anywhere near this confident if it wasn't for this thread and everyones input.

I see you have moved onto the desirable Rinker Fiesta Vee which would be my first choice if I had that kind of money to play with but what about your Capri? Was it a good first boat to "ahem" learn the ropes?
 
I'd say it was worth a purchase at the price you mentioned in the PM... on the basis that if you needed to fit a new alpha 1 sterndrive you'd still be in good shape financially for the whole package.. I owned a 1750 Capri with alpha 1 gen 2 and 3.0l engine.. I too replaced the head gasket (much easier than on a car)... it's a reliable lump albeit a little unrefined but do check it out, especially the risers.. a tell tale sign of the water jacket going in the exhaust risers is rust streaks where the metal meets the rubber pipe going down the back of the engine, may just be the gasket gone but could also be a thinning of the riser itself which can lead to significant issues if not changed.

Suggest you have someone drop the leg and look at the damage, if the leak was apparent over a long term it may be more than just the list of items the current owner has mentioned.. you may also have pitting of the gears due to water damage and possible pressure loss within the drive if seals have been affected (simple to test with a vacuum / pressure pump).. but as said, at the purchase price, it's worth a gamble in my opinion.

if you're not adverse to rolling your sleeves up you can download electronic versions of the maintenance manuals for both the drive and the engine

We had our boat for less than one season as we decided bombing about from A to B wasn't as pleasurable as getting to B and doing stuff there.. video of our Capri here.



good luck on Sunday and a warm welcome to the forum:cool:
 
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