fishinwrench

Woah, that's a pig !

Ya mean like this...?

Oh, there is also a procedure for the reverse lock when the gearcase is removed/replaced on those models. Did you follow the procedure or just remove the bolts and drop the lower unit ? If you didn't capture the washer on the shift link you are not going to have reverse lock and the shift rod will bind up when you re-install the lower unit. It's kinda tricky.

Just looked it up. Mercury wants 159.99 for it IF you can find someone who has one. They are NLA from Merc. That's probably why someone took the low road. Good ol' Mercury Marine. Typical

That grommet is not supposed to be there. Someone has done some funny business there. LOL There is supposed to be a collet that goes OVER the water pump housing outlet. Somebody lost the collet and jerry-rigged it. That's funny.

Only when your too cheap to take it to a decent shop and get it fixed, and too busy to do it yourself. A couple hours of work is required for any trip/vacation. That motor can be fixed quicker than you could make a deal on a new one.

Matt, I strictly flyfish for them so I look for them out on the big shallow mud flats. There are certain things on the flats that congregate them but I don't wanna give that up freely online You'll figure it out if you put in a little time chasing them. Alot of guys target the mainlake points and stuff, and chase the surface blitzes, but I think I catch more and bigger ones out on the big flats.

If it is the powerhead gasket then it is lowering water pressure in the powerhead so YEAH it could cause some damage. If it is the exhaust plate it isn't going to blow the motor up....but it is only going to get worse, so it needs to be fixed.

I was doing well (Gravi) before this long period of high clear skies. Until we either get a good rain or some cloudy days I can only catch them in the late afternoon/evening.

Ahh gotcha (lower cowling). You are gonna have to remove the lower cowling and run it. It may be the powerhead or exhaust plate gasket.

If only I knew what a "trim cover" was..... Gotta pic ?

How many teams do you have normally ?

Say What ? You mean all that high-tech sonar, and the many hours of study learning to interpret it hasn't resulted in some serious fish catching success ? Who predicted that ?

A Southerly move is seriously considered every Winter Even if my shop was down there I'd have to truck my blocks back up here for boring/sleeving. There's not a better machine shop in the world than HGM in Lebanon.

I have little to no Beaver experience but falling water levels in the Fall usually kick off a good topwater bite.

You'll come out about 2k ahead vs selling/trading as is. Plus you'll get to run it awhile....(a couple years?) if you choose. There are 3 ways to "rebuild". On a fairly low hours motor you can simply repair the damaged cylinder, inspect everything else closely and re-use what you can after determining what caused the failure and rectifying THAT. OR you can have all 6 cylinders freshened up (bored or honed) and all new pistons, seals, Reed valves, plus rectifying the original cause of failure. OR you can go full-out top to bottom remanufacturing, replacing everything on the entire engine that can wear or degrade, regardless (except the crankshaft of course). Fresh paint, ect. But you only wanna go that route if you plan to keep it and pass it down to your kids because it is going to cost about 1/2 of what a new motor would cost.

True that, but loyalty should be deserved. I watch Mercury marine shove it up the butt of their loyal customers every dang day. Eighty dollar O-rings, six hundred dollar throttle position sensors, thousand dollar stator upgrade kits because the designers didn't get it right the first time. A POS tilt/trim system that should have been redesigned back in the 1980's but is still being used. I'm truly glad they exist because I have kids to put through college...... But the undying loyalty is something I just can't understand. Kinda like Ford owners I reckon. You keep pulling them out of little mudholes and towing their broke azz home.....yet the owners will always have a blue oval in their driveway.

I remember when the powers that be at Bennett spring were all begging people to please come to the meeting and the "We need to know how you feel" crap was going on. Everyone demonstrably opposed the construction they were considering but at the same time a few (myself included) was pushing for a revised definition of "fly" because the old regs had new materials on flys outlawed (so to speak). It was piddly crap.....truly. Well they gave in and revised the definition of what a "fly" could be BUT they went right ahead forward with their "new construction" initiative even though NOBODY I ever heard from was in favor of it. And then treated the whole deal like they were bending over backwards to appease the masses. WTFever!

In the end I don't think any smallmouth management rules are gonna change. I do believe they'll designate a new length and creel limit on Goggleye, but nothing else. They prolly just initiated this whole discussion because they knew if they changed Goggleye regs without altering any smallmouth regs then the SM guys would throw a tantrum. This way they thwart the tantrum before ever getting started, by asking for input that they have no intention on considering. Head games.

totally agree....but you can't tell a Merc owner anything. They have this cosmic mental block thing going on that no matter how bad they are getting screwed they just have this voice in their head saying "Black Black, the motor MUST be black".

Whether you end up buying a new motor or not you will still come out better by rebuilding the blown one (unless it shot a rod out the side of the block) because you'll only get 850.00 tops for it in it's current non-running condition. You have all Winter it sounds like, so have it rebuilt/refreshed, run it while you shop and study options, then sell it and swap to a new outboard if you want.

It feels like a spoon or heavy jig hits a hard bottom here too, but it doesn't. The puke is fluffy. Imagine a 10" blanket of feathers on a concrete floor.... If you drop a brick on it, it will land solidly.

Yep! When my pond (LO) is drawn down 5-6' in the Winter, you can see that everything below 4-6' is covered in muck. Wave action keeps the bottom substrate clean down to about 6 feet.... but the vision everyone has of well defined rocks, stumps, and logs in deeper water is a mental illusion. Anything on the floor of the lake that is on less than a 45° angle slope is all covered in a thick blanket of rotting leaves and silty puke. Fish don't wanna be there !

Victory Garden Militia

I personally wouldn't waste a minute trying to catch walleye here, but the crappie fishing should be getting good real quick....if it isn't already. I need to switch gears and see if I can find some. Talked to some guys a couple days ago that caught a nice mess in 7-12' under totally clear skies/bright day, I assume they were shooting docks.