Way2slow

I'm just not a four stroke advocate. Two strokes have a much higher power to weight ratio, much cheaper and easier to maintain. Now I will give you my very direct answer, if I was buying a new motor it would be and Evinrude E-tec. If for some unknown reason I did decide to buy a small four stroke, it would be a Honda, I wouldn't even consider any other small four stroke. Is that pointed enough?

Yes, any color other than clear oil or black from dirty oil is bad. Browns/creams is water mixed with the oil.

Make sure you store it with the motor trimed down, the motor has bleed holes all through it to keep any water from being able to puddle inside it, but it has to be trimed down, never store a boat with the motor trimed up. No, don't change the trim oil. Fogging oil is suppose to sprayed into the carbs with the motor running to properly coat all internal parts. Follow the directions on the can but normally you have to bring the motor up to approx 1500 rpm and start spraying. If more than three carbs, get two cans so you can keep a good stream going. Keep enough spraying to make the motor run extremely rough but keep it running. As the can/s get low, back the rpm down and load it up with fogging oil so it stalls the motor. Don't run it anymore until next spring, if you do, it will wash all the fogging oil you just spray in off all the internal parts you wanted to protect. The next time you use it, take a set of spark plugs with you. After running the motor on the lake for 5 - 10 minutes as medium - full rpm, change out your spark plugs. I might also add, if the boat is going to be stored indoors and not outside where it's subject to the extreme temp changes caused by solar warming during the day, I wouldn't bother with fogging the motor. Outdoor storage is where you have to be sure to everything possible to protect it. On a cold night and sunny day, you can pull the cover off the motor after a couple of hours in the sun and the motor will be soaking wet with condensation. Personally, if I wouldn't fill my tanks, I would do just the oppisite, I wouldn't leave anymore fuel in than totally necessary because the less old gas to have to deal with when getting ready to use the boat again the better. In the old metal tank days they filled them so the wouldn't develope internal condensation, but the plastic tanks don't have that problem. If the boat is going to be stored where it will be in temps below freezing, all drains and pump feeds to to be blown out with forced air or pour antifreeze in them. However, there's a bunch of other stuff I would do also but that's me.

Before getting too concerned, it may just be exhaust waste coming out. Pull the prop off and look to see if it's coming from up inside the exhaust area of the LU or if it looks like it's coming down the bearing carrier for the prop shaft. If coming from up inside, it's just exhaust waste and nothing to worry about. If it looks like it coming down the bearing carrier check the oil level in the lower unit and also check for water. First, trim the motor down to approx level and take the top plug out and see it any oil comes out, if it does, it should be black, chocolate or cream is bad news. If none comes out, get you one of the pumps that screws into a quart of gear oil and has the hose end that crews into your LU . This you can usually find for less than $15 at wally world. Then pick up a quart of 85/90, 100% synthetic gear oil. If you get the fosil based, you have to be sure to get some GL-5 rated, don't even try GL-1. When you have these, put a small pan under the LU to catch anything that comes out and take the bottom plug out, let just a little drain out to check to see if it's water or black oil, then screw the pump hose end into the plug hole, now take the top plug out and pump oil into the LU. It should only take a very small amount to make it start coming out the top, if it takes much, you probably have a $300 leak.

Where are you reading that 60 degree angle from. The diameter of the quartz element in the Xducer determines the cone angle, not the sensitity. I don't think you can even get a 60 degree angle in a single Xducer unit, 20 degree is the standard Lowrance Xducer. Even then it would only be useful in shallow water. In 20 Ft or greater, it would cover such are large area, you would have a heck of a time pinpointing the cover/structure you saw on the screen. I was cleaning out the garge and just ran across the package lit on an old 480 I have an see what you're talking about. Don't know where they are coming up with that 60 degree comment unless they are talking about the third echo you would get with a high sensitivity setting in shallow water, which is just about useless. In a normal usuable mode, 20 degrees is what you're gonna get.

Any extended warrenty is like insurance, it's Piece of Mind. You pay through the nose for it while the whole time your hopeing you never need it. For the mass majority, it's money spent with no solid return, but for those unfortunate few that do have to make a claim, it's the difference between having to make a major financial outlay or just being without a boat a few weeks. Power heads seldom break but when they do, you could be looking at $3,000 - $5,000 if you had to do a replacement. Lower units break less than powerheads but you are still looking at up to $3,500 if you have to buy another. Personnaly, I'm like cart7, I never buy any extended warrenties and have never regretted not buying one, but with my electronics and mechanical backgournd I can fix just about anything man made.

My guess would be that old and small of a Chrysler does not have water intakes you can put muffs on. If it does, they come in a couple off different sizes, for small and large motors, you would want to find a set of the small. The only thing, you can't tweek carbs and tune a motor on muffs. The back pressure created by the motor setting in water at the same depth as on the boat makes a huge difference in the way the carbs will adjust and the way the motor will run. A motor also has to be loaded when tweeking carbs etc. Motors can run great while on muffs or in neutral but as soon as you put them under a load, they fall on their face. Out of the water or in neutral a motor can over rev just on timing advance when not loaded so you never even start opening the carb to see how it works.

Lowrance does not sell batteries so they had nothing other than your satisfaction with their product to gain by telling you not to run your sonar off the TM battery. Yes, many people with small boats that only runs one battery run their TM and Sonar off the same battery and don't see a problem. Like the old thing, my grandpaw did it, my paw did it so there's nothing wrong with me doing it, just ain't quit right. There are many problems that can be created by running your sonar off the same battery as the TM but since you don't believe the engineers that made the thing, I dang sure ain't gonna waste my time trying to explain them.

Short answer, any oil that meets TC-W3 specs can be run in any water cooled two cycle motor. Notice I said water cooled, don't use TC-W oils (the W is for Water) in air cooled two strokes. Now, are all TC-W3 oils made the same, "NO". Would I use just any TC-W3 oil in my outboard "NO" Cheap oils are cheap for a reason, they don't have all the wear preventing and carbon/gum reducing additives the better oils have. Pensoil might make oils for 20 different brand names, but that doesn't mean the same thing goes into each brand. You also have three basic types, Fosil based, 100% synthetic, and blends of fosil based and synthetic. Fosil based being the cheaper, 100% synthetic the most expensive and the blends somewhere in between. Even among the three basic types there are big differences in additives that diffent brand names use. Now you will hear all kinds of testamonies as to which is best, but I don't buy anything cheaper than Pensoil. I run 100% synthetic in everything I have but my Rude and run the factory recommended Evinrude oil in it.

I've got it. Javelin R20 DC w/225 Rude. It's fast, handles good, roomy, carries a heavy load very well, has nice lines, rides good, and paid for. This boat is a fishing boat, I take care of the working parts but I don't get upset when it gets dirty (I wash and polish it at least once a year whether it needs it or not) or scratched and the brown water line around the hull doesn't bother me. Bet none of those paying dearly for their Rangers, Tritons, etc can begin to say most of those things. Ride and roomy, yes, but scratched and dirty???

Coast Guard establashies guidlines for max hp rating. The manufactor sets the hp rating they feel is safe for their hulls, many times this is well below what the Coast Guard max allowed. Console boats with a steering wheel are safer to drive than tiller or stick so it's not uncommon to see them with a higher hp rating. Most manufactors lower the hp limit on their entry level boats. Theirs just too much insurance liability involved to rate everything at what the Coast Guard would allow.

A flasher will show any and everything a LCD will, it just does it in realtime and does not make a history of what it see's. It's just a matter of knowing what you are seeing when you see all those little lines. First to see the thermocline, you will need to have the gain fairly high. The thermocline can show up as one heavy line or a number of narrow lines close together but will basically maintain the same depth as you are moving.

Let me clarify something about the charging at 80%. If you're not going to be using the boat for 24 or more hours, go ahead and plug the charger up regardless of the percent of discharge. You don't want to let it sit more than 24 hours with the batteries at any level of discharge. Also, leave the charger plugged in 24/7 when not using the boat. Just be sure to check the water once a month (and only ad distilled water) and keep them clean and dry (wash them with a little baking soda from time to time). It's also a good idea to disconnect everything from the batteries except the charger when you're putting the boat away for an extended time, like for the winter.

If it's a pad-V and it don't chine walking, it ain't going fast enough to fully get up on the pad. Like Cart7 mentioned, setup and load balance goes a long way toward minimizing it, but learing to drive is the only way to stop it. Mine might run 75 one day and never try to walk and then want to get squirrely the next time at 65.

As mentioned, it will never make a great fishing platform, but you might be able to make it usable to some degree. The first and formost is if you can add a bow mount trolling motor, if the bow is not too high to find one with a long enough shaft. This is going to be somewhat expensive if get one to reach the water because you're probably going to need and remote power drive unit with electric raise and lower since you probably don't have reasonable access to the bow while in the boat. A TM is the only way your going to be able to control the boat while fishing. Double anchoring is the only way you're going to be able to hold the boat while trying to fish stationary. You drop one anchor before you get to you spot, go past your spot a little ways and drop a second, then pull back toward the first anchor to your spot. The anchors need to be out at least 45 degrees or more to hold the boat. As for Trolling, they make a unit you can bolt onto the motor that drops down behind the prop to kill a lot of the prop output. This will slow the boat down enough to let you be able to troll. You can also throw out a wind sock (drift anchor), the drag from those will also slow the boat down but you have to be carefull with your lines getting into it. You can make it somewhat fishable but will never be fully happy with it as a fishing boat, other than just drift fishing or getting the speed down and trolling. It will never make a convenient boat to anchor or for casting.

Well, you just complicated things a little. I noticed the Cabela's and BPS chargers don't have the charge indicators. My PM PT 300's have the same indicators built in, their remote charge indicator has that show's full charger, 50% and 20% and was thinking those had that also, which would at least give you some indication. There are a number of companies that make charge indicators, some that can be wired in and used to check the batteries by flipping a switch. The ProMariner remote gives you and idication but that's about all. Any of them will work because they connect to the batteries, not the charger so you don't have to worry about them working with which ever charger you pick. A digital volt meter will work also. All you have to do is take a voltage reading on the battery. Most new, fully charged deep cycle batteries will have approx 12.8 VDC when fully charged and let sit for 24 hours after charging. Each 0.1 volt drop from that is approx 10 percent so if your battery had 12.8 VDC and was at 12.3 VDC after use, it would be at approx 50%. These are just rough numbers but are more than close enough to serve your purpose. If it's showing more than 12.84 VDC, it still has some some residual overcharge left from the charger. Just to clear that up, all chargers over charge a battery. It's necessary to over charge one a few percent to get it to full charge. Just them cheap chargers over charge one too much if left connected too long. If I remember, I think BPS used to have a cheap MinnKota unit to give you a % of charge.

12/24/36 means that since it's a three bank charger it will work on all three, 12 volt, 24 volt or 36 volt system. In your case it just means it will charge both TM batteries and the cranking battery. Don't get confused thinking a ProMariner built charger is a 5 amp per bank charger when they say 5/5/5 per bank with a total of 15 amps. Unlike other chargers, it transfers it's output to the battery/s needing it. Since the cranking battery charges up fairly quickly, when it's fully charged, it transfers that output to the TM batteries and charges them a 7.5 amps each, instead of just the 5 amps. That is there On Demand Charging system. My personal pick for a small charger would be this the Cabela's ProSport 20 plus http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/pod/horizontal-pod.jsp?id=0019015&navCount=6&parentId=cat600056&masterpathid=&navAction=push&cmCat=MainCatcat21276-cat600056&parentType=index&indexId=cat600056&rid=. This one will give you a full 10 amps for each TM battery once the cranking battery tops off. This can make a difference if you come in one night after heavy use and plan to go back out the next morning. My first pick and the only onboard I've run for years is the ProMariner ProTourny 300 three bank, just not too sure your looking for that much of a charger. That sucker will fully charge you batteries in about four hours. As for charging partially discharged batteries. It's recommend you not charge a battery that has greater than 80% charge on it. I no longer fish all day, I go at or just before daylight and fish until I've had enough, usally about noon time. I go in, clean the fish we kept that morning, eat, take about an hours nap, and do things around the house until about 4:30 when I go back out and fish till dark or later. If my batteries are not down to 80%, I leave them alone and don't plug up the charge until I come in the next day at noon. I pretty much have to run my TM on high the whole time to have my batteries below 80% in just one trip, and that's usually when chasing schooling fish. I guess I should also mention I run a Curtis Digital Batttery Charge Indicator that shows me the charge level of my batteries in 10% increments so it's pretty simple for me, that's also about a $200 toy. In reality the monitor lights on the charger or a remote monitor will show you charge level in 25% increments and is all you need. As the memory thing. Lead acid batteries will not develope a memory, NiCads are about the only ones you have to worry about for that and don't know of a NiCad Tm battery. It's just recommended you not charge a lead acid battery with greater than 80 charger and never run one down below 20% charge to get max life out of the plates.

Personnaly, I would use a three bank charger. Your motor will almost never keep the cranking battery fully charged. Plus when stored, the three bank will maintain all three, otherwise you would have to have a maintainer for the third battery. With most any good onboard charger, you should plug it in and leave it while the boat is parked, just be sure to maintain the batteries, clean, dry and water in them. The size depends on how fast you want to be able to charge them. If you have eight to ten hours between trips, a six amp per bank ProMariner (BPS or Cabela's brand made by them) should work fine. If you need quicker charging time, then you should look at the ProMariner ProTourny 300. I know this next comment is going to ruffles feathers with the Dual Pro supporters and others but the ProMariner six amp per bank will actually charge as fast if not faster than the Dual Pro 10 amp per bank. As for connecting to the battery, how the batteries are connected in the boat has no bearing on how the charger will connect to them. The charger will connect to each individual battery. No matter how batteries are connected, each battery is still only a 12 volt battery as long as a charger is connected to that battery.

You can always T a guage into the output of the fuel pump and see what it's doing. If it's not maintain at least 5 psi, it's not going to feed that motor. One little problem comes into play when the pressure drops on those carbs. If the air box is still on it, I think those carbs have .062" main jets feeding the motor, but only have .052" orfices in the needle seats to let gas into the bowls. Needless to say, for a .052 inch hole to pass as much gas as a .062 inch hole, the gas feeding the smaller hole has to be pressurized. Any guage that will let you read 5 - 7 psi easily will work, I use a 15 psi, doesn't have to be a special guage just because it's fuel, pressure is pressure. You might also want to take some voltage readings to make sure your pump is getting plenty of power. Could just be a bad connection or switch. The pump I mentioned is about $75 and get you one of those kits to hook up driving lights for about $15 and it will give you everything you need to add a relay, just throw the switch that comes with it in your spare parts junk box. Go too small trying to save a dollar and it will probably melt a piston due to leaning the motot out from lack of fuel.

I doubt it was just running on the gas left in the carbs. Those gas thirsty loops will barely crank on what little gas is in the carbs. Most likely the pump was pumping a small amount of fuel, just was not making pressure or much volume, (probably why you couldn't hear it running). When you nailed the gas, the pump couldn't keep up then. It takes approx 5.5 psi and about 30 gph minimum to feed that motor. Personnaly, I would have installed a relay to turn the pump on and off with with the key switch. I run the Carter 7 psi @ 75 gph on them and run them on a relay.

If it wasn't one of these, don't leave it connect. http://www.batterychargers.com/itemlist.cfm?cid=2 There is a huge difference between the "Smart" charger and the Auto shut off.

You can always just put an electric pump on it, 4.5 psi and 20 ghp should run that motor.

Vent holes should have no affect on WOT rpm. If the motor is only turning 5,200 rpm, you have a problem. This could be in the form of the motor being over prop'd (too much pitch), the prop has blade/s rolled, or the motor is down on power, could be as simple as throttle cable out of adjustment and not opening the throttle plates fully. For some reason, many people think if they go to a bigger prop, they will get more speed, but usually the reverse happens. My first check would be to get on some web sites and ask others with your same outfit, what pitch prop they are running and what their WOT rpm is. If several say they're running the same motor, hull and prop and turning close max rpm, then I would suspect a bad prop or weak motor. If they're turning a smaller pitch to get the rpm, then you will need to also

Cars don't use deep cycle batteries and don't waste your money on a "car battery". If you are refering to a Deep cycle Marine or Trolling motor battery, that's what you need to be using. The best of them is the Trojan SCS 225. A good cheap battery is Wally Worlds big yellow battery. Unless you run a lot on high, these will run you most of the day, if you mainly keep the TM at a slow casting speed.

They can be recharged after use and you are suppose to change out the charge ever so often, I think it's 6 months on the one I bought, automatic Suspends. Haven't changed it yet but I think it's about $20 a pop.