Rebuilding a 43L after Hurricane Ike

"John;
Only one question: Did

"John;
Only one question: Did you leak test your exhaust manifolds?
Since you had a bent con rod, water got into at least one cylinder somehow. And if your shutters were doing their job, that points to a possibly leaky manifold.
Worth checking in my mind.

Rod"

"Question on electric fuel pum

"Question on electric fuel pump

Does the electric fuel pump 'pump' continuously when the key is on? Or does it turn off when an alarm situation is present?

The reason I ask is that right now when I turn the engine over (not starting yet, just testing things) the fuel pump does not humm. Is this because the oil pressure is low and being deliberately left off or do I have a wiring problem? Is there a fuse on my boats panel for fuel pump perhaps? (just thought of that, otherwise I would have checked)

I ran a 12v lead straight from the batt to the pump to make sure it still worked and it pumped fine."

Follow the fuel pump 12 vdc wi

Follow the fuel pump 12 vdc wire and find the quick connector to see if it's corroded.

"Ayuh,...

The fuelpump is p

"Ayuh,...

The fuelpump is powered only when there's oil pressure present,..
Or from the little terminal on the starter, when starting.."

"Well, it's working now.

"Well, it's working now. I played around and traced around and all of a sudden one of the times I turned the key it came on! Let off the starter and left the key in the on position and the pump ran for about 5 seconds and then turned off. Like it was supposed to.

Tested several more times and in most cases it did just what I described. A few times though the pump came on and ran indefinately until I turned off the key. Perhaps on those times I had achieved the oil pressure needed so it wasn't relying on the terminal from the starter?

Wish I know what I did to make it start working. Going to go over all the wiring to find a loose or corroded connection. The purple wire from the on/off switch on my throttle did look very loose during my inspection. Perhaps?"

"It started!

Picked up my c

"It started!

Picked up my coil wire and spark plugs today. Made sure the gap was right and got everything ready to fire it over.

First few attempts turned over nicely but no fire. Disconnected the fuel line from the carb and found it was dry. I'm sure there's a better way to prime things but I did it by sucking on the fuel line to the tank, then put my thumb on the line and reattached it to the filter. Ran a 12v to the pump and let it run for about a minute until FINALLY gas squirted out by the carb. Reattached the line.

Tried to fire it over again. The battery was dying so still no fire.

I had planned to install dual batteries so I needed to buy the second one anyway. So off I go to the parts store for a new battery. (Yeah, could jumped the one I had off, but as I said, was planning getting two anyway) Once I had it installed I gave it another go.

FIRE! It hadn't turned over maybe two times before it growled back to life.

I need to tweak the timing a little and work on the idle (it dies below 900rpm, suppose this could be timing as well?) but it looks like this 4.3 has a second life.

I DO have a small oil leak between the oil pan and the timing chain cover. I suppose something didn't seat right. Put some gasket sealant around the area so we'll see what it looks like tomorrow.

Shoved a water hose in the inlet on the transom (lower unit is still on the workbench) and the temp leveled out at 170 so I guess everythings good as far as cooling's concerned.

Still nervous about everything, expecting something to crater any second since this was my first ever engine rebuild, but so far, so good."

"Regarding the alignment

Go

"Regarding the alignment

Got my $30 ebay purchased alignment tool in today too. When I insert it, it does go all the way into the splines, but with a little scrape sound.

Should it go in with zero scrape sound, or is the fact that it goes in all the way enough to say it's aligned? No real force is required to insert it, but there's definate scrape.

Also, when adjusting the mounts to realign things, how much adjusting are we talking here? I went up, and down, a full 360 on the nut and didn't really see a difference.
"

"Great work Mark. Did the eng

"Great work Mark. Did the engine have a 170 deg. F thermostat before? If it's a RWC engine, I think it calls for a 143 deg. F thermostat.

Grease the alignment tool w/white lithium grease and insert it. Remove it to see if the spline marks on it are even all around it. Raise the front of the engine if there is little grease on the top side of the tool and vice versa for the bottom of it."

"I went with the serial number

"I went with the serial number to a mercury parts shop and that's what they gave me. I assume it's right.

On to my next problem... Timing. I did what I thought was the right way to set the timing, but it starts to sputter and nearly backfire when I try to bring it up over 1600rpm or so. It does appear that the timing is advancing because it's at 10degrees BTDC at idle (650) and when I bring it up to around 1500 it's at least 15 degrees more advanced.

When I drop back to idle it's running smooth.

Any one have any suggestions?

I have the thunderbolt V ignition system."

Is 10 deg. BTDC what the manua

Is 10 deg. BTDC what the manual calls for. I have an 87 43.L and it is set @ 8 deg. BTDC. Some models require the timing be set to base mode first. Don't know your model ignition.

"Yes, 10 deg BTDC is what the

"Yes, 10 deg BTDC is what the manual states. Also, there was already a white line marked at 10 degrees so I'm betting it's right.

First, an update...

One thing I did not replace was the roller lifters and the pushrods.. they seemed ok. I started wondering about them so I went ahead and opened up the intake manifold to check things out. Lo and behold cylinder four exhaust pushrod was bent into an S shape. No damage to the heads luckily.

I went ahead and replaced all the lifters and all the pushrods with new.

Now, here's the rub. According to the manual it gives specific instructions on tightening the rockers.

Set the engine at TDC for Cylinder 1 and tighten certain rockers, then spin it 360 where Cylinder 6 is at TDC and tighten the others. To tighten it says to bolt it down until there is no looseness on the pushrod, then tighten 360 from there.

Well, I did that this time. And while running the engine I was constantly re-tightening rocker arms. They'd keep rattling loose.

So.... On my 1999 4.3 with roller lifters, do I do what my manual states, or is my manual wrong and I'm supposed to torque them down? I went ahead and tightened them all down and it seems to be running fine again.

And on to the next issue.... it's running better than it did with the S shaped pushrod on 4, but it still sputters at about 2100rpm. Any further on the throttle brings backfires.

What am I doing wrong? Perhaps I have to run it below 2000rpm until things all seat nicely? (And yes, I don't claim to be a master mechanic so please, hold your laughter to a minimum.)"

"Addendum... My gut feeling i

"Addendum... My gut feeling is my timing is off, or maybe there's a problem with the carb (which also is untouched).

I set the timing with a timing light with the purple/yellow wire grounded (supposedly disabling the auto-advance?)

An interesting thing now that I've rebuilt everything after the lifter/pushrod replacement is that after I set the timing and then unground the purple/yellow wire, it's not advancing as far as it did at higher rpm's. Before the re-rebuild it would advance 30 degrees or more at high rpm, now it only advances about 20 degrees.

Again... maybe my timing is off?"

"Weekend update...

Turns ou

"Weekend update...

Turns out the rockers are torqued to 22ft lbs. The crap Seloc manual and the 1994 merc manual did talk about doing the no lash/360 more thing. I found a 1999 merc manual #25 online at alt.mercury that set me straight.

On the Seloc manual... you guys were right. I can understand maybe having some details omitted, but to have info that is completely WRONG? Garbage.

Anyway, after setting the rockers to 22lbs it still performed badly.

Went to my machinist to pick his brain a bit on my issues and he pointed to either the carb or the ignition sensor in the distributor. So jumped into the carb. Took it apart and found that the float bowl was clean as a wistle. He theorized it may be gunked up with bad gas. Cleaned all the parts anyway and put it all back together. No luck. Still sputters at about 1800 rpm.

Stressing over the possibility that I did something really stupid like putting a piston in backwards, etc I started digging back into things.

Took the heads off and found that in my #6 cylinder there was foamed up oil (white stuff that happens when water and oil mix) on the head.

I was this far into it and had a weekend before I could order anything anyway, decided to keep going. Pulled the engine out of the boat, again.

Everything looked ok inside but while I was here thought I'd check the main and rod bearings.

Mains were in great shape. Pistons 6 and 4's bearings were badly scored. #4 had a groove in the middle of the bearing, and #6 had major scuff marks on the top and the bottom.

Replaced those bearings and started putting everything back together. Theorized the white gunk oil in #6 was caused by a bad seal on the head gasket, so this time I was triple sure all surfaces and gaskets were clean. Also, this time I was extra generous on the thread sealant on the head bolts too.

This morning I put the engine back in the boat, re-aligned it and slapped on the lower unit (went on so much easier this time, guess practice pays off eh?)

Fired it off and this time it immediately was able to go over 1800rpm, 2000, 2500.. anything, no problem!

After 15 minutes of running on the water hose I was convinced it was time to go for a test drive.

It ran great! I didn't go over about 3200 rpm as this was 'break in' time.

After about an hour of tooling around I did start to hear a rapping sound. I identified the area to be in the rocker arm covers. I figured one of the rockers had loosened so I took off the cover (brought ALL my tools with me)

Found the #6 intake rocker to be loose. Upon second glance I discovered WHY it was loose. The pushrod had 'pushed' clean through the rocker arm.

Ok,so why did this happen? I replaced lifters and pushrods, but did not replace rockers. Guess I should have?

I was able to putter back to the dock (2 miles) keeping it under 1800rpm.

Going to get the price on rocker arms tomorrow. If not too much I'm replacing them all.

Overall, I was pleased with the performance. I give it a B+ with a U in conduct though."

were the heads checked for cra

were the heads checked for cracks?

your sticking the valves in th

your sticking the valves in the head would be the most likely reason. The "oil primer" is a gutted dist that you install and use a drill to "prime " the oil galleries. it helps prevent having dry bearings on initial start up.using assembly lube is not perfect.

"Yes, I had them 'magnaflu

"Yes, I had them 'magnafluxed' by the machine shop. the heads and the block. All checked out.

And yes, I did not prime it as I should have. Live and learn the expensive and time consuming way.

Ordered all 12 new rocker arms today. They were only $5 each luckily.

Good news is my oil is water free now, and the water coming out the exhaust on startup is oil free. Gotta be a good sign."