Hydraulic trouble.

Hi all.
After sorting out my gear problems on my BF50A and having a weeks good fishing with mates I went to move the boat around on the driveway today. I tried to trim up a little before pushing her around, and nothing. Nothing on the 'local' motor switch and again nothing on the remote controls. I felt like a dead flat battery but is not. I can get her to trim down very very slowly with the switches and she is now all the way down. I can hear the relay clicking as I push the up/ down button.
I disconnected the plug going directly to the hyd pump motor and tried directly with a fresh battery straight to the motor, no joy.
i then decided to relieve the manual hyd valve to try and lift her for a visual inspection this valve is not moving at all and I am now starting to chew up the screw head. I have ordered a new hyd motor on e-bay for I believe a pretty good price.
My delema is that how can I relieve the piston pressure to remove the trim/ tilt unit ( I can easily get to the lowest pivot bolt. Can it be removed? Can I somehow release the pressure. Have I missed something here?
I can also not easily drive to my mates workshop with the motor tilted down.
so I'm a little bit in the poo right now.
Any ideas guys?

Dean.

If you can get an impact driver in the head bolt on the relief valve, that will often loosen it. Soak it in PB Blaster or a similar penetrating oil first.

So I take it it's ok to give it a whack. I was a little worried it's a type of 'needle' valve where over tightening or direct pressure could damage the valve and valve seat. I suppose I have nothing to loose but as I can see on boats . Net that part can no longer be replaced. My old impact wrench is done in but I will pick up a new tomorrow and hope for the best. The best and only oil I can get here in Denmark is wd40 I'm hoping while it's not great stuff it will do the job.

As long as you are consistently putting pressure on it to turn out, you should be OK and not damage the needle valve. Our terminology may be different, here. To be clear, an impact driver is a spring loaded device that when you strike it with a hammer, it depresses along a spiral grove and forcefully twists the head either in or out depending on how it's set. An impact wrench is a power tool like those used to remove lug nuts from a wheel. I think the impact driver would be the better choice for a slotted screw head. It drives the blade into the screw head at the same time twisting it out. Start striking it lightly at first, then with stronger blows until it twists loose. There is always the possibility that it can break the bolt head. And, of course be sure that the driver is set to extract the bolt, not tighten it. (I've made that mistake enough times to always raise a flag about it.)

Seems that there ought to be some sort of penetrating oil available in your area. WD-40 is OK, but a penetrating oil would be better, I think.

I've had to impact drive many of them. Never broke anything. Just make sure that you're loosening the manual valve screw and not the drain.

BTW - I usually end up using the impact driver to loosen the drain screw on the lower unit od my BF 225 because it is usually stuck fairly tight. Trying to use a regular flat blade screwdriver will often bugger up the head of the bolt, but the impact driver does the trick every time without damaging the slot on the screw head.

Second that , exactly what I use also

Well I have tried an impact driver with no success I'm just tearing up the slot on the valve head. Why they placed it on the port side when most of us are right handed I don't know. The motor is tilted all the way down so I can't get to the bolt/ pin going through the hyd ram. The only way I can see that I can remove the hyd unit whole is to try and separate the motor from the stern bracket by removing my steering unit and then the tilting rod with the motor weight taken up by a hoist. I could then after removing some other small parts remove maybe the right hand stern bracket and there after the hyd unit whole as I'm hoping I can get to the ram bolt.
Its a lot of work but I see no other way to get the unit out if I can't release the pressure.
Is there not another way to drain the hydraulic fluid so I could lift/ tilt my motor with the motor still in place. All I really need to do is change out the hyd pump motor.
Many help what so ever is greatly appreciated. As you my guess this is becoming a bit of a headache. Also if I can somehow raise the motor I can drive it on the trailer to a mates workshop where he has a hoist and I keep my tools.

Dean

Deanmck,

Sorry this is going badly. I feel your pain.

Well, right next to the manual valve screw head is another screw head. Although, with the outboard in the position it is, you may not be able to get to it. And, even if you can get on it, it may be just as stuck as the manual valve. But, if you could get on it and loosen it, you could drain the fluid from there.

But then again, I would be doing all i can to get that manual valve screw loosened. If I had a "boogered" screw head like that, I would get out my myriad assortment of center and or pin punches and put the tip on the outer edge of that screw slot and hit that baby in a ccw (counterclockwise) manner to see if I could budge it that way.

I also have an assortment of automatic center punches. They are spring loaded and some of these are very aggressive with really strong springs. I have used these before to "walk" a stubborn screw, with a moloxed head, out of it's hole.

I wish you success.

Hey jgmo.
thanks for the advice. I didn't think of using a punch but why the hell not, I have nothing to loose. Just to confirm that the other screw you mean is the spool valve just forward and a tad higher than the manual valve that's pissing me off?
thanks
Dean

Yes, the spool cap would be the larger of the two caps and would be forward of the manual valve on the port side mounted pump. Just be careful as there is a whole stack of items behind it that may want to come tumbling out unexpectedly.The good news is that I don't see any big (or small) springs in there to fire things at you.

Great thanks for clearing that up.
i now feel a little more confident in my course of action.

Dean

This thing is driving me nuts.
i have the bottom bolt out as well as the upper cylinder pin. Everything is loose but the damn thing won't come out.
the shop manual says there is a 10 mm 'distance collar on the bottom mount. Does this also go through into the stern brackets? I can't even see this collar let alone remove it. My only ideas now are to run a haksaw blade thru either side of the mount or to take the motor off the boat and remove one of the stern brackets. Not easy either way.
Has anyone out there advice on what I should do next?

Dean

Na.
I have taken the motor off the boat and managed to pry the hyd unit out, what a mission.
The bolts holding the pump motor on were so corroded in I got only one of the four out using a punch. The other three broke off at the head. That's alloy, stainless, and saltwater for you. Anyway I drilled them out and retaped them. The new pump motor is on and tested, the paint is drying.
I'm hoping this project is soon over.

Dean

It seems like the hard parts in your wake. That is always a good feeling.
Congratulations on gettin' it done!

Finally it's all done.
The motor is back on the boat and home in my driveway again.
everything is back together and newly greased. It gave me the ****s a bit once everything was back on as it did not want to tilt. Topping up the oil fixed this. Thanks for the help and encouragement along the way. Without the help and advice on this forum this motor would have been on the scrap heap long ago, instead I'm expecting a few more years out of her.
Im hoping for one more days fishing this year, 80,000 trout have escaped from a local fish farm.

cheers
Dean.

V for......HAPPINESS!
GOODONYA fer stickin' it out!