Blown Head Gasket?

Another weekend on the river here in MS, and more bad luck :( . Had the 86 Sunsport running beautifully for a nice day of wakeboarding and cruising, everything seemed to be great. Still having some starting issues that should be solved by new battery cables. (Slow turning over, slower when the motor's hot, battery cables are hot.) After pulling her out of the water, I removed the center drain plug and it was covered in oil. The left side of the bilge from the stringers down looked like they had been sprayed with oil the length of the engine block. I checked the dipstick, and there was almost no oil in the pan, good news is there was no sign of water in the oil. Next weekend will tell for sure, i just hate to have to tear this engine apart :???:

Have you checked the gasket? If you have no water in oil that doesn't sound like a head gasket. I would check all the gaskets before taking the motor apart. Like the timing chain,valve cover, front main seal,rear main seal (if you have signs of oil between the motor and trans). Also the oil filter, I have had that happen to me before with my truck

Why do you think its a head gasket? I had the motor sag and the oil drain hose fitting
on the bottom of the pan was hitting the bilge floor. What a oil mess I replaced the hose assb and realign the engine never had a problem since.

I will take a closer look when there is better light, we pulled the boat out just a little before dusk, so it was dark. I suspected the head gasket because it appeared the oil had sprayed out of the left side of the engine at about the level where the head meets the block.

It sounds like you've got bigger problems at the moment but I'd also rethink the starting issue as well unless you can see that something is definitely wrong with the cables. The cables getting hot is most likely the result of the starter dragging and not a problem with the cables themselves. I would guess that the bushings in the starter motor are worn out and causing problems with the bendix engaging and disengaging and also making it much harder to spin.

Starting issue - pull the starter and have it checked - same for battery, replace cables if they look in anyway suspect.

as for the oil leak - I would NOT suspect the head gasket - hook up a garden hose to your water inlet and run the boat in the driveway on a sunny day - fill up the oil before you start it....

clean up the engine and bilge with simple green or similar, then start it and look for leaks.

I would suspect it's the valve cover gasket on that side of the engine - or, it could be oil pan, or fuel pump, or timing cover, or front crankshaft seal.

Hey all, finally got out to do some trouble shooting this weekend and found where the oil is coming from. Oil is being blown out of the end of the dipstick when at any RPMs above idle. Oil s also being blown into the flame arrestor via the hoses coming out of the PCV valves on both of the valve covers. Its pretty bad at high power settings, and I have determined I need to do a compression test, as I'm suspecting blown rings in at least one cylinder. I've got another 60+ hour work week ahead of me so I will try to work on the boat when i get a chance during the week, or next saturday.