Throwing in the towel

I'm getting a little tired of wrenching instead of boating.

My prop shaft slide out of the tranny today and the prop hit the rudder. Every blade on the prop is bent. I got the shaft back in and was able to come in under my own power, but it was vibrating like crazy. Anyone ever attempt to straighten a prop on your own?

After sitting for 20 minutes to fix the prop shaft the engine had the same problem as before with a hard to turn over issue. After trying several times I did get it to turn over and crank and just like before it was hard to keep idling. The two hours before it had run flawlessly. It took almost two more hours to idle back to the ramp and the boat ran great at 1,400 rpms. But as soon as I tried to idle in ramp area, it was impossible to keep running. When cranking at this point it would easily turn over, but just wouldn't fire. Stupid. Spitting nails.

So outside of obviously fixing the prop, I'm going to try messing more with the carb. I was given a fully functional Holly 650 tonight and I'm going to try it next time to see if the experience is any different.

But I'd really like to just throw in the towel. It's summer now and I'm just ready to use the boat.

Ah man, sorry to hear that. I get the same way with things. It sucks when we can't use our toys. I had a prop that was a little bent. Not sure how bad yours is but I have a shop here in town that said they could send my prop off and get it straight and balanced for $120. If you want me to ask where he sends his props, I could get you a name/number???

Thanks Brad. I appreciate that. We have a prop shop here in town so I'll be taking it there most likely. I know the prop can be restored, but it's the hard starting and then poor running after that which is making me so frustrated. The prop is just the icing on the cake.

After sleeping on it, I really think that the carb might be the issue. Instead of heat being the issue, it might be that when I sit after running for a while that carb is leaking fuel into the cylinders and loading up. Thus making the engine hard to turn over at first but then when I can get it turning over, whatever the carb situation is could be causing the poor performance. I've heard guys on this forum hate on the Holley carbs because they're so tough to dial in. I'm not a carb guy so I may not be dialed in correctly.

I'm hoping that's it anyway.

Maybe look into one of those insulating spacer from edelbrock?

What do you mean by hard to turn over? Does this have electronic ignition conversion on it?

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Originally Posted by TitanTn

After sleeping on it, I really think that the carb might be the issue. Instead of heat being the issue, it might be that when I sit after running for a while that carb is leaking fuel into the cylinders and loading up. Thus making the engine hard to turn over at first but then when I can get it turning over, whatever the carb situation is could be causing the poor performance. I've heard guys on this forum hate on the Holley carbs because they're so tough to dial in. I'm not a carb guy so I may not be dialed in correctly.

I'm hoping that's it anyway.

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Sounds to me you are heading in the right direction with the thought of the carb. Sometimes it is hard when on land to test things to find out on the lake they are still out of adjustment. My thought is the carb is loading up on raw fuel causing the hard starts and rough idle. Have you pulled a plug to check the colour. My bet they are fuel washed black and also part of the issue.

The season is young and don't get too frustrated. A few hours of work and you will running across the lake effortlessly.

The most common issue with a Holley that makes it run poorly all of a sudden is a blown power valve. It's a very easy check/fix, but the bowl has to come off to check it, which means you need a gasket on hand in case the old gasket is destroyed removing it.

Sorry about the prop. For the price, a prop shop is the way to go, though. They will get it measured straight, instead of just "eyeballed" straight.

I agree with GJD it only takes one back fire to blow the power valve . Also make sure you float levels are not too high. If it happens again pull the trans disconnect knob and pull the throttle back about half way and crank it that should clear any flooding.

I've never been good at diagnostics, so I'll defer to the experts. Good luck man, I hate to hear you're having such a hard time with this.

I've got to pull a prop as well. Yay.

Bummer. I'm still in the early season work phase as well. As in the other thread on carb issues, I've decided to buy a wedge spacer to level the carb. If you're flooding the carb, there's usually only 2 paths, the power valve, (as already stated) and it doesn't have to be blown to be leaking, if someone used the wrong gasket on the power valve fuel will leak around it. The other is the boosters. Can be either the front or back boosters that are dripping fuel. In my case it's one of the front boosters, and while I'm pretty sure it'll fix by lowering the float yet again, I'd rather fix the problem properly than band aid it. The boosters can be leaking due to too high fuel pressure, too high float level, or a throttle plate that isn't fully closed. I thought the last one might be the case with me, but it continues to drip after the boat is shut down, so I'm pretty sure the fuel level is just too high.

With the boat idling, look down the carb and look for fuel dripping, from what I've seen on other forums, it's very common. If it continues to drip after the motor is shut down, it's pretty much guaranteed to be a float level issue, and if it stops then it could be a bent throttle plate or shaft, or you're curb idle is set way to high. I saw on another forum that someone fixed the issue by turning the idle mixture screws way out (like six turns IIRC) because the idle circuit was just not supplying enough fuel, so the curb idle had to be set high, then it was forced to idle by pulling fuel through the boosters, it's definitely worth a try before you start pulling the carb apart. That's where I'm headed next.

One more thing on the hard start. When you're having the issue, run a jumper wire straight from battery hot (the battery side of the solenoid is the perfect place) straight to your coil, and see how that goes. In my case it fires right up, and it will run when I remove the jumper, but it won't start without. Guess who's troubleshooting the ignition at the next visit? It's possible that someone put an ignition coil in that has internal resistance so you have essentially 2 ballast resistors, I suspect that's my problem, but I haven't had a chance to get at it. My boat is 3 hours away so I can only work on it when I'm at the cottage.

Good luck, it ran before, it'll run again.

BTW how did the shaft come off? did it pull out of the coupling or did the coupling come off the transmission?

What is your base timing??? Too far advanced timing makes hard work for the starter...

I appreciate all of the responses. Good ideas and I'll continue to look into all options. I do think there are carb issues, and it might be the cause of everything, or maybe not, but I know I need to solve the carb issues and go from there. I got the donor carb on today, but it has some minor leaks and needs tuning at least - if not more. I'm just not a carb tuner. I can do the basics, but it's so tough to troubleshoot something when you're not experienced. You never know if the test was conclusive or if you just screwed it up because you don't know. So the bottom line is that I'm taking it to someone. Throwing in the towel.

Here are the pics of the prop.

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