She's makin a new noise captain' !!

J3ff

Just cruising around youtube... 

This guy says the sound was no his gimbal bearing.. hmm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTJq2uRS2n8

This one says it was a bad ujoin cap, whatever that is.. not sure it's the exact same noise though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7oi0db_jG4&t=14s

reneechris14

A bad u joint cap will shred your bellows. If theres pieces flying around.

J3ff

Either way, people seem to be saying to keep it at the dock till fixed. I've already taken it out 3 times with the noise (hey, gotta get out there!) Tempted to risk it this weekend one day and then again on the 4th of July. 

Called the three major boat places here and they all said they are booked for weeks. At this point it just needs to last two more outings. Feeling good about that seatow payment I made! 

RustyS

Pretty sure my friends failed due to some water intrusion. Some water had gotten into the bellows cavity (long story as to how/why it was there). And, I'm thinking the water had set in there all winter and the water broke down the grease in the sealed bearing to the point of creating the growl/train noise.

I wouldn't risk traveling too far with a bearing sounding like that. If that thing decides to fail you will probably be losing the coupler, trashing driveshaft & u-joints, then tearing bellows, and then needing more than Sea Tow; you will need air bags to get her off the bottom!

You're a daring man @J3ff! Good luck to you!

rasbury

well....what else are you likely to tear up if you don't do the repair if the bearing completely fails? Sounds like it could get real expensive....the bearing is what 50 bucks, pull the out drive, pull the bearing and push a new one on.....couple hundred vs lord knows how much if that bearing comes apart...just sayin....

J3ff

rasbury said:

well....what else are you likely to tear up if you don't do the repair if the bearing completely fails? Sounds like it could get real expensive....the bearing is what 50 bucks, pull the out drive, pull the bearing and push a new one on.....couple hundred vs lord knows how much if that bearing comes apart...just sayin....

Easy to say for people w/ a trailer I'm at the mercy of the local marina's, all 5 of them told me today that they are booked for weeks!

J3ff

RustyS said:

Pretty sure my friends failed due to some water intrusion. Some water had gotten into the bellows cavity (long story as to how/why it was there). And, I'm thinking the water had set in there all winter and the water broke down the grease in the sealed bearing to the point of creating the growl/train noise.

I wouldn't risk traveling too far with a bearing sounding like that. If that thing decides to fail you will probably be losing the coupler, trashing driveshaft & u-joints, then tearing bellows, and then needing more than Sea Tow; you will need air bags to get her off the bottom!

You're a daring man @J3ff! Good luck to you!

Wouldn't mind hearing how water got in there. Called Merc. they said that the only reason it usually fails is water gets in.. so now I'm wondering if it's full of water and what other damage may be under there. 

J3ff

Willhound said:

J3ff said:

It really doesn't make sense that it would be the coupler... I found another post on club sea ray where Merc replaced his entire outdrive, which did no solve the problem. In the end he said "The gimbal bearing was just tearing up the transom plate." So they replaced the transom assembly.. sure hope that isn't my problem here! 

ordering this now: https://www.harborfreight.com/air-grease-gun-219.html

@reneechris14 thanks for the pic. Didn't know those were there, always thought the coupler was sealed. @J3ff I don't know about you but I'll certainly give it a try. Your post above is worst case scenario but I don't think we're there yet. Throw some grease at it.

Lmk how you do - waiting for the grease gun from Amazon, will be in tomorrow and will go down and see if it has the zerk on Friday.. 

rasbury

If you can get the boat pulled and they will let you work on it in the yard, it's a pretty simple job ( can't believe I'm saying that) but you do have to have the aligning tool...you can get a slide hammer from an auto parts store....bearing should be easy to find...

J3ff

I've got the alignment tool... I personally checked it each winter for alignment.. was fine each time. Thinking hard about what might have happened, I was in some shallow water with the out drive up anchored both front and back and I did at one point have a wave come up and either the very rear bottom of the boat, or the drive hit the bottom, just a gentle bump but it def. happened. Wonder if that would have done enough damage to let some water get in there... 

rasbury

Nah, I would not think so...that out drive has to take a beating... now if your trimmed to high in shallow water and giving it the gas...that will do it...I know you want to be in the water but.. .

J3ff

How would that do it? I rarely trim high and run at the same time, but may have had to do that once in the last month.. 

rasbury

I'm not 100% but something to do with the angle and the bearing floats a bit in the race. I'm sure someone else will chime in but that may have been your culprit  it ain't worth screwing up a bunch more stuff in my humble opinion. I don't have the money to risk a more expensive repair.  

J3ff

My main mechanic is on vacation, will call him Monday but pretty sure he's going to tell me too bad.. what a pain. 

212rowboat

so that gimbal bearing allows for a touch of angle from the shaft, and yeah- it's my understanding that the main culprit for blowing them out is trimming too high- like in trailering mode- which loads one side and at a goofy angle, allowing the other side to break the bearings seal and ingest whatever is there- air, water- or expel grease... which is to say you've lit a fuse.  

as i mentioned several posts back the seal is the likely culprit- leading to the difficulty-short-of-failure...  

what you're going to find is your boat isn't going to like a particular angle of trim, and that range will grow until it's every 'angle'.  what you'll also find is it ain't going to like RPM's in that range.  meaning, it will seize, stopping the engine.  however, you can usually run at a low RPM with a straight up seized gimbal bearing so long as you have some grease in there, and for a decently long time. 

the last thing you want is the gimbal bearing to break free and spin in its seat.  if you score that seat, you're going to have bearing issues regularly from now until the end of time. 

your call.  a bearing is a fairly simple fix.  a transom plate ain't a simple fix.  i'd guess you could get many hours out of it without issue so long as it's greased and you run low and slow at an angle it agrees with, but... at no more than a 80/20 chance of getting by with it.  that 20 is a mighty expensive oops.  

J3ff

If I could find someone to haul it out and replace it tomorrow that would be what is being done, however no one in town is available for "weeks"

I know all the ins and outs of replacing that transom mount and everything inbetween ... At this point it really only has to run at full lowered position for about 3 hours total, it's 25 mins to the spot and back and the plan was to take it out Sunday, Monday and one day for fireworks. After that I'm getting on a plane to go start a new job in FL and wont be back for three weeks, when back the boat will be hauled out and put on a trailer and head south itself. 

The question becomes "If it can make it for those three hours of use, does it get fixed up here in CT or wait till FL" up here the guys are busy as ever, can barely get them on the phone. I know down in the keys right now it's kind of their down time.. will call around tomorrow and see if anyone will do the job real quick before it goes in the water down there. 

RustyS

@J3ff If they will pull her out and leave in the straps you could have this completed in a couple of hours. $100 gimble bearing.....

My conclusion of what happened to my friend is a bit long of a story.........

He had the new transom assemblies (both strbd and port) installed late 2016 and they were fresh for 2017 season. Port drive was rebuilt (new internal gears, seals, etc.). Issue was on this side.

When we pulled the drive, water came out of bellows; we assumed the worst.....torn bellows. After a very thorough examination there were no tears or anything to suggest water came in from bellows.

Then I noticed someone had taken a hammer to the pivot housing and it was buggered up and the aluminum had an outward protrusion that in my opinion rendered the waterjacket o-ring useless in that it allowed a minimal amount of water to bypass and find it's way into the location where driveshaft housing enters the pivot housing. There was evidence on both the pivot housing and drive at the location of buggered up aluminum where they mated of discoloration suggesting water bypass. Other than this there was no way water had an opportunity to get into the bellows.

We filed down the pivot housing, cleaned everything up with emery cloth, reassembled, and had him back in the water 2 hours later.

And before someone asks; No, he did not have any overheating issues as there was still plenty of water available to cool the motor.

Also, previously he had a mysterious wet bilge with oily/greasy water. Now his bilge is mostly dry (short of rain water), and no sign of any oil. We had looked at everything from drive reservoir tubes/bottles, bottom of motors, etc. and could not find any evidence of oil/grease. My theory is the grease from former gimbal bearing was coming through into bilge with water mixture creating the former messy bilge.

Knock-on-wood everything seems fine so far this year. He should prove our theory and have the boat pulled again and remove the drive to assure the bellows is dry; but that probably won't happen til end of season.

Told you it was a long story!

J3ff

Long but good to read, I do also recall having some oily/greasy water, however I thought the source of this was my drive oil lube that I spilled while refilling it start of season.  Another mechanic has floated the idea of if I had a LOT of water in the bilge and went up on plane, that the water may have gotten in from the front and ruined the bearing that way.  As you know, the amount of rain this spring has been amazing and I have been having a pretty decent amount of water in the bilge every time I've gone down. Usually I run this when pulling away from the dock, sounds like I need to do it AT the dock.. going down to the boat now.

The main problem isn't finding someone to fix it or pay for it, it's finding someone who has any time in their schedule.. sigh. 

J3ff

Had two marine mechanics down to the boat today. They both told me that while it def. needs to be fixed, it will be fine for the 5 hours of use I need it to be, both said that if the noise is not changing or getting worse it's not that bad just yet, but if I hear it start to intensify to shut it down and get towed to the dock. They wouldn't give an estimate on how much longer but said it should be fine for the next few times out as long as I don't make it work too hard... so I guess nothing past 8 or so mph, that's okay, will take our time and enjoy the view, have a jetski for the speed! 

rasbury

Good luck!

J3ff

rasbury said:

Good luck!

I will have the shipper stop at your place for a few hours - what's your hourly rate?

In all seriousness, after speaking to the mechanics, the biggest question of the moment is how did water get in there and ruin it... that is the assumption right now. Which can't be answered till it comes out.

I will say that AGAIN today I had a LOT of water in the bilge.. we did have a couple heavy rain cells come through last night, but if I go back down there tomorrow and the bilge is high with water then there's a real problem.. I may have to go get a salt water test kit (I am not tasting my bilge water).. we'll see! Gotta love boats

rinker270nb

How high was the water in your bilge and were your pumps running?  Your description makes me think your engine was sitting in water?  I get a bit of water my 270 after a rain as well.  

J3ff

Not that high.. but more than normal.. bilge needs to turn on sooner than it does.. 

J3ff

Just put 5 squeezes of grease in there, no change, put 4 more in, no change. Not going to put any more in.. it's obv not going to fix it Just fyi.

Oh and no water in the bilge today, so it must just be rainwater ... 

reneechris14

I guess the life span of the gimbal is short. Hope all goes well for the 4th.

J3ff

Took it out to a close spot today... It seems to limp along just fine, but you can feel the problem getting up on plane.. it just isn't as fast as normal and the motor is working MUCH harder than usual for the slow speed that's actually happening... gave her one run up to 4500 and then right back to 1500.. Will Limp it out Sunday and a couple days next week. Then it's off to the shop I guess.. 

rasbury

When you lost the motor did you replace the gimbal? If not, how many hours are on it? I can't imagine if so in the short amount of time since it would go bad just from use...

J3ff

Replaced the motor ($17000 including labor) and at the exact same time the transom mount, which included everything but the out drive ($3000 including labor).. 

You bring up the real question.  If everyone says they only go bad when water gets in there... then how is water getting in there? Will be a question for the mechanic I guess. 

reneechris14

You will know when it comes apart. 

Willhound

Add me to the possible gimbal mystery. Had an opportunity to have our marina mechanic wander over and give a listen yesterday. I had already greased both fittings on the coupler bearing/shaft but the noise was still there.
He feels it is the gimbal bearing even though we just changed it out winter of 2018, so one full season on it. Drive passed a pressure test last fall so not sure how/when water could get in or if there is another cause. I do recall bumping the skeg while slowly backing into a beach last summer, maybe I jacked it.