mercruiser/ searay is a bitch ?

I can appreciate the frustration but blaming Mercruiser or Sea Ray won't fix a cracked manifold. As mentioned....any number of things could have gone wrong draining water from the manifolds.

Arguably the "crappy Official Mercruiser" process you followed worked well for 13 years or so which indicates that perhaps something has changed which blocked water from draining out. You don't watch how much water drains out because the "crappy Official Mercruiser" process didn't tell you to do that. You don't modify your "crappy Official Mercruiser" winterization process after the first manifold cracks which causes you to crack two more.

As I said....I appreciation the frustration but if you want to solve the problem you have to own it and figure out why those manifolds did not drain. This type of problem doesn't care who built the engine or the boat.
 
aerobat77 said:
yes ... since we sea ray owners all have been there my current plan is to sell this trash asap and get a grateful boat instead one which in spite of best care and maintenance always wrecks when you have limited options .

@ scowflaw : not to exclude but i drained the system way before any freezing last spring . its the singlepoint drain - i do not have manual drain ports on the manifolds. i expect it to work .

ah whatever , it really needs to cool down because a cool head is needed for a good financial solution and this piece of crap is not worth being heated up . tomorrow is monday and i will organize a solution.

its the third and last time a searay will ruin our holidays .
Click to expand...

don't rely on the single drain system!!

remove the plugs on the underside of the exhaust manifolds EVERY year.

Pull the small block drain hoses off the manifold under the crank pulley EVEY year.
 
We get a lot of manifolds freeze cracked from improper winterization in these parts. Not saying it was not a contributor in this situation, but all the ones I've seen were horizontally cracked. as the water lays. I wouldn't be surprised if it was more of an installation problem. Not sure why Mercruiser only went with 4 bolts to mount them? Maybe save in the casting process? Volvo and GM use all 6. Obviously not an issue if installed correctly as there is a pile of them out there. Wonder if the over torqueing theory would have allowed the manifold to have increased stress near the center bolts. The gaskets are soft and the torque is only supposed to be 25 ft/lbs. Pretty easy to get carried away with them with a standard wrench.
 
Blueone said:
If I had something for 14 years and it never gave me trouble..... I would marry it.... not bash it :)
Click to expand...

i could write you down what issues i had to sort out with my 240 in 14 years but i know a boat can and will have something to fix so i only report you the big fails . this year it was a step to much .

update : the mercruiser dealer who changed the stbd manifold last year will stand behind it and pay me a new stbd manifold , the road crane which has to arrive and the wage for a certified mercruiser mechanic to install he has to contract since his own mechanic is on holiday leave. i will pay the port manifold / port gaskets . he wants the old manifold back to make a claim against mercruiser europe since he says his costs for this here (especially the road crane ) are massive.

the mechanic refused to change this on the water and since this harbor has no crane or slip a road crane has to arrive.

i,m a bit sorry for the dealer but i made him VERY clear in my good mood i expect nothing less than this or i,m ready to sue him .

the mechanic also asked me how i winterized and confirmed draining via the singleport is not always safe. i told him the same i told here : he is free to discuss the entire fantastic draining system and procedure with mercruiser but surely not with me . he fully agreed on this .

after a further talk and realizing we travelled 6 days and 35engine hours from our home port to the position we are now he started to doubt if freeze is the answer since this should have happened earlier in this case.
 
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two brand new manifolds are installed . the riser look good with no restriction . i hope it will hold .
 
Hopefully the installer had a torque wrench and had the torque specs from Mercruiser. Also hopefully he checked the deck with a straight edge before installing.
 
Not to be nit picky but I just don’t like the look of that seam at the joint. When I magnify the picture I just don’t like it. I’d rather it be clean and smooth but maybe I’m seeing things. Is that a little oxidation there?
 
The other odd thing is the cup plugs are not painted... if this is oem then the castings are machined with a primer paint then assembled and pressure tested then the part is masked and painted with a top coat... something doesn’t seem right here if they are factory
The paint on the part looks like primer...the white dot usually signifies it passed pressure test.... the other observation is the two cup plugs on the far right and left are at different depths.... when you install cup plugs you have a spec to follow and you will have a tool to seat the cup plugs with a shoulder on it so you don’t go too deep/shallow... there is a big difference on the depth like they were put in by eye

My best guess is you have a couple used manifolds repurposed ..... just an observation
 
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That's the way they come. Cups are stainless and the bore is deep, so depth isn't critical.
 
let me give you a report on this :

after you learned how happy i was about being wrecked second time in row on holiday i really opened the very big sort of parade against the certified dealer who changed the manifold with an oem one less than a year ago with official invoice . after realizing he will not get away with this and what effort we are talking at our remote location he claimed mercruiser europe to cover the costs due to casting failure.

mercruiser agreed under following conditions :

- they will send their own instructed mechanic to look and change
- they want have measured the heads
- they want an ecm readout on overheatings and other fault codes
- they want the raw waterpump flow volume test performed
-if any item fails the test mercruiser gives it back to dealer responsibility and refuses any coverage by itself.

both manifolds were sent directly from mercruiser europe via ups express overnite so i guess they are as oem as it gets.

-both heads are in limits between ports and overall lenght ( i was afraid )
- pump flow is in specs ( i was not sure )
- no ecm fault codes ( i knew )

since things got official the mechanic refused to do it on the water and wanted the boat craned .

he changed the manifolds and of course i took a close look he cleans any surfaces and torques to specs . we are lucky no exhaust has any sign of water intrusion .

the engine was run for 30 minutes and after this the bolts were re-torqued.

i had to sign the torque will be checked again after 20 hours by a certified mercruiser mechanic . the seam visible is additional sealant to the gaskets .

after offering him an on board coffee and after a friendly talk he said "mercruiser cannot proof you it is not a casting defect so they will now take all costs but i tell you this is freeze damage. you can do this work on water but its not my money for the road crane and this here getting official i will not take any chances during installation" .

thats the story of my disaster here...
 
i will change my winterization to antifreeze . lesson learned .

i want to thank you all for your words and your hints . you might have been spot on with freeze , nobody will ever know for sure .

i have not bought a searay to bash it and i never did but i tell you i was pi**ed off this thing failing the socond time in row . mercruiser really should report in bold letters the freezing protection is not safe . the gm block seems to be not bad because my engine passed all tests after having now 500 hours.

best regards
 
aerobat77 said:
i will change my winterization to antifreeze . lesson learned .

i want to thank you all for your words and your hints . you might have been spot on with freeze , nobody will ever know for sure .

i have not bought a searay to bash it and i never did but i tell you i was pi**ed off this thing failing the socond time in row . mercruiser really should report in bold letters the freezing protection is not safe . the gm block seems to be not bad because my engine passed all tests after having now 500 hours.

best regards
Click to expand...
You missed scoflaws point. It’s not about using antifreeze for winterization, it’s about getting all of the water out of the system first!
 
Make sure this autumn that you kneel and beg the drain system to work properly. Then measure the volume if she is holding out on you then divorce her.
Or, do what has been suggested.
Or. Don’t. It all depends on how often you want water to freeze inside the motor.
 
For the single point drain, I always treated this as a temporary measure in case the weather was going to turn cold before coming out for the season. I has the type with the bicycle pump that activated the drain. I only used it a few times, late in the season when there was a cold snap, as a precaution.
 
like said i will sort the draining out until autumn , changes will be made for better ;-)
now i hope anything will hold together...
i today learned one more thing : using aftermarket parts and diy work greatly reduces costs but you are screwed if something goes south . if you have oem parts and a certified dealer who installs it you can push them for responsibility if something happens inside the warranty time when you make them believe you are dead serious about it .
e.g mercruiser itself would not come out the corner if the manifold would be sierra marine .
 
So what your saying is pay more up front so you can get compensated for a fake claim that was totally your fault. Well I prefer to shop for bargain prices and take due diligence when maintaining my stuff.
 
aerobat77 said:
let me give you a report on this :

after you learned how happy i was about being wrecked second time in row on holiday i really opened the very big sort of parade against the certified dealer who changed the manifold with an oem one less than a year ago with official invoice . after realizing he will not get away with this and what effort we are talking at our remote location he claimed mercruiser europe to cover the costs due to casting failure.

mercruiser agreed under following conditions :

- they will send their own instructed mechanic to look and change
- they want have measured the heads
- they want an ecm readout on overheatings and other fault codes
- they want the raw waterpump flow volume test performed
-if any item fails the test mercruiser gives it back to dealer responsibility and refuses any coverage by itself.

both manifolds were sent directly from mercruiser europe via ups express overnite so i guess they are as oem as it gets.

-both heads are in limits between ports and overall lenght ( i was afraid )
- pump flow is in specs ( i was not sure )
- no ecm fault codes ( i knew )

since things got official the mechanic refused to do it on the water and wanted the boat craned .

he changed the manifolds and of course i took a close look he cleans any surfaces and torques to specs . we are lucky no exhaust has any sign of water intrusion .

the engine was run for 30 minutes and after this the bolts were re-torqued.

i had to sign the torque will be checked again after 20 hours by a certified mercruiser mechanic . the seam visible is additional sealant to the gaskets .

after offering him an on board coffee and after a friendly talk he said "mercruiser cannot proof you it is not a casting defect so they will now take all costs but i tell you this is freeze damage. you can do this work on water but its not my money for the road crane and this here getting official i will not take any chances during installation" .

thats the story of my disaster here...
Click to expand...
scoflaw said:
So what your saying is pay more up front so you can get compensated for a fake claim that was totally your fault. Well I prefer to shop for bargain prices and take due diligence when maintaining my stuff.
Click to expand...

#saved
 
scoflaw , no .

i never intended or made a fake claim . fact is the manifold failed inside the warranty time and i winterized to mercruiser procedure. if this was sufficient or not , if this was freeze or indeed a casting failure will never be answered for sure .

to exclude for sure damage in future i will change the procedure going further than mercruiser asks to do .

i wanted to say something different : if in my very case the manifold would be replaced by myself nobody would care for the damage this year.
 
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