bighorse
New Member
I took my 2003 200BR with the 5.0 MPI and Alpha outdrive out today. After pulling the wakeboarders for a while, I took a run up the river and opened it up a bit. After a minute or so at about 4500 RPM's I felt a bump that I think was a brief deceleration from a miss. It continued intermittently, so I shut it down to idle and I heard a clattering sound. I turned the engine off and checked the oil, which looked fine. When I was underway, the water temperature was normal (~175) and I had about 40# of oil pressure.
I started the engine with the hatch up and the clattering was definitely coming from high on the left side of the engine. The oil filler cap is on the right side, so I took it off and could see it oiling that side, but had no way to check the left side. I put it in gear to limp back to the bank and after a minute or so, the clattering went away. I ran it on up to about 3000 RPM's on the way to shore (about 5 minutes) and it never missed again. I initially thought I had blown a head gasket, but I've never heard the sound of a blown head gasket go away when the engine speed increases under a load.
At the end of the day, I ran it at a steady 3400 RPM's back to the ramp. Not only did it not heat up, the temperature actual dropped to about 150 on the trip to the ramp, and I've never seen it that low after it has reached normal operating temperature.
A friend who was with me thought the miss was maybe from water in the fuel or bad gas, but we couldn't understand why that would cause the clattering, and on just one side of the engine. A couple weeks ago I had a leaking shift cable boot, which I've since replaced, and at one point had water up past the separator before I noticed it and turned on the bilge pump. I'm going to replace the separator this week and changed the oil just to be sure there's no water in it.
Does anyone have any thoughts on the issue?
I started the engine with the hatch up and the clattering was definitely coming from high on the left side of the engine. The oil filler cap is on the right side, so I took it off and could see it oiling that side, but had no way to check the left side. I put it in gear to limp back to the bank and after a minute or so, the clattering went away. I ran it on up to about 3000 RPM's on the way to shore (about 5 minutes) and it never missed again. I initially thought I had blown a head gasket, but I've never heard the sound of a blown head gasket go away when the engine speed increases under a load.
At the end of the day, I ran it at a steady 3400 RPM's back to the ramp. Not only did it not heat up, the temperature actual dropped to about 150 on the trip to the ramp, and I've never seen it that low after it has reached normal operating temperature.
A friend who was with me thought the miss was maybe from water in the fuel or bad gas, but we couldn't understand why that would cause the clattering, and on just one side of the engine. A couple weeks ago I had a leaking shift cable boot, which I've since replaced, and at one point had water up past the separator before I noticed it and turned on the bilge pump. I'm going to replace the separator this week and changed the oil just to be sure there's no water in it.
Does anyone have any thoughts on the issue?
