Hello;I am new to both this site and to boating!
My name is Keith and I live in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba, Canada.
Late last August I tripped upon a deal to get my new (to my family and I) a 1988 Freedom 160 with a 3.0L with the OMC Cobra out drive.
The previous owner bought it from his boss; he replaced the floor with all new plywood and sealed it with a marine type of epoxy. Then he took it into one of the local marina's there and had them do a once over on the craft fixing what it needed. They started with the Factory FourWinns trailer and put new tires and repacked the wheel bearings, replaced the light wiring along with the tail light assemblies.
Moved on to the boat, They changed the oil, altenator belt, spark plugs wires and cap set along with the fuel filter. They even replaced the starter and did a compression test on it (140psi across the board). That is when they decided to do a running test on it and hoked up the water muffs to the out drive, started it up. They shut down and asked him if he wanted them to replace the motor as the block was cracked. His boss didn't winterize it and the water froze.
This is where I came in, I seen the boat on a classified listing and answered it. He was so ticked at the whole thing that he just wanted to dump it. I picked it up for next to nothing and took it home.
I pulled out the motor replace a frost plug that popped out, found a crack about 4" long under the intake. I figured that I didn't have much to lose so I tried something. I cleaned up the crack and mixed together some two part JB weld epoxy and smeared it into the crack and reinstalled the motor. I thought that since the block is cast iron, it would be rough and give enough surface area to allow the epoxy to hold. Tried the water muffs the next day, IT WORKED to my surprise!!
My family went out for seven hours that afternoon without an ounce of problems. That was the last day before the water works people drained the River where we boat. NOW, It is about that time to try again. I hope it works Great. Looking forward to a lot of fun this summer.
