www.iFourWinns.com

While cruising yesterday my tether came undone and my motor quit at 4000 RPM, I was cruising roughly 35 at the time and coasted to a stop when I discovered what happened, now the motor appears hydrolocked and will not turn over.
Does anyone know if a 98 Sundowner 195 should have a flap in the exhaust to prevent backflow into the motor?
I am going to pull the plugs and free it up and hope a rod is not bent, but jeez, having a tether is a good idea but to seize the engine during use, really!
any one evere heard of this?
I will be checking it out shortly, I had a sherriff tow me back to the dock and he crashed my boat into the dock, now I have a big scar in the front of my boat as well, I guess a day on the water is not always better than a day at work .

Volvo at some point discontinued the flapper valves in the Y pipe, a decision that I did not agree with, but that's what they did. I hope you can get the water out of it as soon as possible. Remove all the plugs, ground the coil lead so you don't have sparks in the engine compartment and crank it over. Then spray some fogging oil in the plug holes and crank it over again. Get a fresh set of plugs (it may take a while to fire up because of the oil) but reinstall the old ones to burn off the fogging oil. After its running smoothly let it cool off and put in new plugs.

Here is a schematic of the OMC version of the same engine (1994-1998 OMC and Volvo had a joint venture and the designs were exactly the same). Interestingly it does show the flapper (pn#410)...

http://www.crowleymarine.com/johnson-ev ... mdl=UVYH37

You should check the static water line of your boat, you may need riser extensions to prevent that from happening again. Some of these boats sit really low in the stern and that can exacerbate sucking water up the exhaust. They do make riser extension blocks but it will raise the height of the exhaust and it may not fit with the current configuration of the boat.

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88 Four Winns 200 Horizon
4.3 OMC Cobra-4bbl
2002 Walker Bay 10/2012 Suzuki 2.5
2008 Walker Bay 8

1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4.0/Selectrac
2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7 Hemi/Quadradrive II

Pulled out the plugs, cranked out the water, pumped some oil in the cylinders and cranked it over, hooked up a compression gauge to check for a bent rod and the gauge maxed out because water was still in the manifolds, cranked and cranked for a looong time until finally the water stopped coming out.
at first the oil looked clear, after I fired it up (on all cylinders, hooray!!) I checked the oil again and now I have a milkshake from water in the oil, running it on muffs and have changed the oil and filter 2 times but still have water, I can only suck out about 3 quarts each time so I am only getting 2/3 of the oil out, but what a relief to not have a bent rod, I thought surely the motor was toast! I will just keep changing the oil until it looks clear before I put the engine under any load.
I will check into the risers, how do you go about checking the static water line?
it does seem to sit low in the back.
What a lesson, I will make sure the tether is secure from now on.

I had mine backfire on startup & hydrolock, so your day could've been worse!
When there's no exhaust manifold pressure, the Bernoulli Effect will suck water in to your cylinders.
Why can't you get all the oil out? This would be my #1 priority!!!

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2011 Four Winns H180 SS.
Aussie built Mustang 2800.
SOLD - 1997 Four Winns Horizon RS

There are a couple of ways to do it but I might try this way. Get a piece of 2x4 long enough to span the gunnels and over hang each side by about a foot. Put the boat in the water and open the engine compartment. Lay the 2x across the top of the engine. Measure from the lower edge of the 2x4 to the top of the exhaust risers. Then measure from the lower edge of the 2x4 to the actual water line. Be sure to measure straight down as the gunnels will be at an angle relative to the waterline.
This will enable you to determine how high the exhaust risers are above the water line. Merc says at least 13". So let's say the water line outside is 15" from the gunnels and the risers are 2" below the bottom edge of the 2x4 and the gunnels, that's 13" so it should be enough.

_________________
88 Four Winns 200 Horizon
4.3 OMC Cobra-4bbl
2002 Walker Bay 10/2012 Suzuki 2.5
2008 Walker Bay 8

1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4.0/Selectrac
2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7 Hemi/Quadradrive II

I am using a topsider suction tank, it uses a small tube that goes into the dipstick tube, it only goes into the oil pan partway, is there a better way to get the oil out?

thank you, great idea, I will try this.

Yep there is. What I did was use a piece of garden hose, with a female garden hose end held on with a hose clamp and fabbed up an adaptor using some plastic tubing to hook this up to the regular hose on the Topsider (I have the same thing). You see the threads on the top of the dipstick tube? The female garden hose fitting threads right on there. Be sure to put a gasket inside the female hose fitting. It works faster and you can really suck the pan out. The problem with the little hose is that it doesn't make a perfect seal in the dipstick tube. The better the seal is the more oil you can get out.

_________________
88 Four Winns 200 Horizon
4.3 OMC Cobra-4bbl
2002 Walker Bay 10/2012 Suzuki 2.5
2008 Walker Bay 8

1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4.0/Selectrac
2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7 Hemi/Quadradrive II

another great idea!! I will see what I can hook up and keep changing the oil, Lou C , you are very knowledgeable, thank you for your help.

No worries, just been 'a workin' in the garage as a shade tree mechanic oh about since Nixon was president lol....

https://www.dropbox.com/s/d0wisrd7z8xjn ... p.JPG?dl=0

I had this hose from an electric pump that didn't work well but as long as you have the female adaptor you can fab up whatever works, the hoses have to fit tightly though to not lose vaccum....

_________________
88 Four Winns 200 Horizon
4.3 OMC Cobra-4bbl
2002 Walker Bay 10/2012 Suzuki 2.5
2008 Walker Bay 8

1998 Jeep Grand Cherokee 4.0/Selectrac
2007 Jeep Grand Cherokee 5.7 Hemi/Quadradrive II