Back to the main site

Prop slipping?

C

Crowbar

Well-Known Member
Messages
84
Reaction score
26
Location
Springfield Ma.
I had a interesting problem yesterday! Had a minor prop/skeg strike in sand. Continued thru no wake zone with no problem. Went to take off 9' of water & the motor reved up but the boat did not go! Tried again & same thing. Shut down, trimmed all the way up and everything appeared ok. Trimmed back down & took off as normal. Boat was fine the rest of the day. Am I loosing my mind? Help with ideas?
 
Crowbar

Don't take this wrong but are you sure you didn't disengage the prop drive and just revved the motor with the throttle? These new four stroke engines don't require throttle and choke for normal starts like the old two strokes did. You can still disengage the drive by pushing the button on the throttle and just rev the motor on the new four strokes. Just thinking out loud.
 
A few years ago we caught a piece of debris (small stick) in front of our I/O that did exactly the same thing (ventilated the prop to no forward thrust). Thought we had spun the hub in our prop until we saw the stick after putting the boat on the trailer. Not sure where any debris would get hung on an outboard but any chance that could have been it? Maybe a slug of algae, grass, or something?
 
Twice now I've caught debris on the lower unit.  It does exactly what you say.  I stop the motor, trim up, it floats off, and then all is normal.

Today I just had some short weeds caught.  I was surprised how little it took to make the prop feel funny.  Probably a dozen or so thicker weeds (quarter inch) and they were only about 18-24 inches long.  I could see they were all bent in half as they got wrapped around the lower unit.

You must have dug something (stick, root, wire, etc) out of the sand.

Keep an eye on it, but real problems (as in something is broken) doesn't just fix itself.  You had to have something stuck in front of the lower unit and then it freed itself when you trimmed up.
 
I think u may be right about something caught in or around the prop! Definatly not in neutral, as the boat started to lift then fell flat.

We will keep an eye on it! Picking up a ss prop soon so that will rule out the hub!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top