Output of water from spout hot and not strong?

[gutzy]

Havent used my yamaha 25hp for about two weeks so I thought I would plug in some fresh water and turn her over for a few minutes.
Started sweet , but after a minute or so I clicked onto the fact that instead of a "jet" stream coming from my motor it was more like a tap turned on halfway. Still water but not a lot of pressure.
Then after I turned her off there was a little bit of smoke coming from the hole about halfway up the arm.
I dont know a lot about motors except how to check sparks and change oil.
I would really like some advice on how to check the water pump (if there is one) or if you could suggest what is wrong and what I should do.
Any help will be greatly appreciated by me and probably others
Thanx

[Pacific]

Not really familiar with Yamaha's but I have seen OMC motors with little or no water out of the telltale. The problem is often just the hole in the telltale is partly blocked with salt . Try pushing a piece of whipper snipper line up there. You can do it with the motor running and see if it works straight away. If you have a compressor you can blow air up the telltale before you start it up. I changed a perfect pump once just for a blocked telltale. Hope this helps.

Pacific.

[gutzy]

thanks a lot pacific goin to shops be back in 30mins and will try it. ;D
Any other advice for easy to do at home? :o
Could be helpful to a lot of other boaties ;)

[gutzy]

Pacific and readers,
Done what was suggested and there was a build up but am unable to kick her over out of courtesy to neighbours.
Will let you know how it goes

[OISTA]

Again not familar with yammies, but if you open the engine cowl and fid where the tell tail goes through the base. There should be a little rubber hose going from the block to the tell tail. Unplug this from tell tail end remove tell tail from motor (so engine housing doesn't fill with water) and run motor. I found with my motor the tell tail hole is smaller than the cooling hose, so any crud built up there.

[gutzy]

can you use say wd-40 mixed with water in a drum to go through motor.
I know that sounds crazy but is there an additive you can use with fresh water?

[BaysideMarine]

There are additives but I woudln't use them. I see no merit int he manufacturers claims.

A good flush for 10 minutes or so is the best thing you can do.

Re clearing the telltale, poking something up there will kind of work but if the obstruction is solid then it will fall back down and cover the hole again.

Easiest mehod is to remove the telltale hose from the fitting in the bottom cowl, whack your lips over the fitting and blow it clear. Telltale hose back on and away you go.

What year engine is it as you could have salt buildup issues int eh narrow cooling galleries. Did the powerhead feel hot when you were running it? Were the earmuffs correctly fitted when you flushed it? Kinked hose? Low pressure?

Cheers

[gutzy]

everything was normal just not much pressure.
I have tried poking the hole and am taling the boat out in a few hours so I will let you know.

[davez104]

Did you give it plenty of time to warm up properly? Some motors have thermostats that may open and close even when the motor is running. My 135 Merc has a very strong jet of water even at idle, but if idling for extended periods I notice the temp guage droping and then the thermostat will close some and the stream is less untill the temp comes back up again.

Dave.

[Dirtysanchez]

Are you using muffs or a bin / drum ? a lot of cheap muffs nowdays let more water onto the ground than into the engine, I nearly cooked a thermostat once on my old suzuki due to this..

On my mercury 30 (really a tohatsu apparently) the telltale was getting blocked because those bastard little wasps keep making their nests in there
(S'pose I should get out in the boat more often)

As has been said, make sure the pipe to the tell tale isn't blocked, and make sure you have a decent system for getting the water into the engine, $8 Muffs should be thrown in the bin in my humble opinion :)

[rough_shag]

Kinked hose caught me out one time,had a trigger type fitting on the hose and checked the pressure before connecting the hose to muffs but because of the trigger backpressure it threw out a good strong stream even though the hose was kinked!! tricking me into thinking I had good pressure in the hose!.A good thing to do with muffs is to turn on the water and then squeeze both sides of the muffs til water comes out of bleed holes etc before starting motor.Also run the motor for a good ten mins to allow temps to rise and t/stat to open thereby flushing entire engine block.Just a thought...I would get the telltale showing a good strong stream BEFORE going on the water.

[darkside]

ok , i know everyone is going to hate this one , but years ago i had a similar problem with salt build up and an old fisherman said get a drum fill it with water, put a cup full if domestos in it and run the motor for about 10 min , it cleared up the salt and run like a dream . didnt seem to have problems with it after and it ran a lot cooler , he said he did it every 6 months for the last 20 odd years , i would be concerned with the impeller but hey it worked and ive done it ever since .