Light at the end of the exhaust hose

We had business obligations on Saturday so Sunday was our only time to try to finish this exhaust system rehab project.  Unfortunately, today was colder than it has been for much of the winter, about 28 degrees in the shed where our boat is stored, but what the hell, it's winter in New England so we went to work.

We left the boat last weekend with the port outboard elbow installed. We couldn't do any more without more 3-inch exhaust hose. Today, 6-feet.of new hose was waiting for us when we got to the boat yard so we sawed off a 23-inch piece, coated the inside of the hose with dish washing liquid and this time, also the hose fitting on the elbow.  That made a big difference and the hose slid onto the elbow with a minimum of persuasion.

Here's what the exhaust adapter looked like before we mounted the elbow. There is a block-off gasket between the manifold and the bottom of the adapter so no cooling water flows through those four ports around the edge. Only the center is open for exhaust gas.

 

There's another gasket between the top of the adapter and the exhaust elbow that we put on after taking this photo. We would have liked that upper gasket to also be a block-off style but as far as we could find, there's no such gasket available. 

Oh, in case you're wondering, we did remember to take that hunk of paper towel out before mounting the elbow.

Then we picked up the entire elbow and hose assembly, slid it onto the inlet of the muffler and dropped the elbow down on the adapter mounting studs. We found mounting the first elbow on the port engine last weekend somewhat time consuming but as we repeated essentially the same assembly sequence on the inboard side of the port engine, we knew exactly what to expect and it went much faster.

Now the difficult work on the port exhaust system was finished. It was cold but we were on a roll.

 Trying to make everything look good too, so we even lined up the blue stripes on that very expansive Triden exhaust hose.

Next, we started on the starboard engine by literally knocking off  the elbow and adapter from the inboard side of the engine. With that elbow gone, we'd have greater access to the outboard elbow.  We disconnected the exhaust hose at the muffler and whacked the outside elbow until it came off. We threw that over the side to join its mates and went to work on the old adapter.  It's held onto the manifold with four Allen-head machine screws.

Luckily, whoever put these old adapters on used a thread lubricant of some kind and we were able to use a conventional Allen wrench to get them out. We used a wrench on the end of the Allen wrench and finally I had the last of them out.

The adapter in this picture looks somewhat funky but there's no cooling water running through that point so whatever rust there was, wasn't from that.  Anyhow, with the mounting bolts out, the old adapter was knocked off.

There were very few people at the boat yard but we had a visit from our friend Brian and this time he brought his Dad. They are also owners of  Silverton 34C that's a lot new than ours. It's fun talking to people who know and understand boats. We're looking forward to seeing them next summer once our boats are back in the water.

Back to our exhaust system,  a look down inside the manifolds showed that they are in pretty good shape. You have to love closed cooling systems.

Next we mounted the new adapter and then the elbow with the needed 22-inch of exhaust hose on the outboard side of the starboard engine. With two elbows under our belt, this one went smoothly.

By the time we got this far, it was getting really cold in the shed. Next weekend, we'll do that last exhaust elbow, add fittings at the front of each elbow for cooling water and the exhaust rehab will be finished.