Hello yall. First timer here, also first bass boat and motor over 9.9. Ok bought a 1986 Ranger 372V boat with a 1983 Mercury 150 on it, cranks up great and runs good too. My son and I took it out yesterday afternoon for a first run at the lake. Idled out of the cove and got onto plane then shortly after an alarm went off, let off the hot foot and we noticed that the temp gauge was about to peg out on the hot side, shut it down. Great I thought well my boy hit the trolling motor and we fished the bank back to the cove that the ramp was in. The tell tale was peeing good, well appeared to be good while it was running. So I figured poppet valve needed replacing. Was planning on replacing the water pump/impeller next week as the older gentleman we bought it from said that it was about 2 to 3 years since it had been serviced. (???? yeah I know talk is cheap) Any way to day I took the covers off and for what ever reason hooked the muffs up and ran it. Tell tale sputtered for a second then a steady stream, noticed that the starboard side thermostat housing was leaking, not a steady stream though. It has a standard cold/hot temp gauge with marks in between. It never got to the half way point and then started dropping back to just below the quarter mark and leveled off for a few. Told my son to watch the tell tale and I climbed in and rev'ed it neutral to just above 3500 rpm's. Temp gauge fluctuated as described. Put it in forward after letting it idle down for a minute and did the same thing around 3500 rpm's. The water out the tell tale would vary in "stream pressure" but was steady as in coming out. When I eased it to about 3900 rpm's the stream dropped off to a "strong sputter" then came back strong. So, what gives???????????? Could it have just been clogged up with something or what?
I am going to change the impeller, spark plugs and foot oil next week as I have whole week off. Should I also change the poppet valve? Sorry for the long post and thanks in advance.
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yea they bitting here to real good
