The good news is: The exhaust is connected!

The bad news is: There’s a leak.

Marty worked on the elbow one more time to get it shorter and more streamlined and turning the water input by 90º. Fitz screwed it into the manifold, stopping off at Gramps’ garage to make use of a pipe wrench and vise. A dear friend texted and offered to pick up anything I needed in town, having read our plight. I thought, a new engine would be nice, but replied, honestly, that there’s nothing at this point that can help. This has been a community project.

Fitz and I got the assembly gooped up with high-heat silicone gasket sealant and screwed it all together (finger tight) a couple nights ago. This morning, I tightened it up the rest of the way, now that the sealant is cured, and attached the hoses. There’s still a kink that I’m not pleased about in the big hose getting it around the fuel tank. At the very least this kink reduces the flow through the hose and adds some inefficiency to the whole system. At the worst, it’ll slowly rub its way through either the hose (bad) or the fuel tank (really bad). I need to figure out a way to put something in between them that will be sacrificial to reduce the likelihood of really bad.

I fired it up. It started just fine. Spits water out the exhaust just fine. Runs smooth and free of smoke. But, there’s a little drip, drip, drip every few seconds off the elbow. Given where it’s dripping and from what I could feel, it appears to be coming out of the threads where the elbow goes into the manifold. I don’t know how that’s possible. From what I could see and my understanding of how things flow in these parts, it doesn’t seem right.

So, I’ve texted the mechanic (again) and am starting down the path of getting it in to a professional. Assuming he says it’s OK to run, knowing the little drip is there, we’ll get it to the marina this coming week. The marina has informed me that their crane is down for repairs, so we can’t get the boat hauled out on the dry to do the other work until that’s fixed. But, perhaps we can get it over there to a mooring so the mechanic can do his magic.