Yanmar saildrive - water leak management

[Goosebumps]

I would advise to check how Hacking family solved the water ingress problem of their Yanmar saildrives at svocelot.com.

What oild do you use in your SD20 saildrive? My old very experienced marine engine mechanic in Cape Town told me that few people realuze that the older SD20 takes ordinary engine oil, he put same oil in my saildrive as he put in my saildrive.
He explained that he dealt with many saildrive problems caused by people putting 90 hypoid oil, car gearbox oil in their saildrive!

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by Goosebumps

I would advise to check how Hacking family solved the water ingress problem of their Yanmar saildrives at svocelot.com.

What oild do you use in your SD20 saildrive? My old very experienced marine engine mechanic in Cape Town told me that few people realuze that the older SD20 takes ordinary engine oil, he put same oil in my saildrive as he put in my saildrive.
He explained that he dealt with many saildrive problems caused by people putting 90 hypoid oil, car gearbox oil in their saildrive!

I have sd 50. Dont know SD 20. Oil I use is mercruiser, the only prescribed oil.

I have found no water when changing oil, so no issues. Me quite new to saildrives. Boat 2 years old.

[Sailingcouple13]

I have had sd40s, now have one sd50 port and sd60 starboard. SD 50 no problem vacuum exartacting oil while boat in the water, negative pressure no problem if you remove fill cap. Do not use yanmar pump it is a messy pain. Get one of the oil extraction tanks that you pump negative pressure in prior to extraction. You can then just walk away while oil works it's way up, be patient it will take awhile for 90 gear oil. After you start getting air let sit for 15-20 min and extract the oil that takes time to settle tp bottom.
You can fill sd50 & 60 from top. The sd40 you had to fill from bottom so you had to use yanmar hand pump to fill. Note sd40 & 50 require gear lube, the new sd60 use motor oil.
The sd40s were terribly poor design and have the shortest life span. The sd50 much better but have clutch slipping issues, the sd60 is a much improved. I will most likely change out the sd50 next year to the sd60.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by Sailingcouple13

I have had sd40s, now have one sd50 port and sd60 starboard. SD 50 no problem vacuum exartacting oil while boat in the water, negative pressure no problem if you remove fill cap. Do not use yanmar pump it is a messy pain. Get one of the oil extraction tanks that you pump negative pressure in prior to extraction. You can then just walk away while oil works it's way up, be patient it will take awhile for 90 gear oil. After you start getting air let sit for 15-20 min and extract the oil that takes time to settle tp bottom.
You can fill sd50 & 60 from top. The sd40 you had to fill from bottom so you had to use yanmar hand pump to fill. Note sd40 & 50 require gear lube, the new sd60 use motor oil.
The sd40s were terribly poor design and have the shortest life span. The sd50 much better but have clutch slipping issues, the sd60 is a much improved. I will most likely change out the sd50 next year to the sd60.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

Oil change SD 50 is easy with exctractor. First time took longer second time, walk in the park.

I do have slipping clutches and devised specific approach.

When one adds revs slowly when engaging or moves revs below 1600 temporarily, saildrive likes to disengage. But if you turn around each time gear change takes place and observe propeller rotation traces in water, and correct immediately if no engagement, I found to be no issues, even in real tight places.

After prolonged motoring, and before maneouvering, turn on and engage the other motor and change gear to idle in long running motor to have time to cool down (water goes thru saildrive) before manoeuvring.

I am using this approach 6 mths now and just fine. So, not sold on SD 60 yet.

[Sailingcouple13]

My slipping is manageable as well but annoying. I just thinking when I need to replace cone clutch just buy a new sd60 and be done. Its about 5k for new and close to 2k to replace clutch. If I do it soon can probably get close to 2k selling the sd50. So net cost only additional 1k. Then have matching drives again with same gear ratio. I do not see the value in spending the dollars on replacing clutch knowing it will be an issue in short order again. The sd60 is much easier to change oil in the water as well. They have added a tube to the lower plug bringing it up above the oil level in the drive. So no mess to unscrew the plug. It's the little things sometime that are the most valuable.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[arsenelupiga]

for me will be around 16k, 2 x sd 60 all up.

to be honest, I prefer to spend this money on new carbon sails or something else that makes boat better sailor.

my theory, if it does not slip, does not get worse. see if it holds.

my wife learned the trick also.

[arsenelupiga]

for the record:

i have pumped out saildrive oil in both legs to see any traces of water. Helps against slipping as well.

After 3 weeks, I found around 3 cm3 of water on bottom of bottle from port saildrive. Oil was changed after 20 min motoring.

This leads to strategy how to live with water in saidrives till next slip.

Motor for at least 20 min every week.

this way water will remain trapped by oil and no corrosion.

Anyone similar experience ?

[Zoid]

Quick question. I change the SD20 oil every haul out and then in between haulouts I pump out as much of the oil as I can (about 1 liter) with a vacuum pump and change that throughout the season. On one of my SD20's I had all Quicksilver oil from most recent change while hauled out. Well I couldn't find that brand while out sailing so I used another brand to replace the liter or so I had removed. The result is that the oil in that saildrive is bubbly at the surface. It doesn't appear milky, which I assume would be an obvious white color. Quicksilver is a blue color if you're not familiar and the replacement oil was a deep amber in color so I have half blue and half amber oil in there. That can make color identification tricky. Anyway, I initially thought it was just air pockets working their way out, however it is still bubbly at the surface well after it should have worked the air pockets out. I'm not concerned about it, but thought I'd ask in case bubbly is a sign of water or anything else not good for the drives.

I've never seen "milky" oil that usually denotes water contamination so it's hard to know what to look for.

Thanks in advance.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by Zoid

Quick question. I change the SD20 oil every haul out and then in between haulouts I pump out as much of the oil as I can (about 1 liter) with a vacuum pump and change that throughout the season. On one of my SD20's I had all Quicksilver oil from most recent change while hauled out. Well I couldn't find that brand while out sailing so I used another brand to replace the liter or so I had removed. The result is that the oil in that saildrive is bubbly at the surface. It doesn't appear milky, which I assume would be an obvious white color. Quicksilver is a blue color if you're not familiar and the replacement oil was a deep amber in color so I have half blue and half amber oil in there. That can make color identification tricky. Anyway, I initially thought it was just air pockets working their way out, however it is still bubbly at the surface well after it should have worked the air pockets out. I'm not concerned about it, but thought I'd ask in case bubbly is a sign of water or anything else not good for the drives.

I've never seen "milky" oil that usually denotes water contamination so it's hard to know what to look for.

Thanks in advance.

Interesting question. Quick Silver being synthetic, I also would be interested about seeing water intrusion.

[belizesailor]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

for the record:

i have pumped out saildrive oil in both legs to see any traces of water. Helps against slipping as well.

After 3 weeks, I found around 3 cm3 of water on bottom of bottle from port saildrive. Oil was changed after 20 min motoring.

This leads to strategy how to live with water in saidrives till next slip.

Motor for at least 20 min every week.

this way water will remain trapped by oil and no corrosion.

Anyone similar experience ?

Yes, its common practice for boats with water intrusion during peak charter season to have the SD oil changed between charters and sent right back out.

Obviously, repairing the problem would be the better solution, but keeping the oil emulsified seems to work...or at least I've never seen a catastrophic failure as a result.

[NoTies]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

for the record:

i have pumped out saildrive oil in both legs to see any traces of water. Helps against slipping as well.

After 3 weeks, I found around 3 cm3 of water on bottom of bottle from port saildrive. Oil was changed after 20 min motoring.

This leads to strategy how to live with water in saidrives till next slip.

Motor for at least 20 min every week.

this way water will remain trapped by oil and no corrosion.

Anyone similar experience ?

At the risk of repeating myself, see post 27

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by NoTies

At the risk of repeating myself, see post 27

because after running propellers for a while I did not detect ANY pressure as if saildrive has already built solution you propose.


I only say that as I check oil immediately after turning off engines. So far, never any pressure detected.

Mine is SD 50.

[NoTies]

What has that got to do with anything. If you have an oil reservoir above the waterline you put the saildrive under positive pressure so water shouldn't get in.

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by NoTies

What has that got to do with anything. If you have an oil reservoir above the waterline you put the saildrive under positive pressure so water shouldn't get in.

Sailrive oil level is around 20 cm above waterline. Seals are around 6ocm below waterline.

Therefore positive pressure is already in place at seal level.

nothing to do, in my opinion.

[NoTies]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

Sailrive oil level is around 20 cm above waterline. Seals are around 6ocm below waterline.

Therefore positive pressure is already in place at seal level.

nothing to do, in my opinion.

20 cm above the waterline??? Where's the engine, in the cockpit?