Propeller exchange project: what do I need to know?

[phipseml]

Hi everybody,

Thanks for all the good advice, this forum is great.

It will be very hard for us to do anything under water since we are not diving ourselves and there are no services available for recreational boats, which means we can ask industry services but it will likely be very expensive, more than it's worth for us. I will ask them anyway and see what they say. Otherwise I will wait until on the hard in July and see what I can do.

There is no water in the diesel filters or in the oil, which speaks for OK diesel quality and tight gaskets. The engine is old, so the smoke could be something else, I agree, but the fact that the smoke intensity increases a lot after a certain power input makes me believe that it has something to do with the prop.

Being able to try out several prop sizes and pitches would be great, but not possible right now. The previous owner said he tried calculators and three different props and finally got stuck with the one that's on now and agrees that it's too big but the best choice they had back then.

Cheers,
Phil