Back in April we took a family vacation and stayed at my friend’s house on Lake Jackson in GA. He had a ratty old sqatty 9.5 Johnson in his boathouse that hadn’t been used in years, why??? Typical no-good leg seal allowing exhaust up into the powerhead. Harry and I wanted to see if we could get it running, my friend really didn’t care what happened to it. (He was only keeping it for sentimental reasons.) I went through the carb and Harry did the magneto, I sprang for some new fuel lines and an impeller. We checked the leg seal and it had a major wrinkle in it, the shift boot and everything else was intact. The motor ran fine but that damn seal was never going to be right, I tried everything but it seemed that most of the exhaust exited up into the top.
Then Harry got an idea – why not try a can of Flexseal? My friend indicated it would be fine with him, it was a wall hanger anyway. (He thought we were crazy messing with it since he said we could use his nice SkiNautique and nearly new pontoon boat with a 100hp Merc 4-stroke.) So for $7.99 and a little adaptation of a spray nozel with a straw to aim down in the leg, we gave it a shot. Add in 24hrs to vent the flammable fumes and Harry gave it a try on a 14′ tinny that was also moldering away in his yard. Darn if it didn’t work perfectly! Harry must have put 20 hours and over 2 tanks of fuel through it during our vacation. We kept waiting for the Flexseal to burst into flames or do something wacky, but it was fine.
I’m not sure I’d try this on a "good" motor, but it did seem to work. That stuff is does have a lot of uses!
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