Prop Repair/Replace Advice

[ryanmitchell]

Gents

I am bringing in my boat to get it winterized. The prop on my 40 horse 4 stroke Merc is a little dinged up. A couple of the blades have a one inch wide/half inch deep chunks missing from the blades. I know that sounds bad, but we managed most of the season with the damage. When a prop is repaired are the blades shortened and grinded down to meet the dinged area, or is something applied to the missing area, sealed and then grinded. Ideally i would like to get a new one and repair the old one.

What is the best place to get a new prop? Winterizing shop quoted me at $150, but I think I can beat that price online change the prop myself.

Thanks

[surforeno]

Gents

I am bringing in my boat to get it winterized. The prop on my 40 horse 4 stroke Merc is a little dinged up. A couple of the blades have a one inch wide/half inch deep chunks missing from the blades. I know that sounds bad, but we managed most of the season with the damage. When a prop is repaired are the blades shortened and grinded down to meet the dinged area, or is something applied to the missing area, sealed and then grinded. Ideally i would like to get a new one and repair the old one.

What is the best place to get a new prop? Winterizing shop quoted me at $150, but I think I can beat that price online change the prop myself.

Thanks

I would suggest you stick to original Merc parts for your prop, but shop around, and you can usually find something to save a few bucks. $150 sounds like a full kit, you should be able to find just a prop. As to fixing a prop, they would normally add metal if neccessary, they repair to match a template. I can not imagine a case where they would grind down. This would seriously change the performance of the motor and prop. With a motor this small, you could probably live with the damaged prop as your backup, without repairing it, and go to repair only when new prop is damaged. If you are not getting a lot of vibration or any kind of a rough feel to the motor(as easy to detect as holding your hand on the cowl or lower unit when running)you are probably ok with the prop. It is probably not going to hurt your motor. But what you will find is that you will never get top performance from a damaged prop. Although it may run smoothly enough, many do, what often keeps it smooth is the fact that the blade is cavitating somewhat while it runs(creating vacumns in the water instead of cutting the water cleanly). This type of cut through the water is inefficient and will never give you maximum power or speed with damaged props, and also tends to be problematic when you are up on plane as you can lose your seal easily in turns, and over rev, and have to either slow down or drop motor down, usually both.

[ryanmitchell]

Thanks a lot for the info. I always do quite a bit of research before i make any decision. I am going to get a stainless prop, 12 pitch and get the OEM one repaired and kept as a spare or pop that one on for river trips, new lakes or the Chip, as that is where the majority of the damage took place. I talked with a guy at Sodebloom's in Minnesota and her said that the stainless with give me a better performance, and all the scares about the lower units getting blown out is all garbage. If you hit something good enough, it is going to screw up things anyway. Plus I would think that you might be a little more cautious when navigating with a $200+ prop on the back. I trusted what this guy was telling me. I will get a differnt pitch on the stainless do better handle the load on the boat, probably a 12. At the least it is normally me and my brother a lakewood, full cooler and some gear. Throw in another angler and tackle box, and it is heavy. So the 12 was suggested. It was a dissappointing year, results wise, and want to have a better season next year.

Now I just have to decide if I want a lowrance with the new structure Scan or the Bird. Either 997 or 798. 798 is more practical, but the bigger screen on the 997 would be choice, but twice as much. Cabelas actually has the 997 for $1500.

[beez80085]

Check out the Turning Point Propellers website. They have a prop wizard on their homepage that will steer you in the right direction as far as spec's. Of course they will recommend one of there own which are pretty competitively priced, but you will have the spec's for shopping around nonetheless.

www.turningpointpropellers.com

[Ty Sennett]

The Lowrance looks a lot easier to read just like the sonar. If you do get the Hummingbird, get the big one as it's a lot easier to see. It is a lot more money but you will be much happier.

[ryanmitchell]

I have my sights set on the new one coming out the 898si from HB. Ty I thought yo have had issues with Lowrance in the past. Have you play with either the HB side imaging or Lowrance Structure Scan? Do you have one of the new HD units? You like?

[Ifishskis]

Gents

I am bringing in my boat to get it winterized. The prop on my 40 horse 4 stroke Merc is a little dinged up. A couple of the blades have a one inch wide/half inch deep chunks missing from the blades. I know that sounds bad, but we managed most of the season with the damage. When a prop is repaired are the blades shortened and grinded down to meet the dinged area, or is something applied to the missing area, sealed and then grinded. Ideally i would like to get a new one and repair the old one.

What is the best place to get a new prop? Winterizing shop quoted me at $150, but I think I can beat that price online change the prop myself.

Thanks

Northern Propeller in Schofield (Wausau) does a great job on props at reasonable prices. They also have new (last time I stopped in) and rebuilt props. 715.359.5264 is their number.

[Chops]

Going slow saves props....my bro in law navigated me right over the milk jug on the East Branch this summer. He thought it was the deep part...good thing we were just chilling and going slow. That big ole boulder was hungry.

[Ty Sennett]

I have the new Lowrance HDS units and they were junk at first but now the problems are gone. They were having trouble with the units taking on water.

As for the side imaging part of the Lowrance, I think I'll get it over the winter. It looks a lot easier to read than the Humminbird. Look at Lowrance.com to see the side imaging. That might help you decide.