Procrastinating/need advise

[garcia]

Broke the skeg on my outboard motor. I have talked to diff. people, and some tell me that I can do it in place. Others that I have to drop the lower unit. I understand that I have to keep the unit cool(wet rags) to avoid ruining the seals. I need some opinions from any of you guys that have welded a skeg back. I will be using the Syncrowave 180.
Frankly, I feel that I'm scared: "Today it's too windy, have to do some shopping, need to cover the water pipes, it's going to freeze tonight, the deer are going to be moving today" It goes on and on.
I just want some opinions on what I might face.
Thanks,
García

[Wheat]

Don't weld it at all bolt on a Skeg-Guard they sell in Trailer Boats Magazine. I won't tell if you won't.

[HAWK]

garcia,

I have never welded a skeg guard before. However, my son and I watched a detailed video on doing it. You must remove lower unit to avoid heat transfer. Do not cut the area to be welded in a straight line. Use a jig saw or reciprocating saw (for cutting off the old broken guard) to zig-zag the weld line in order to vastly increase surface area. Cut off the old guard near the top using this method. Locate a new guard and trace a template to match the original zig-zag. Bevel both pieces to a 45 degree angle on both sides. Once the new piece is cut to match, clean well with a ss brush and alcohol. Line up the new skeg guard with the matching zig-zag cut and tack into place. The welder in this video used a spool gun. Is your guard thin enough (3/16" single pass) for the sync 180 to penetrate? The zig-zag increased the weld area almost 3 times of the original horizonal line. Be sure to locate a new skeg guard of the proper material commercially produced and sold for boat motors. Do not attempt to make your own new guard to weld on. The material has to be tough enough to withstand daily boating rigors without breaking. It must also be brittle enough to snap when impacted hard enough to prevent tremendous damage to your motor. Therefore, do purchase a commercially available skeg guard for your motor with the correct thickness and top to bottom taper.

If you tackle this one, please post pics in a step by step fashion. I wish you the very best of luck. From the video I saw it is definitely possible.

IF YOU CAN LOCATE A BOLT ON UNIT, IT WOULD SAVE YOU SOME HEADACHES! WHEAT HAS A GREAT IDEA. If not, then try this procedure. If you want a pictorial, I'll try to free hand something in a PDF and attach as a .zip

[bail76]

I fixed one of these on my buddies boat once. We did it with it on the boat and used wet rags to keep things cool. I used tig to do it with 5356 filler. I beveled the new guard on both sides and smoothed out the rough edge on the drive. I brushed it thoroughly with a ss brush and used acetone to clean it with.The biggest problem I had was even with all the cleaning the broken cast aluminum still contained lots of dirt. What I did was make a pass and then grind most of it back out with a flapper wheel and then make another pass and kept this up until the beads ran clean. This was a couple of years back and it has taken some hits but is still holding well. The zig zag technique that hawk mentioned sounds like a very good idea. The bolt on units they have out seem like the way to go though. If you do decide to weld it on the boat just take your time and keep things cool so not to damage the seals. Best of luck.