Do SS props on a B3 have rubber hubs?
I've not had mine off, ever, but have looked and poked at them - they don't appear to have rubber hubs.
Had the boat out yesterday. The Potomac river was incredibly full of debris after all the rain this area had for much of last week. Crap was everywhere, from tiny sticks to logs 12" in diameter and as long as the boat. I managed to navigate through the clumps of grasses and what looked like sea weed, didn't hit a single BIG thing, but likely mowed over some small sticks and through some grasses/weeds. Ran it about 30 minutes down stream without issue, except for a strange, high pitched, ringing sound that I've never noticed before. Not noticable below 2K RPM but there above that. Definitely coming from the drive - as putting the drive in neutral and reving the engine confirmed the sound wasn't there. Everything else was normal - no vibrations or anything.
Had lunch and left. Had to go through another debris field at idle until I got to clear water. Slowly throttled up and felt the vibration start immedaitely, along with what sounded like the probs blowing out. Backed out of it, shut it down, raised the drive, and could not feel anything wrong. Nothing wrapped around and the blades felt fine. Dropped the drive and tried again - same thing. Felt exactly as though the props spun, vibrating, increased engine RPM, but no added speed. The steering felt really weird too - un-responsive.
Resolved to motor back at just above idle speed (which would have taken quite some time). Did that for 10 minutes. Decided to diagnose more so stopped and put it in reverse. No strange sounds. I goosed the throttle hard and it did not vibrate, make noise, or anything - just sharply accelerated backwards like it should. Put it back in neut, scratched my head. Tried reverse again and got the same result - nothing abnormal at all.
Decided to try forward again. Slowly opened the throttle and, to my amazement, whatever was causing the problem was gone. No vibration, no prop noise - nothing. Slowly brought her up on plane - still nothing. Dropped back to idle and then hammered it and the boat was on plane in it's normal 3 to 4 seconds with no vibs or weird sounds (aside from the high pitched noise mentioned earlier). Ran it back to the marina at just over 3100 RPM. Once withing spitting distance I spun it up to just over 4k. Zero problems.
Ideas?
Dan
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