Drive oil change issues...
 

Need some help... doing a oil change on a freshly rebuilt bravo one (AADS). After removing the lower plug and draining the oil overnight I found, to my surprise, that the reservoir never drained. Took the reservoir off, drained and cleaned it out but nothing really junky at the bottom was found. So I started to pump the oil in at the lower unit and the oil will not fill into the reservoir. I got about about 2.5 quarts in and could not pump anymore in no matter how hard I tried (not even an drop dribbled into the reservoir). Could lines between the drive and reservoir be that plugged with junk only after 18ish hours on the new drive?

I would pull the drive and check the valve assembly in the bell housing and see if oil comes out when you push in on it. That will let you know if have flow from the bottle to the drive and that the line isn't pinch somewhere in the bilge. If you have flow to the drive then something is amiss in the oil passage to the upper. I believe there is a spring and checkball there.

Probably some sludge in the line. The Merc gear lube will turn to goop over time.

Drive oil only has 19 easy hours on it and has been in there since late July. I cannot find a kink in the tubes so I'm leaning towards a bad dribble/check valve in the housing but the transom assembly is new. If it is junk in the line, would trying to put some air pressure in the line from the reservoir towards the drive be at all detrimental?

Found the issue...interesting to see there is not a fitting for the check valve to connect to the upper housing.:confused:

Guess a phone call is in order to the shop

https://drive.google.com/thumbnail?i...&sz=w1342-h557

They didn't give you back your original upper. They gave you back an older model that didn't have a reservoir.

Yeah, I'm not too happy about this at all. Hopefully a phone call will get this worked out since there is a 2 year warranty on this and it's only been 2 months.

So what you are saying is that they sold you an upper from like 1988 - 90 era ? Or am I missing something in the posts here ? I can not open the google link

AADS sold you this ? just asking

Yes AADS did the rebuild. Spoke with George today and solved the issue. He pulled the drive and installed the new transom and rebuilt the drive but did not install the drive itself. He had a local marina install the drive when they went through the boat for a once over. It must have been the previous owner who had the upper case switched during a previous rebuild and had no clue or didn't care.

George said it will not void the two year warranty so I'll just be changing/checking the oil a bit more frequently since the reservoir is now useless.

Can't they just install the fitting. I would think it would just be a little machining. Winter project. I would want the reservoir to be functional.