Never had a need for a freshwater flush...until now! Yeah, should be easy enough to fab one up. Thanks. .

Lifter? Is the sound up top?

Attaches to garden hose.

I would change the gimbal bearing while you have it apart ( you've gotten your money's worth at 400 hrs ) . Are you sure its a greaseable and not a newer sealed bearing ? Also , make sure to use new drive installation o-ring kit ( once the o-rings on yoke flatten out , yoke can spin inside inner race ) .

Yes the gimbal bearing is greasable. I've owned the boat since new and it gets greased every year. I know exactly how many pumps it takes to properly grease it on the years I don't pull the drive to grease the driveshaft splines and check alignment. U-joints are perma-lube. I probably will toss a gimbal bearing in even though this one still rolls smoothly.

Not a typical lifter noise and coming from behind the motor best I can tell. Speaking of lifter noise, anyone else pizzed that GM discontinued their EOS years ago? Man that stuff was magic for noisy lifters!

Maybe the starter nose gear is not fully retracting and clicking on the flywheel, you won't hear that just cranking it over, but you will when it starts.

Might be starter related but really doesn't sound like it. After exhausting all the obvious causes that I have the capabilities and facilities to diagnose, I gave up and took it to a shop hoping their Merc techs can quickly/accurately pinpoint the problem. Not a good time of year around here to get some shop time due to winterizations. I appreciate all the suggestions and will post an update once I hear back from the shop. If the motor has to come out, it opens up a whole other can of worms in terms of what to do in addition to fix the problem on a 400 hour engine.

BUP got it on the water supply issue. Most gardenhoses even at full blast will not match the flow of a bravo pump at idle. If possible in your case ,if you can put 4" or so of clean water in bildge and just let the pump suck it out with a hose flowing in ,should get you 2 or 3 min run time without any bad pressure/volume mismatches.just make sure dont have any junk down there that can get sucked into pump.

Government (EPA) nailed the EOS years ago. Wasn't GM's fault.

However, I believe it is back, just under a different nme and part #. I'll go do a search.