Your correct. Let's Play and Donzi Super V were smoken. All three lost their coolant and then poof. Your also correct about the aluminum heads. No telling what damage lies beneath. CRE will have to open them up and check for damage if the teams want them to or possibly some other repair facility...then they will have to be resealed. Not a good week for the 525. The water was brutal.

J

Question....What kind of engine failure causes fire?

We were told the coolant leaked out and the engine got so hot the hoses caught fire. Did they really flame? Who knows. Did it smoke, melt and produce black soot. Yes. You can see the smoke in the picture above. The 525 has a closed cooling system.

J

Lets try to stop all the rumors. The water hose came off of the oil cooler under the motor. All the water that cools the headers didn't get there. The crossover hoses burnt off because of the exhaust temp.,causing the fire.

Rapidcat is correct! We didn't tighten the hose clamp tight enough. It was fine on the garden hose but with the water pressure when running it blew off. Just another lesson learned by us. The fire was the cross over hoses on the headers. We towed in and replaced the hoses in the pits and ran the motor.Everything was fine and just needed a good cleaning.
Keep your eyes open for the Merc 525 in our new SVL next year. I have the utmost confidence in the 525 and feel it is the motor of choice for us.
Mad Dog