2004 mercury 60 hp 4 stroke no water from P-hole

Redwood Charlie · Monday at 4:31 PM

I sure hope someone can help me because I'm out of ideas. No water was coming out of the "p-hole" The motor temp never got over 145 according to the Sea View app but there was no water coming out of said hole. I pulled the lower unit and replaced the impeller. The impeller was tired but not defective in any way. I decided before just bolting it back on I would try to flush the system with a hose first. I removed the thermostat because I was going to replace it too. 1st I flushed from the bottom and water came out of the thermostat hole no problem. Then I flushed thru the thermostat and water came out the bottom pipe no problem.
Then I plugged the bottom intake and tried flushing thru the thermostat to see if I could get water to flow from the P-hole and nothing. The last thing I did was screw the hose into the P-hole to back flush and no water came out of the thermostat or the bottom intake pipe.
I did not crank the water wide open but it did have decent pressure. I did push a wire into the P-hole as far as I could but it stopped after about 6 inches. Any and all ideas are welcome

Mad Dog 2 · Tuesday at 11:18 AM

Redwood Charlie said:
I sure hope someone can help me because I'm out of ideas. No water was coming out of the "p-hole" The motor temp never got over 145 according to the Sea View app but there was no water coming out of said hole. I pulled the lower unit and replaced the impeller. The impeller was tired but not defective in any way. I decided before just bolting it back on I would try to flush the system with a hose first. I removed the thermostat because I was going to replace it too. 1st I flushed from the bottom and water came out of the thermostat hole no problem. Then I flushed thru the thermostat and water came out the bottom pipe no problem.
Then I plugged the bottom intake and tried flushing thru the thermostat to see if I could get water to flow from the P-hole and nothing. The last thing I did was screw the hose into the P-hole to back flush and no water came out of the thermostat or the bottom intake pipe.
I did not crank the water wide open but it did have decent pressure. I did push a wire into the P-hole as far as I could but it stopped after about 6 inches. Any and all ideas are welcome

Have you disconnected the hose from the Tale tell fitting and run the motor to see if water pumps out?
A number of us on here have had problems with the muffs especially the type with rectangle hard plastic seals/ears. I thought my impeller had failed but then I put a 1/2 a plastic 55 gallon drum under the O/B and it pumped fine.

Pappy · Tuesday at 11:51 AM

Take compressed air and blow out the tell-tale. Very often a bug will build a nest in the hose.
Take the hose off at the powerhead end and blow through it from the other end and back through the powerhead from the fitting.
If no compressed air then take a piece of wire or a long tie wrap or whatever you have and clear the obstruction.
Since your temp was normal there was no reason to pull the gearcase unless it was for periodic servicing of the water pump assembly.......which is a good thing.

Redwood Charlie · Tuesday at 1:04 PM

Mad Dog 2 said:
Have you disconnected the hose from the Tale tell fitting and run the motor to see if water pumps out?
A number of us on here have had problems with the muffs especially the type with rectangle hard plastic seals/ears. I thought my impeller had failed but then I put a 1/2 a plastic 55 gallon drum under the O/B and it pumped fine.

I first noticed it with the boat in the water. I do like the 55 gallon drum idea

Crazyboat · Tuesday at 5:37 PM

Run a pipe cleaner up her, sometimes it's a small blockage. Happened on my F115 Yamaha years back. The wire worked quick and easy.

MrGiggles · 2025-01-29T08:02:42-0500

If you've got those mud dauber wasps in Arizona, they will plug up any orifice they can fit in. Four stroke outboards often have a bigger outlet nozzle that's perfect for them.

I usually had to fish out the nozzle on my 90hp 4S two or three times every summer. A piece of .090 weed whacker string works pretty well.

When I had that motor disassembled shortly after purchasing it, they managed to plug the hoses in the water cooled fuel sending module, managed to get through about 18" of hose to get at it. Determined little buggers.

Sea Antsy · 2025-01-29T08:15:32-0500

Yea.. get some weed Wacker line or THICK mono leader and keep it tied on your mount somewhere.. I have to run it up the pee hole several times a year.. OUCH..