After a fuel filter replacement we always have fun with the bleeding process as laid out in the manual. It never seems to happen the same way twice and rarely on the first attempt.
This year we tried something my father heard from a boat neighbor. I cranked the engine while he sprayed some fluid (not starting fluid... I think it was WD40) into the intake. The engine ran on that until the fuel system had purged all the air.
Two things though...
- It sounded awful with a rythmic bang about 3/sec.
- The guy spraying has the only throttle control. He got carried away at one point and the engine was reving up pretty high. I realized at this point that being at the controls meant that I had absolutely no control.
Fuel cutoff would do nothing, throttle would do nothing. So communications with the guy with the spray is critical.
Anyone know if this is a safe operation? It was a whole lot easier but I'm a bit skittish about using it for next year. If it's not damaging the engine in anyway then it's a great thing.