Was driving down the river last night with just me, the dog, half-dozen dekes. I have a PD 32 with heads/valves/shims, k&n, and gutted exhaust. Going downriver, I hit 28.9mph, new top speed!

About half-way back to the launch, I hit a rock, stump, or something else hard. It didn't jarr the handle, but I heard a smacking sound. About 400 yards later, motor starts making all kinds of noise like I scored a piston or something. I shut it down, check the oil, looked for damage, nothing.

Start her back up, motor sounds great. Put her in gear and it sounded like I was scraping the prop against a steel file. Shut her off, checked the prop, the rock guard, nothing is binding or catching. Decided to call it a day and called a buddy who towed me out.

This is an '06 motor I bought used. Has around 100 hours. When I engage the prop I hear the usual mechanical noise, but it's 10x louder at least. I'm thinking I took out the LU?????

How much damage was done to your prop?

been there. done that.

think you are correct.

Has that lower unit been changed out to the new style? if not, you need to anyway..

call kp and he will get you set up with a new one...

you can take it apart (like I did) and find out for sure....

Just take it off and unbolt the sections and you can see the gears....mine were chunked...

when i went to take mine off, the four bolts that hold the bottom part on were broken in two. It was only friction that was holding it together.

kp said probably not the rock it self, but the bolts can work loose (and eventually crack if not tightened) if you don't ck them, and that little movement can cause the gears to wear.

rock might just be the straw that broke the camel's back.... i hit my rock probably 5 or 6 running hours before it actually cut loose for good so don't know for sure that is what ultimately caused the failure... I had a little more warning, it would 'grind' for a second and then stop for awhile....

good luck and let us know what happens.

That's the thing, there was no damage to the prop...

I'm guessing it was a stump because the water is low, so maybe it just hit hard enough to wreck something? It sounds like bad bearings or a grinding gear. I don't hear any skipping, it's just about 10 times louder than it should be.

Operator Error!

Well, insurance is covering all the new parts, so I can't complain!! Fortunately the weather has been garbage up here, so I'm not missing much.

Just heard back from Pro-Drive today. They're shipping me a new lower unit, a long-shaft extension (worked as a short but will improve performance), a new reverse bracket (wasn't rachetting correctly) and a new prop. Our season is only another 12 days, so looks like she might be done for the year