Re: 9.5 hp Evinrude – how to determine if its worth fixing

[Don]

Jay
It is kind of tough to advise you on this engine…Guys usually love or hate these things. I guess they are like many other engines, once you have worked on a bunch of them, you figure them out and get used to them. Nonetheless, I surely don’t want to condemn this engine without even seeing it.
Like everyone else says, if it is a salt water engine, you may want to save it for parts.
Does it show any evidence of black exhaust soot under the engine cover? If so, there may be exhaust leaking back up into the engine pan, which is a bad sign. Repairing this problem usually means splitting those engine pans setting scores of washers/spacers/springs and mounts free to fall all over your shop floor.
You mention low compression numbers, but I wouldn’t get too concerned until you try to run the engine a bit and retest. Have you changed the gear lube? The gearcase is probably toast if it is full of water, or has no lube in it. Like Johnyrude says, don’t get too far into this project without attempting to remove the gearcase to see if the driveshaft is stuck into the crank splines.
Finally, engine mount problems are common with these things. So, try rocking the powerhead back and forth/side to side in the engine pan to see if there are any obvious problems with the mounts. Once again, bad mounts means splitting those engine pans.
So, invest a few hours of your time investigating this engine’s trouble areas before getting in too deep. Hopefully, a new impeller and recoil will give you another engine to use!