1980 Evinrude 15hp pee hole

Hello, I recently bought an evinrude 15 that the previous owner knew nothing about. I removed and cleaned the carb, and put in new spark plugs. The motor started on the first pull after installing the plugs. There was not any water coming out of the pee hole, so I shut it down. How long does the motor need to run before the thermostat opens and lets water pass? How many people just run the motor without the thermostat? I plan to change the water pump impeller before running the motor. I just wanted to make sure that the motor was worth working on before spending too much more time and money.

Any motor that runs good is worth replacing the impeller on, impellers don't cost much and are pretty easy to replace. Water should start coming out the peehole within 15 sec, most much sooner. Sometimes a little increased throttle brings it out immediately. I don't run without a thermostat, proper operating temperature is important.
Tim

By all means replace the impeller for no other reason than peace of mind with a new (to you) engine. If the cup or lower wear plate have grooves that you can stick your fingernail on then replace the complete pump. Cheap compared to the price of rebuilding your powerhead!
In most cases the lack of water at the indicator hose is nothing more than debris in the hose. Blow it out and it should start to flow. The thermostat does not need to be open in order for the indicator to flow. It will flow any time there is water being pumped through the system.
The thermostat plays an important part in idle quality of your engine among other benefits. Also, OMC designed the thermostat to fail in the open position when or if it does fail. The thermostat is by-passed when at higher RPM anyway so it poses no restriction to cooling water when you need it most. Leave it in there. Only the "less knowledgeable" will remove them.

Pappy is correct, do not remove thermostat. Replace maybe, but it does not sound like you have a thermostat problem. A lot of these older motors will have gunk in the tell tale line that plugs them up is all. But the cost of an impeller is only $15-20 and maybe an hour of work. Well worth the investment on a running engine.

Thanks for the responses. I will let yall know what I find.

I cleaned out my indicator hole and only got a few drips out of it, so I removed the lower end to have a look. The flaps will not straighten out, so I will be replacing the impeller within the next few days.

I also had a "pee" problem with an older 15hp Johnson (get out of the gutter :shock: ). It was an intermittent problem so I changed the impeller and that seem to cure it, but the lack of indicator stream started again. So I tried the wire up the indicator hole but due to that 90 degree elbow it was difficult to send any meaningful length of wire past it to try and clear it. I read an article on web about a guy who modified his motor by drilling a hole at the bend of the elbow and installing a screw plug in it. With the plug out, he was able to send a wire more easily through the passages. I went one step further and deleted that elbow altogether and just installed a straight connector that shot the water out the side of the cowling through a new hole.

After all that, it stopped peeing again so this time I took the head off and noticed all the junk in the water passages. A new thermostat and head gasket was very cheap and cured that problem once and for all until I sold that boat.

Good luck.

I use weed eater string to clear mine. It will bend with the water line, and won't puncture it!

While you have the lower unit off, run something up inside the water tube that goes from the impeller housing up to the powerhead to check for any blockage there. I used a length of small dia. rod with a slight hook on the end. Run it up the tube like an auger, don't be too aggressive though. Slowly auger up thru tube, I ya feel too much resistance, let up. Ya don't wanna wreck the grommet between the tube and the powerhead!

Here is a very good article about your motor, cooling and water circulation pathways.

https://www.sschapterpsa.com/ramblings/water_circulation.htm

Thanks for all of the suggestions and links. The new impeller should be here tomorrow.

Replaced impeller and water flow is good.