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Salty Gator wrote:Porter’s

Salty Gator wrote: ↑March 6th, 2022, 11:56 am By the way, there are a lot of people that say a skeg guard weakens the skeg because of the holes you drill weaken it. Also traps salt and sand where it can’t be washed out. If it were me, I’d repair the skeg and toss the guard. Last I had mine done it was $50 good luck

Crap that was supposed to be an edit not a quote

Salty Gator wrote:

Salty Gator wrote: ↑March 6th, 2022, 11:56 am By the way, there are a lot of people that say a skeg guard weakens the skeg because of the holes you drill weaken it. Also traps salt and sand where it can’t be washed out. If it were me, I’d repair the skeg and toss the guard. Last I had mine done it was $50 good luck

Crap that was supposed to be an edit not a quote

Absolutely the truth! Besides that you can fix it properly cheaper than what the skeg guard cost in most cases.


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homboyfsu wrote:Thanks for all the advice! Will return the SKEG Guard. One minor question does Porter's return his calls? I called 2 times in a week.

Juan wrote: ↑March 8th, 2022, 7:11 am Personally, I'd keep the Skeg Guard. Instead of a shiny chrome look, a welded repair will make it look more like the original but if and when you hit something again, it will probably break at the weld where a Skeg Guard is designed to break off at the bolts holding it on to the lower unit and if a weld repair isn't done with a cold metal welder, the heat could easily damage the lower unit seals.

Salty Gator wrote:

Juan wrote: ↑March 8th, 2022, 7:11 am Personally, I'd keep the Skeg Guard. Instead of a shiny chrome look, a welded repair will make it look more like the original but if and when you hit something again, it will probably break at the weld where a Skeg Guard is designed to break off at the bolts holding it on to the lower unit and if a weld repair isn't done with a cold metal welder, the heat could easily damage the lower unit seals.

The holes are in the skeg, which weakens it. We’ve been down this road before Rick. There are pages and pages on The Hull Truth. OP,,, Read all you want and form your opinion.

Juan wrote: ↑March 8th, 2022, 9:57 am Salty and I had this discussion a long time ago and I think we agreed to disagree. Just a matter of preference imo. I don't believe the two small holes required to mount a skeg guard in the upper and thickest part of a skeg weaken the skeg any more than a weld. The way I see it, there's advantages and disadvantages to both ways:
A weld doesn't weld all the way through, the skeg is weaker at the weld because of it and welding with anything but the right cold welding equipment could damage seals.

A weld looks closer to original where a skeg guard is usually a chrome add on.
Skeg guards are weakest at the bolts where they mount but they're designed that way so that the bolts shear off. If you hit something hard enough, you'll lose the skeg guard.
Skeg guards are easy to replace but there has to be enough of the original skeg remaining to drill two mounting holes where the entire skeg can be repaired / replaced with a weld.
I could go on but as I said, I see advantages and disadvantages to both. I'll still go with a skeg guard when I can and weld if I have to.
Just don't hit any rock and it doesn't matter.