1951 Johnson Seahorse HD-26 2.5 hp

Here is the pride of my (outboard) fleet, an all original, well preserved, 1951 Johnson Seahorse. It's a real small engine, only 2.5 hp. Wonder how much difference that 0.5 hp makes over a 2 hp, haha!

Some specs of the engine:

- 4.08 cu.in ( about 66cc)

- two stroke

- twin cylinder, alternate firing

- direct drive

I got this engine from a man who started selling boats and engines over thirty years ago. He took over an old boat shop, and when doing that, he started to clean the place up and threw away old stuff. He found this engine sitting in the corner of the store, and said to himself "no way I'm going to throw that one away!", and brought it home where he had it sitting in his garage for thirty years. He never attempted to get it running, he just wanted to save it from the scrap man.

This engine is quite a rare model. The HD-26 was only made for one year, 1951. It was sort of a transition model between its predecessor, the HD-25 2.5 hp and its successor, the 3 hp JW-10 that was released in 1952, replacing the 2.5 hp class altogether.

This engine is from the "pre-choke"-era. You pump the primer to prime the engine. You set the high speed mixture setting by turning the lever instead of pumping it

Gas tank shut off valve

Got it running with the 30 + years old spark plugs!

Also visible in this pic is the low speed mixture setting valve needle, at the left just under where the spark plug wires start.

Here s the carburetor and the primer mechanism. Note, no rubber gas lines here! Just some real nice copper lines.

Operating instructions

And lastly, here is a couple of screenshots from an old owners manual of this engine