Ok, got an update here…I think my Sea Doo Saga is now solved…
Decided to carve out some time and take on this job myself (what’s the worse that could happen?) with a good friend/mechanic last night…
We started by pulling the gas tank and carefully drained it to find tons of little particles in the tank, from deteriorated pick up lines. The 2 screens and their clamps were also found in there. After thoroughly cleaning the tank and giving the hull a nice detail, we re-installed it. We then replaced the old deteriorated hoses with brand new fuel lines and re-connected the screens/check valves. Everything went together nicely.
From there, we traced the lines to the fuel filter…holy crap, was that full of debris…took that all apart, cleaned it all out with a bunch of soap, water, and q-tips…re-assembled…
At that point, we decided to fire it up. He did not think there was any reason to go into the carb., as the filter was where the stop-gap basically was for fuel flow. So, we go to crank, and it fired right up. Sounded better than it ever has, truly. I am so excited, bec. even though I have not yet water-tested it, I really do feel this thing is finally fixed. It just sounded so good, so much cleaner than it ever has, without any break up at all…
Obviously the next step is to just get it on the water and verify I am good to go…but I am honestly feeling great about where we are at…also, the shop that wanted to do this job wanted 4.5 hours for it, while we did this in under 3…and I guarantee, we were WAY more thorough than they would have been…half the time we spent doing this job was in cleaning everything before re-assembly…
I can almost tell you right now having you cleaned all the big particle filters and they were that dirty, I would spend the time and money to get them carb filters clean. My fathers was the same way and the small filters on the carburetor were all clogged with green residue from the old fuel lines, ethanol ect.
I see you think you have it fixed, but getting back to this I think they should have offered you $200 off, the amount they charged you recently for the plugs and sea trial that did nothing to resolve the issue. I don’t think it’s fair to expect them to refund something from last fall. With all the things that could have gone wrong in storage with old fuel etc I don’t think it’s fair to hold the marina responsible for a fix done that long ago. I don’t doubt that you’re telling the truth about not running it since but no shop can reasonably warranty carb cleaning/adjustments over a 6+ month storage period.
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Definitely a +1 to this. If the large particle filters were full of crap the little jets in the carb are almost certainly clogged again too. That’s probably why it ran well for the 1.5 hours you had it out after having the carb cleaned and adjusted.
I am completely on board with this line of thought. In my head, I was easily willing to let go of the $150 spent on the carb. adjustment at the end of last season, my issue was that they seemed to not really accept much of any responsibility for where it has gotten up until this point. The carb. adjustment done last year, whether needed or not, was not the issue. However, I paid it and was fine with it. At least that was believable. The $200 charged this time where they eventually determined that the plugs were bad, clearly was not the case. That was a waste of money…
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Noted, and I do not disagree. We probably will do this sooner than later, but I want to water test first and see what happens. Also, will be making a point to check the fuel filter after every use going forward this season, just to see if there is any remaining debris from the supply lines (pretty sure we got everything though)…
If I remember correctly the filters are less then 5 Bucks from anchor marine. Also if they did a carb adjustment wile having fueling issues there is a small chance with all this extra fuel coming in you might have to lean it out some on the idle screw. It might have a good idle when the engine is cold. Once it warms up you will know what needs to be done.
EDIT_I did not even pull off the carbs completely on my fathers, I just flipped them upside down to get at the filter and it prob took less then an hour. \
Funny you mention that, once we started it back up, we did have to adjust the idle down, as it was high…it’s ok, we will get it right…the hard part is over at this point, I suspect…
The idle prob was up because the fuel mixture was a lot richer then before and it was on a cold start out of the water. When you adjust the actual idle screw like you did you are covering up the fact its running rich still. You will notice when the engine is warm when you go do your test runs it might hesitate or even stall/ foul the plugs out at idle because you have the same fuel mixture that is very rich.
What you might end up having to do is, put the ski in the water with a load on the pump adjust the idle back up and lean the Mix screw out. Just wanna give you some heads up bud. :TUP: Hopefully you will have that thing going before we have to do 10mph everywhere lol
Engines love to run rich when cold but that is what a choke is for. Just make sure and adjustments you make are in the water and the engine is warm and you will be in the right direction!
:tup::tup::tup::tup: To saving some cash and getting into it yourself.
I purchased a 96’ Seadoo XP yesterday, getting it registered tomorrow and heading up to Fourth Lake in the Adirondacks this weekend. I guess i bought it from @LXIFLYBY , but did not make that connection until tonight. Great guy, cant wait to get this thing out on the water!
I always checked my 2 strokes for vacuum leaks by spraying starting fluid (lightly) around the outside of the carb, the throats, intake manifold, etc while running and listen for any change in rpm. Any leak will cause it to run lean which will take the engine out quickly.
Side note - don’t use starting fluid to help get a 2-stroke started.
Side bar, OF is my jam! My late grandfather purchased a camp on the channel right before first lake. It’s stayed in the family since. LOVE it there, and even though i’m in CA for work, I try to get back often. I’ll be there August 13/14th weekend.
Won’t be out at all this week. Too much going on and the terrified of boats mother in law will be staying with us this weekend so won’t get out then either. Grumble.
