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Damper plate upgrade


John23LSV

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Upgrading the damper plate on a 2000 LSV

This is my first post. I joined the crew this past spring and have learned a lot from previous posts concerning maintenance and ballast for my 2000 LSV. One common problem that seems to plague numerous members is the damper plate. After hearing the clunk into gear and that low growling harmonic noise as you idle in forward and reverse. I thought it would be best to replace it now before having something go through the bellhousing only to make a larger and more expensive repair. Following are some pictures and brief explanation. I hope this can help out the next member looking to do the upgrade.

Because the Walters gear drive is right on the gas tank with no room to move it back off the spline you need to lift the engine up about six inches so that it can be removed. Its hard to see but I placed a 6X6 at the top of the framing across the garage and borrowed a chain pulley system that I connected to the engine to do the lifting. Remove the transmission mounts and remove two of the three bolts from the engine mounts so it can pivot up .

1.jpg

Remove seat up against engine compartment by removing screws at top and back of seat on engine side.The sides of the seat are attached by lag bolts and on the bottom sides of the seat are small lags through an aluminum brace.

2.jpg

Remove bolts, washers and nuts from aluminum cross brace at top

3.jpg

Remove bolts,washers and nuts from either end of bottom aluminum brace.

4.jpg

Lift engine, transmission and V drive up about six inches, loosen nuts on V drive and slide back to remove. Placed v drive to the side on drop cloth. I did not remove the fluid from the v drive or transmission because once back together I wanted to take the boat back out for a test ride. Loosen transmission cooler from bracket and snake it back to transmission so you don't have to drain fluid. I removed the transmission and bellhousing together as one piece and set it to the other side on a drop cloth. I'm surprised at what GM and or Indmar had designed as the original damper plate. ( A piece of tin with some springs ) As compared to the heavy duty damper plate I purchased from Discount Inboard Marine. I was told that there might be a clearance issue between damper plate and bellhousing so I borrowed some clay from my daughter, placed it on the ends of the bolts and test fitted the bellhousing on with no clearance problems.

5.jpg

New damper plate installed( torgue to 35 ft-lbs )

6.jpg

Reverse procedure to reassemble until you get finished product. I replaced my strut bearing also while everything was apart. Aligned engine ( it was easy to get lateral movement of engine for alignment with chain pulley system still up. trying to move engine on mounting rods was difficult to say the least with all the weight on the rods, pulling up on the chains to remove the weight made that a breeze to align.)

7.jpg

I took the boat out on the lake last weekend and it drove like brand new. No clunking or noise.

  • Like 2
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HOLY FIRST POST, John.

Very nice article and great description. (Not to mention nice storage garage)

I vote this be put into the DIY section.

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I think all first posts should include a DIY article, instead of something like "how much oil does my monsoon take and what filter do I use"

Nice job and sweet boat house there.

-Chris

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Nice job and well done John. Stick around...I can tell with you wrenching skills you'll fit right in around here. Yahoo.gif I agree....best first post I've ever read.

Boy is the damper plate you put in look a heck of a lot better than the original one! Great idea with your daughters clay. I love the boat garage too!

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Thanks Crew - Glad to be a part of the forum

Pistol Pete I learned how to load pictures to crew posts from your video. So thanks for that and how would I move or copy this post to DIY section

Paul - I purchased the damper plate from Discount Inboard Marine, it's made in Germany. It's not the upgraded Indmar piece

To all that appreciate the boat house Thanks, I'm a general contractor and I built the boathouse and doors. I recently built one for my neighbors X-45 that is designed as a drive through. I attached some pictures

boat2001.jpg

Picture068.jpg

Picture069.jpg

Edited by John23LSV
  • Like 1
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John,

One of the Admins or Mods would have to move this over to the DIY section.

I bet they'll see this thread and move it some time soon.

Glad my corny, one take vid., helped you out.

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Wow....that drive through boat house is my dream boat house! We have a dedicated tow vehicle so if I could get one that is 50 feet long I'd be set! Rockon.gif Pull in, and go immediately to cleaning up the boat! We plan to build our own house someday....I gotta use that idea!

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Everyone beat me to it. That's a sweet garage, and I've seen a few.

I had the same question on the dampener plate that Paul asked (and you answered), it's a weird looking one.

Peter :)

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Man some people have it made!! I'll bet there is even a drain in the floor of that garage.

My scenario: Move 4 bikes, toolbox and any misc crap that the kids stack in front of the boat. Then I can hook up and pull out (very carefully its tight) Then I have to put up the tower/ speakers/ board racks etc.

Putting away reverse the above except I have to deal with a wet garage floor all the time.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Very nice article John, welcome to the crew :thumbup:

This kinda bothered me all summer so I'd like to get everyone's take on it. I've heard this dampner plate issue could be more prevalent in 05-06 boats :cry: I have an 06 vRide and one of my buddies has an 05 vlx. In both boats you can definitely feel/hear the tranny engage into forward or reverse but I wouldn't describe it as a clunking or grinding noise and there's no howl or grind while idling in any gear. However, another buddy has an 07 LSV and it's almost impossible to feel/hear it engage into forward or reverse. Do any of us have potential problems?

BTW, all 3 of us have the 340 Monsoon

Nate

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I'm certainly no expert on the engineering and design of Malibu Boats, but my problem started at the end of summer in 09 when I heard a low harmonic noise when I put the boat in gear(forward or reverse). Idled perfectly in neutral with no noise. As I gave it the gas the noise went away. The clunking noise going into gear only happened once in a while but was happening more often over the next year. I have a hammerhead engine in my lsv which is a chevy proformance parts ZZ4 block and aluminum heads with the Indmar multi port fuel injection. I'm very happy with that part of the powertrain. I'm not sure who designed the damper plate but it looks cheap and not a good match for 365 HP boat made for wakeboarding, skiing and towing the kids.

As the noise continued into this last summer I read some posts and realized that I wasn't alone and it helped me understand what was actually going wrong.(glad it wasn't the transmission or vdrive) Also the pictures of springs going through the bellhousing of some other members made me want to take action. When I removed the damper plate from my boat it had 430 hours on it.The springs were loose and I'm not sure how much longer it would be until it exploded, but I certainly didn't want to find out.

Most of the posts that I read had problems with the 05 models. Maybe its the fact that we started adding ballast to the boats? Not sure, I'm the second owner of my boat, but I know that it came from the factory with the wedge and 350lbs of ballast, so its not like they didn't realize that there would be extra weight on the boats. I am planning on adding another 1500 lbs this winter so I will give the new plate a good test next summer. It doesn't seem to be a problem with the people that just like to ski and don't add any additional ballast. So, maybe it is the weight?? But it is still, no excuse! They were selling the boats to people like us that wanted to wakeboard which includes additional ballast.

Not really sure if you have the same damper plate in your boat as the one I had. I guess you could call Indmar and ask what type of plate you have in yours. As a reference you can ask them if it is the same plate that they put in the 2000 year boats. If that is the case, you probably have a upgrade in your future. Depending if your a skier or a wakeboarder/surfer adding ballast. When I took my boat for a test ride after the upgrade shifting into gear was very smooth, no noise, no clunk, like new. I also replaced the strut bearing with an XPC Verconite thermoplastic bushing from skidim.

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I will add another small but important part to diagnosing this:

I dont' know about the floating wedge but if you have a manual wedge beware that the wedge can create a rattling sound on take off (when the wedge is deployed) This had me convinced that my damper was about to go until I noticed one day that it wasn't doing it. So out of curiosity I deployed the wedge and the noise came back.

The prop wash can cause the wedge to rattle.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I'm certainly no expert on the engineering and design of Malibu Boats, but my problem started at the end of summer in 09 when I heard a low harmonic noise when I put the boat in gear(forward or reverse). Idled perfectly in neutral with no noise. As I gave it the gas the noise went away. The clunking noise going into gear only happened once in a while but was happening more often over the next year. I have a hammerhead engine in my lsv which is a chevy proformance parts ZZ4 block and aluminum heads with the Indmar multi port fuel injection. I'm very happy with that part of the powertrain. I'm not sure who designed the damper plate but it looks cheap and not a good match for 365 HP boat made for wakeboarding, skiing and towing the kids.

As the noise continued into this last summer I read some posts and realized that I wasn't alone and it helped me understand what was actually going wrong.(glad it wasn't the transmission or vdrive) Also the pictures of springs going through the bellhousing of some other members made me want to take action. When I removed the damper plate from my boat it had 430 hours on it.The springs were loose and I'm not sure how much longer it would be until it exploded, but I certainly didn't want to find out.

Most of the posts that I read had problems with the 05 models. Maybe its the fact that we started adding ballast to the boats? Not sure, I'm the second owner of my boat, but I know that it came from the factory with the wedge and 350lbs of ballast, so its not like they didn't realize that there would be extra weight on the boats. I am planning on adding another 1500 lbs this winter so I will give the new plate a good test next summer. It doesn't seem to be a problem with the people that just like to ski and don't add any additional ballast. So, maybe it is the weight?? But it is still, no excuse! They were selling the boats to people like us that wanted to wakeboard which includes additional ballast.

Not really sure if you have the same damper plate in your boat as the one I had. I guess you could call Indmar and ask what type of plate you have in yours. As a reference you can ask them if it is the same plate that they put in the 2000 year boats. If that is the case, you probably have a upgrade in your future. Depending if your a skier or a wakeboarder/surfer adding ballast. When I took my boat for a test ride after the upgrade shifting into gear was very smooth, no noise, no clunk, like new. I also replaced the strut bearing with an XPC Verconite thermoplastic bushing from skidim.

Sorry for the stupid question, but what does this harmonic noise sound like?

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Sorry for the stupid question, but what does this harmonic noise sound like?

I don't know how else to explain it....ever travel in an old car really fast on the freeway? It is that noise that the car makes, kind of cyclical in nature.

Someone else might have a better explanation. :lol:

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Ruffdog is right on. A harmonic noise is something that would happen in a repetitive pattern based on the frequency of the part generating the noise. The repetitive pattern would increase or decrease as the vibrating "source" part's vibration increases or decreases (ie as the throttle increases or decreases in this case). Sometimes the harmonic noises will go away at a certain frequency or above a certain frequency.

Think of two sine waves of the same amplitude that are out of phase. The points the two waveforms cross would be a harmonic. If the frequency of the waveforms increases, the number of harmonics (intersecting points of the waveforms) would increase over a given time period.

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