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Fuel line issue(pic inside)


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So I've been having numerous small issues with my boat and how its been running. The boat was struggling to take off out of the hole, it hesitated a lot before finally taking off. So I had the carb rebuilt. That seemed to fix the taking off problem.

Then I was out the other day and after a few hours, the boat was surging at any speed. I couldn't really get up to speed for the most part but it started happening right when my buddy was about to drop a ski and barefoot. Needless to say it killed the rest of a great day out.

So I decided to check out the gas tank and fuel line and discovered 2 things. The first(being the picture below) was that there seemed to be a line missing at the end of the fuel line pickup(thats what I'm calling it). It looks like the previous piece broke off, however I couldn't find it in the gas tank by sticking my arm in it. I think I'm going to pull the whole gas tank later this week.

So my question here is, what should be on the end of the orange tube? Should it be a soft rubber hose that lays on the bottom of the tank??

The second issue was that the breather line that attaches to the empty hole next to orange tube, it was clogged. Not only was it clogged but it was about 6' long and coiled up a few times. From the nipple to the vent is only about 1 to 1.5 feet. So the hose got cut and shortened. The other this is that the nipple, I was told was supposed to have a "ball" to help prevent water from getting into the tank. It did NOT have that.

Based on all that mess above, do you think I made the right choices? Is there anything I missed or other things I should do???

oGmSwzL.jpg

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looks like you might be on the right track. is the hose in the picture long enough to reach the bottom of the fuel cell? i had the same issue with gas pick-up hose on a lawn mower fuel cell. hose broke off causing mower to surge before eventually shutting off due to lack of fuel. replaced the fuel hose with one of the proper length and the problem went away. is there a lot of dirt/debris in the bottom of the fuel cell? maybe moisture? A can of sea-foam might help with those issues

with regards to the vent hose, keep in mind that when your tank if full or close to full the fuel will move around a lot on waves. With the shorter hose it could slosh up and out the vent onto your gelcoat which if not cleaned quickly will turn white gel a dark yellowish brown color that is hard to remove. the longer hose may help prevent this from happening with the additional coils. not sure on the ball or check valve on the end. Just my thoughts.

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looks like you might be on the right track. is the hose in the picture long enough to reach the bottom of the fuel cell? i had the same issue with gas pick-up hose on a lawn mower fuel cell. hose broke off causing mower to surge before eventually shutting off due to lack of fuel. replaced the fuel hose with one of the proper length and the problem went away. is there a lot of dirt/debris in the bottom of the fuel cell? maybe moisture? A can of sea-foam might help with those issues

with regards to the vent hose, keep in mind that when your tank if full or close to full the fuel will move around a lot on waves. With the shorter hose it could slosh up and out the vent onto your gelcoat which if not cleaned quickly will turn white gel a dark yellowish brown color that is hard to remove. the longer hose may help prevent this from happening with the additional coils. not sure on the ball or check valve on the end. Just my thoughts.

Yeah I should mentioned I siphoned out as much debris as I could, however the more I think about it the more I want to pull the whole tanks and ensure its free!

I get what you're saying about that long line. However the breather is higher than the connection for the line. I'll have to keep an eye on it and make sure I'm not dumping gas out of the breather. I may have to add a little longer length hose. Just not sure a 6ft hose was needed.

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Hard to tell from the picture, but it doesn't look to me like the rubber hose connection on the orange tube is broken. I would suspect that it was cut like that so that it would not get suctioned against the edge or bottom of the tank. Is it possible it has just slipped up on the tube? I would think that if this was your issue, it would only happen when the fuel was low in the tank. Wondering if the 20 year debris buildup could have been the issue.

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Hard to tell from the picture, but it doesn't look to me like the rubber hose connection on the orange tube is broken. I would suspect that it was cut like that so that it would not get suctioned against the edge or bottom of the tank. Is it possible it has just slipped up on the tube? I would think that if this was your issue, it would only happen when the fuel was low in the tank. Wondering if the 20 year debris buildup could have been the issue.

I see what your saying that it doesn't look broke. I just assumed because it was very uneven that it was broke. Do you think there should be a soft bendable tube laying on the bottom of the tank?

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Bump, Any ideas of whether I should have a "soft" house attached to the orange one and have it lay flat on the bottom of the tank?

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Bump, Any ideas of whether I should have a "soft" house attached to the orange one and have it lay flat on the bottom of the tank?

I see no benefit, just one more place for debris to accumulate and more area that could clog. I would think a "cut-away" view of your tank should look like this:

post-28780-0-82722700-1432144498_thumb.j

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If I understand your question right, this is what you are considering doing:

Both responses of yours are accurate. I don't know that the Orange tube goes close to the bottom, it looks like its been cut? I don't know if the addition of that black hose onto the orange was factory or something someone added?

I'll have to take some measurements tomorrow and see how far down the orange part goes. The hard part is I would need to remove the tank to get an accurate measurement.

Edited by Arick
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If it does not get very close to the bottom, that is not necessarily a bad thing. It will help prevent any debris from getting sucked up from the bottom. The downside to a larger gap between the pickup and the bottom of the tank is that if you "ran out of gas" you would actually still have gas in the tank that the motor wouldn't be able to use. Essentially your 30 gallon tank might effectively become a 29 gallon tank (or smaller depending on how short the pickup is).

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If it does not get very close to the bottom, that is not necessarily a bad thing. It will help prevent any debris from getting sucked up from the bottom. The downside to a larger gap between the pickup and the bottom of the tank is that if you "ran out of gas" you would actually still have gas in the tank that the motor wouldn't be able to use. Essentially your 30 gallon tank might effectively become a 29 gallon tank (or smaller depending on how short the pickup is).

I get that and agree with you. But not knowing what the length of the orange tube should be, I will have to pull the tan, take measurements and guess at what the length should be.

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You got the tube out without pulling the tank. Can't you hang a stick in the tank to estimate the depth?

My tank has a "reserve" section that the fuel is drawn from. That part is lower that the rest of the tank. If your draw tube is in a dropped portion, you aren't missing out on much fuel.

Also, if your fuel line is original 1994 stuff, you should probably replace it all and clean the tank anyway.

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