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Newer guy needs help


RyanB

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Hey gang,

Bought a brand new 2014 23LSV with the LS3 September 30th. We have used heck out of it the first year (over 130 hours so far), but I am now having a few problems that I would like assistance with. Hope it is ok to put a bunch in one thread, but if it is better to separate I will.

1st, boat ran very good up until about a month ago. I did the 25 hour service last year, took the boat in for an oil change and the recall on the LS3 (I thought it was a spark arrester, but now not sure). That was at about 115 hours. Since then, I have had a problem where at times, only in neutral or at slow idle, the boat runs REAL rough. It actually gave me an error message once to "service engine immediately". That happend as I was at the ramp, putting the boat back on the trailer, so I didn't run it at all.

Took the boat to the dealer, he cleared the message, blamed it on bad (low octane) fuel (I had to fill one tank on the water with 85 octane), and said it should be good. Well, it isn't. Still will run rough every so often. Any ideas on this?

Also noticed that I have a lot of white smoke behind the boat now. Never had it before. Doesn't matter if I am loaded up surfing, or if I am running back to the dock. Always white smoke. Could the two be related?

Another new issue is that the auto bilge pump now comes on a lot. Rear plug is tight, center plug is tight, no water coming in from the engine when I am running it. But yesterday for example, we were surfing, never took water into the boat other than people getting in and out of the lake. Boat was on the water from 10 - 6. Bilge came on at least a dozen times. Ideas here?

Final question, regarding ballast. I added two 900 pound bags in the lockers for this trip. With those things fully loaded, I couldn't even get on plane. Didn't matter where the wedge was. 4 people and 2 big dogs in the boat. Prop is a 2419. With just standard ballast, I can get to 5600 RPMs. This trip was about 5000' elevation.

Anyway, with the hard tanks full, and those locker bags half full, the water seemed to come over surfgate, making the wake terrible. So, long story short on this one, how big of bags (if any) should I be running? And should I change the prop.

Hope I am not too long winded. Thanks for the help.

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Couple thoughts

1) You put 85 octane in an engine that requires 91 ? Sounds like a great way to screw up the motor and would definitely make it detonate and run like crap. Just for grins take a look at your spark plugs.

2) Bilge pump issue - open up the hatches (engine and the one over the front/mid pumps) and watch to see where it is coming from, even if you have to do it while surfing. Takes a lot of water to get the bilge to run must be coming from either the engine or one of your ballast lines.

Edited by oldjeep
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I agree with oldjeep on the engine issue. Run some premium through and see if that helps.

As far as the water, double check the shaft seal. My dripless shaft seal failed this year and we had to fix it.

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I could be wrong but I thought that engines with knock sensors would simply retard the timing if lower octane fuel was used...

I doubt you are the first person to put 85 octane in a boat (or vehicle for that matter) that 'requires' 91. It is far more likely that the gas was 'bad'...i.e. old or contaminated...from the marina than the lower octane rating causing problems. I would not go there again. Have you canged your fuel filter(s)?

Regarding smoke....are you sure it's smoke and not steam?

Edited by RTS
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If you are getting white smoke and water in the bilge, I would be looking at your water flow on the engine. I'd guess you might have a hose not fully connected. If it is semi-closed, the engine may not overheat right away, but your exhaust will get really hot.

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Couple thoughts

1) You put 85 octane in an engine that requires 91 ? Sounds like a great way to screw up the motor and would definitely make it detonate and run like crap. Just for grins take a look at your spark plugs.

2) Bilge pump issue - open up the hatches (engine and the one over the front/mid pumps) and watch to see where it is coming from, even if you have to do it while surfing. Takes a lot of water to get the bilge to run must be coming from either the engine or one of your ballast lines.

if the water is coming from the engine your bilge water coming out of the bilge outlets on the side of the boat will be hotter than the lake/river water. that would be a good indication of the source

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I could be wrong but I thought that engines with knock sensors would simply retard the timing if lower octane fuel was used...

I doubt you are the first person to put 85 octane in a boat (or vehicle for that matter) that 'requires' 91. It is far more likely that the gas was 'bad'...i.e. old or contaminated...from the marina than the lower octane rating causing problems. I would not go there again. Have you canged your fuel filter(s)?

Regarding smoke....are you sure it's smoke and not steam?

The maps only go so far, and you can only pull so much timing out

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As far as not planing with 900lb bags, you need to counter that with additional bow weight. I assume your bow was sky high, and the boat couldn't get enough forward momentum because of the prop shaft angle. My LS3 sounds like it runs rough sometimes with the cruise on. When getting to surf speeds, it reduces power too soon and the sputters to compensate. Never had it run rough otherwise. My bilge runs a lot too, but it's my ballast fittings.

Edited by mrnate450r
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To answer a couple questions. One, I am talking about 30 gallons of fuel in a 70 gallon (I think) tank. And that was at least 90 gallons ago. And most, if not all, the lower octane fuel was burned out of the boat before the engine started acting up.

Added ballast tanks are 750, not 900.

Bilge pump is coming on, and expelling water. I have not checked the temp of the water, but will. I have looked into the engine compartment, and I can not see water coming in when it is running. Engine temp stays around 170*, sometimes lower, so it is getting plenty of cooling.

I am 90% sure it is smoke, and not steam, but not 100%. I will say that the exhaust smell is now bad enough that no one wants to sit on the sunpad when we are running. And you can smell exhaust more when surfing than you did before.

Pro shop guy I spoke with today said that he has run more weight in a similar boat without trouble planeing, so perhaps the engine is not producing 100% power.

Boat is at the dealer, and they will lake test. They were thinking the water might be one of the seals around the prop shaft.

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Here is a photo from yesterday. Not the best (and I'm not the long haired guy in the photo), but you can kind of see the white that I am talking about on the lower left side of the photo.

Steam or smoke, it wasn't there in the past.

image.jpg1_zpstvzarbfu.jpg

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To answer a couple questions. One, I am talking about 30 gallons of fuel in a 70 gallon (I think) tank. And that was at least 90 gallons ago. And most, if not all, the lower octane fuel was burned out of the boat before the engine started acting up.

Added ballast tanks are 750, not 900.

Bilge pump is coming on, and expelling water. I have not checked the temp of the water, but will. I have looked into the engine compartment, and I can not see water coming in when it is running. Engine temp stays around 170*, sometimes lower, so it is getting plenty of cooling.

I am 90% sure it is smoke, and not steam, but not 100%. I will say that the exhaust smell is now bad enough that no one wants to sit on the sunpad when we are running. And you can smell exhaust more when surfing than you did before.

Pro shop guy I spoke with today said that he has run more weight in a similar boat without trouble planeing, so perhaps the engine is not producing 100% power.

Boat is at the dealer, and they will lake test. They were thinking the water might be one of the seals around the prop shaft.

Do you have a fat sac or lead in the bow? The stock tank is not enough. Bet you the pro shop guy has bow ballast above and beyond stock tank

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Just stock. But it took moving 3 guys and a 90 pound dog to the very tip of the bow to plane with it half full.

Make sure you have the auto wedge feature engaged.

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Make sure you have the auto wedge feature engaged.

Auto wedge puts the wedge in the full down position while getting on plane before it sets to the position you want it in the preset. If you can't plane without the wedge, this is irrelevant.

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