Riders who are first timers to the Daytona Freeride are often new to surf and saltwater riding as well. These are twin challenges to deal with your first time out.
First lets start with your ski. Keeping a ski running well can be hard anyway, but riding in surf and saltwater is especially hard on a jet ski. Riding in freshwater, your ski can leak water and have all kinds of issues, but will still run well at home on your lake or river. Drop it in at Daytona and 5 minutes later
your brap now runs like crap.
What is the problem? First Saltwater is highly conductive, while freshwater is not.
con·duc·tiv·i·ty noun \ˌkän-ˌdək-ˈti-və-tē, kən-\
: the ability to move electricity from one place to another
This means as soon as your ski is wet, then everything is conductive. This means anything electrical that is not insulated can and will fail. A bad start/stop switch will kill or weaken your spark on any yamaha. Bad spark plug wires or boots or connections will go bad. Battery, power/ground cables and connections all can cause problems. Bilge pump wiring and switches go bad. Many have been shocked while riding on their bars or throttle lever. I remember Blue being a shock victim one time due to some bad bilge wiring.
Second problem is water ingestion. Again back at the lake, gulp some water and your ski stumbles for bit but will usually clear right out. Hit the ocean and the same gulp can kill your engine or cause it not to clean so quickly. The same conductive saltwater plays havoc inside your motor. Roll your ski over and gulp a little more water and it will not restart at all. Next wave hits you and Oops! Repeat a few times and say hello to Davey Jones' locker!
Often a ski will have several of these problems at once resulting in big problems. A leaky hood seal or unsealed cables at pole area and a crappy coil together can kill your day in the surf.
Some knowledge ahead of time can help you to prevent these problems.
*Keep the water out. Check your hood seal. You can lay a dollar bill in different areas and clamp or ratchet hood down and check the seal. Cables passing through pole base area should be sealed. Cover or seal all holes and penetration in your hull. Make sure all cooling lines are tight and there are no cracks to spray saltwater into your carbs.
If you fall off in the surf, always roll your ski with the carbs up. This keeps the bilge water on the bottom and away from the carbs. Always remember throttle up when in the water which keeps the carbs up. Another tip if you have trouble restarting after some water ingestion is to use your primer if you have one. A couple squirts of fuel can often help to displace some water and get you started faster and with less cranking.
*Keep the water that does come in away from your carbs air intake. Make sure your hood has hood tubes to direct the water lower into the bilge area. Make sure you have a cover over your engine/midshaft couplers as they will sling bilge water into your carbs. Stock flame arrestors work much better than open screen a/m air filters are keeping water out.
*Get the water out. Make sure your stock siphon and/or aftermarket bilge pump system is working and wired properly. Versiplugs and scuppers are very effective at removing water anytime you are moving forward even in rough water when bilge pumps have problems.
*Yamaha Start/Stop switch problems
These switches and their connectors are water sealed when new and work grear when in good condition. When Start/Switches get older the rubber seal over the lanyard switch fails and fills with saltwater resulting in no spark or weak/intermittent spark. Also the ebox start and stop connectors have rubber seals to the wires and between the male and female sides which can and do fail resulting in starting, stopping and running issues. Third issue is damage to the wires anywhere along the s/s switch harness between the ebox and bar switch. It is common for insulation to get damaged during install or from rubbing against anything sharp or an overheated waterbox.
If you have spark issues in the surf, the first test is to disconnect the plug with the black/white wire at the ebox. This disconnects the stop and lanyard switches. If your ski now has spark or now runs better, you need to repair or replace s/s switch. You can turn idle down until engine dies without holding the throttle and ride that way, but it isn't safe to do so.
Of course, JetManiac carries new OEM start/stop switches, s/s repair and ebox harnesses, s/s ebox connectors, and lanyards and will have them on hand at our booth on the pool deck.
*Ignition Coil problems
This is the probably the most common problem with jet skis in saltwater. The high voltage wires must carry the high voltage through the wet with saltwater wires through the connection to the spark plug wire terminal to the spark plug itself to the plug gap and fire across a gap with saltwater and saltwater vapor in the combustion chamber. ANY chance the high voltage can jump to the ground of your engine block, etc. it WILL. This means any crack or pinhole in the plug wires, boots, or connections, and you can kiss your spark goodbye! Any high resistance in the wire from internal breakdown or corrosion in the wire and wire connection will amke this problem worse.
Cutting back spark plug wires to fresh wire and installing new crimp on terminals and boots can often fix the problem. We use and recommend MSD boots and terminals. If wires are bad, then coil replacement is required (The wires are epoxied into the coil inside the ebox.). We have used coils for those on a budget. Also have OCD rebuilt coils with new wires and MSD boots and terminals installed. Finally, the Ferrari of coils is the JetManiac Yamasaki surf coil. All New coil starts with an OEM Kawasaki ignition coil (hotter spark, lower price) with new OEM wires and black, red, yellow, blue, green, or orange sheathing and new yamaha ebox grommets and MSD boots/terminals installed and surf sealed. These coils are surf proven.
*Saltwater intrusion
Saltwater can leak inside your ebox and/or flywheel cover area and cause all kinds of issues. Parts can ground or short out, etc., etc. Take fuse cover off ebox to check for water there. Also any damage or added connections in your stator harness can cause weak or no spark condition.
Weak or poor battery, cables, and connections can all contribute to poor cranking performance when ski is wet with saltwater or from extended cranking because of other saltwater issues making ski hard to start.
Bilge switches, wiring, and connections can all fail or short out in saltwater.
*If you get water in your motor and it will not start, you need to fix it immediately!! Do not wait until the next day or you will be sorry.
http://www.x-h2o.com/index.php?threads/so-you-sunk-your-ski.111656/
*Flushing and care after saltwater riding
Flushing removes the salt water from the water passages inside your motor and exhaust. This is a good practice, but not critical if you are riding again the next day.
However, it is much more important to remove water from inside of your motor and exhaust system. Cylinder walls, rings, crank webs and bearings are not stainless and can begin to rust very quickly when wet with saltwater.
Always brapp you motor out well after riding. Start it and do it again several times over the next hour or two will help alot.
Make sure if you get water in your motor while riding to run motor on a hose for awhile to burn water out.
Fogging oil is great for helping to prevent issues. Spray it directly into your carbs while motor is running to fog crank and bottom end. Then remove plugs and spray directly into your cylinder. Then hold stop button and simultaneously press start button to cot cylinder walls and rings without starting motor.
To be continued when I get more time...
JetManiac always tries to have a large inventory of parts at our beachside booth on the pool deck behind the host hotel to help riders keep their skis running so you can enjoy as much time on the water as possible! We will have a large selection of new, used, and reconditioned parts and can help you with troubleshooting and problem diagnosis.
