This why you take stuff to people who know what they are doing.

[WFO Speedracer]

Customers Seadoo GTX DI , they brought it to me because it didn't run , I checked the compression and basically had nothing on either cylinder, I can clearly see the engine has been into before by the head gasket and paint missing off of the head bolts. But I give it the benefit of the doubt and pour some marvel mystery oil down the plug hole hoping the rings are just stuck, no dice.

So I pull it apart , the top exhaust bracket that bolts to the cylinder is missing, I get the rest of the exhaust off and go to remove the cylinder, it slides right off with no resistance and sure enough what is left of the ring are stuck but there is similar damage on both pistons right where the rave valves are at, I look at the rave valves and the ends are beat up on both of them. I found the missing bracket laying it the bottom of the hull where it had been bouncing around.

Then after talking to the customer I find out the local Seadoo dealership did this work , what they didn't do was clearance the rave valves for the oversized pistons, so the rave valves clearanced theirselves. I could do better work on the back of my truck tailgate than some of these shops do, that's fo sho !

 

[Mike W]

Didn’t clearance the RAVE valves on a 95 XP 800 with a X motor I had years ago. Got lucky and it didn’t need a bore. Just new pistons. Lesson learned. But hey, it ran great for 1 minute.

 

[WFO Speedracer]

Didn’t clearance the RAVE valves on a 95 XP 800 with a X motor I had years ago. Got lucky and it didn’t need a bore. Just new pistons. Lesson learned. But hey, it ran great for 1 minute.

Yep it will shear those rings right on off , this one will have to be bored again and new pistons with proper rave valve clearance this time..

 

[Sparkplug]

I just did a 200 hr service on my 1100. Rings and wrist pins. I put one of the powervalves back in upside down. Good thing I spun it over by hand first. The best experience comes from the worst experience.

 

[Myself]

I just went through a set of carbs for a guy on a Waveventure 700. It had a blown exhaust hose......this guy bought a cdi, had the electrical box a complete mess, bought an aftermarket coil, then finally bought some cheap chinese carb kits, and it STILL didn't run. Had I looked at it first I probably would have just replaced a $40 hose and he'd been good to go!

 

[WFO Speedracer]

I just went through a set of carbs for a guy on a Waveventure 700. It had a blown exhaust hose......this guy bought a cdi, had the electrical box a complete mess, bought an aftermarket coil, then finally bought some cheap chinese carb kits, and it STILL didn't run. Had I looked at it first I probably would have just replaced a $40 hose and he'd been good to go!

Exactly and just because you take it to a dealership does not mean the work will be done correctly , most of the guys in dealerships here have never even laid eyes on a DI engine much less repaired one.

 

[Myself]

Hell, my local dealership sends customers to get a DESS key programmed..........apparently they can't do it????

 

[WFO Speedracer]

They don't know how to do it on the older machines, their equipment will perform the task, but they have no idea how to perform that task on the older stuff.

 

[WFO Speedracer]

So I checked the bore size and it looks to have been bored .25 OS, I get 88.23 on the pistons and 88.40 on the bore size, so that's .17 mm clearance or .006 for you Mericans , technically it should have been ok and it would have been if they had actually checked the clearances on the raves. Its so beat up around the exhaust port now it will probably take another .075 mm to clear which will be 1.00mm OS..

 

[Sparkplug]

So I checked the bore size and it looks to have been bored .25 OS, I get 88.23 on the pistons and 88.40 on the bore size, so that's .17 mm clearance or .006 for you Mericans , technically it should have been ok and it would have been if they had actually checked the clearances on the raves. Its so beat up around the exhaust port now it will probably take another .075 mm to clear which will be 1.00mm OS..

I've had super good luck pulling sleeves. Chucking them up in my lathe. And boring them out with a boring bar. Then using a sunnen Hone to finalize it. Haven't seen anyone do it this way. But it works killer if your chuck is big enough.

 

[WFO Speedracer]

I had a local guy that used to bore my cylinders, he was in an accident with a zero turn mower and now he is in a wheelchair, I think I can get him to do this one if I go up there and help him.

 

[DylanS]

It’s insane what some people and shops charge for very sub par work. Just seen a ski up for sale that was put together by a “professional” builder that charged 100 an hour… one of the worst looking engine bays I’ve ever seen lol
Guess everyone’s a professional these days

 

[WFO Speedracer]

I believe last time I checked the local stealerships were getting $160 per hr here. If I did that I would only work one day a week.

 

[Quinc]

Problem is all the guys with experiance that took pride in there work (remember back when if you did a sub par job your co-workers would ridicule you..) are gone. All that is left is one master mechanic and a bunch of yahoos staring at there phones while working.. Last time I went to a stealership was for warranty work on a street bike. They returned it to me with the oil completely drained.. Who knows what else they missed..

 

[DylanS]

Problem is all the guys with experiance that took pride in there work (remember back when if you did a sub par job your co-workers would ridicule you..) are gone. All that is left is one master mechanic and a bunch of yahoos staring at there phones while working.. Last time I went to a stealership was for warranty work on a street bike. They returned it to me with the oil completely drained.. Who knows what else they missed..

Are you sure it didn’t have that new invisible oil they’ve been selling?

 

[SUPERJET-113]

I took a 96 XP into a huge dealership in 2000 once for them to install a new MPEM brain in the Ebox... They had the ski for like 2+ months and said they couldnt get it to work and kept giving the run around. I went and p/u the ski and tore it all apart and they had the wire colors/stripes not matched up correctly(there are like 20 wires). I figured it out and it worked!
Soooo, I had to go back to dealership for them to reprogram DESS to new MPEM and I told them how their supposed "Level 2 Seadoo technician boy" was a incompetent imbecile. That was the first time I've I took a ski into a stealership, and was the last time! I only took it their in the 1st plase was because it was a Sea-poo poo!

 

[WFO Speedracer]

I can't bring myself to cough up $1500 for the upgrade to unlimited on my candoo programmer, I haven't even had a need for it this year so far and quite honestly I hate doing the electrical troubleshooting on the 4 tecs..

 

[Myself]

I can't bring myself to cough up $1500 for the upgrade to unlimited on my candoo programmer, I haven't even had a need for it this year so far and quite honestly I hate doing the electrical troubleshooting on the 4 tecs..

I know, I wasn't doing much 4 stroke stuff when I bought mine and it was a tough pill to swallow. I just used it today to reset maintenance for a supercharger I just rebuilt. Next up is one with a limp mode issue so I'll have to hook up and check that one out.

Oh ya.......the one I just finished the supercharger rebuild on............it had already been to the local dealer AND another powersports repair place that apparently couldn't figure out the issues it had.

 

[WFO Speedracer]

Yeah that's the kind of work I am trying to avoid, there is no bright future in fixing other people scewups on four strukers, I am doing a DI right now, thats bad enough,

 

[Myself]

Had a Seadoo this week come in. Guy has tried to work on it himself. Tells my wife he needs a key programmed and maybe the "cdi" is bad cause he has no spark when he jumps the solenoid to crank it over. Whatever.... So, I take a look, voltage is good, fuses in the MPEM are random and incorrect. I fix that and hit the start button and the oil light comes on....OK, the mpem woke up. But still nothing with the lanyard. Strange thing was the lanyard wouldn't light up the oil light........also I notice the DESS wiring is not run through the grommet, just laying on top being smashed by the hood and storage bin, hhmmmm..... On a hunch I grab my DESS test post and plug it into the harness, BOOM, she turns over and lights off with a bit of fogging oil. Sooooo, I guess somebody installed a used, bad, DESS post and then gave up. Took me all of about 15 minutes to diagnose the issue.