Mini Trail
New Member
My dad bought this boat at an auction or something last year. He and his buddy worked on it but never put it into the water.
I picked up a few weeks ago after we re-habbed a trailer from my old Ultranautics SeaFlash which was a terrible-riding and slow boat from the people that made the WetBike.
Once I got it started, most of the work went to cleaning the hull and removing all of the dated 90's stickers.
Here it is after power washing.
I got some of that red elastic sports wrap tape and wrapped the rear grab handle and the gross green rubber that oozed off of the handlebars.
Then I painted the faded pink parts red.
They look a lot nicer although I can't find a decent picture after it was all done. I did both of these useless vents, the trim knob thing and the fuel cap.
Last weekend I put it in the water on a trailer and tested everything out. It ran well, idled, the trim went up and down and water coursed through the cooling lines. The head never got too hot to touch. Alas I didn't have paperwork still so we didn't ride it.
This past weekend we took it to a lake where we were camped and I finally got it into the water. At first it didn't run particularly well. The idle was too low in the water and it handled oddly mostly because I kept playing with the trim. It was busy on the lake so there was a lot of traffic. My daughter didn't like the XP because water came up over the boards when we stopped and the funny handling and she thought it "stunk". I had spoiled her on the GTX the day before. We ended day one early as a result.
Day two I took it out by myself. I went through the manual first and learned how to set the idle. I played with the trim some and determined that it ran best all the way down regardless of the conditions. I tried riding at different RPMs after about 30 minutes I was riding it around 6000 and when I gave it more throttle it bogged. After that the bogging got worse. I pulled off to check it over and couldn't see anything wrong. I tried to adjust the idle again but I could hardly get it to start. I headed back towards the trailer going slower and slower. It would hardly take any throttle and seemed lean when I could get it to idle. I worked on it some at the dock but couldn't figure anything out so I took it back to the campsite so I could drink beer while I looked at it.
Sunday I took it back to the water early. The lake was mostly empty so I had plenty of time to fiddle with it on the ramp. I raised the idle (a touch too high but I can live with it) and couldn't find anything wrong with it. I launched it and let it idle around the loading area then slowly took off. It revs fast and jumps out of the water with the trim all the way down. I followed the procedure from the day before starting slow and slowly increasing speed. The engine ran clean as I explored all of the empty coves and glass smooth water. I stopped for about 5 minutes in one of the coves and it restarted easily and I let it idle me out into the lake. I gassed it and it responded immediately so no loading-up whatsoever.
After 30-40 minutes of issue-less riding I again throttled it over 6000 rpm and it bogged just like before. I decided that 6000 RPM was good enough for now but the bogging continued until it died.
When I could get it to run I rode around 2000 rpm back to the trailer. When it died I contemplated the problem. I convinced myself that it was a coil or some other electrical component going bad.
We left the lake and when I got home I read a bunch of threads and decided to check the fuel selector. It was hard to believe that it could run that long if the selector was stopped up but it was worth a shot. I removed the selector and pulled the reserve line first. The reserve line started spraying fuel with vigor, much more than it should have. I tried to get my thumb over the end but it was spraying past it. I unscrewed the gas cap to stabilize it and air rushed into the tank for a good 10 seconds.
I now believe that my problem is the gas tank is not venting correctly. I am not sure where it is supposed to vent. Does that sound plausible? Did I block a hole when I painted the cap?
Also at what point would I ever adjust the trim?
I'm sure I can come up with more questions. I thought that this boat looked very dated but there were at least 3 more like it on the lake this weekend with the same hull.
I picked up a few weeks ago after we re-habbed a trailer from my old Ultranautics SeaFlash which was a terrible-riding and slow boat from the people that made the WetBike.
Once I got it started, most of the work went to cleaning the hull and removing all of the dated 90's stickers.
Here it is after power washing.
I got some of that red elastic sports wrap tape and wrapped the rear grab handle and the gross green rubber that oozed off of the handlebars.
Then I painted the faded pink parts red.
They look a lot nicer although I can't find a decent picture after it was all done. I did both of these useless vents, the trim knob thing and the fuel cap.
Last weekend I put it in the water on a trailer and tested everything out. It ran well, idled, the trim went up and down and water coursed through the cooling lines. The head never got too hot to touch. Alas I didn't have paperwork still so we didn't ride it.
This past weekend we took it to a lake where we were camped and I finally got it into the water. At first it didn't run particularly well. The idle was too low in the water and it handled oddly mostly because I kept playing with the trim. It was busy on the lake so there was a lot of traffic. My daughter didn't like the XP because water came up over the boards when we stopped and the funny handling and she thought it "stunk". I had spoiled her on the GTX the day before. We ended day one early as a result.
Day two I took it out by myself. I went through the manual first and learned how to set the idle. I played with the trim some and determined that it ran best all the way down regardless of the conditions. I tried riding at different RPMs after about 30 minutes I was riding it around 6000 and when I gave it more throttle it bogged. After that the bogging got worse. I pulled off to check it over and couldn't see anything wrong. I tried to adjust the idle again but I could hardly get it to start. I headed back towards the trailer going slower and slower. It would hardly take any throttle and seemed lean when I could get it to idle. I worked on it some at the dock but couldn't figure anything out so I took it back to the campsite so I could drink beer while I looked at it.
Sunday I took it back to the water early. The lake was mostly empty so I had plenty of time to fiddle with it on the ramp. I raised the idle (a touch too high but I can live with it) and couldn't find anything wrong with it. I launched it and let it idle around the loading area then slowly took off. It revs fast and jumps out of the water with the trim all the way down. I followed the procedure from the day before starting slow and slowly increasing speed. The engine ran clean as I explored all of the empty coves and glass smooth water. I stopped for about 5 minutes in one of the coves and it restarted easily and I let it idle me out into the lake. I gassed it and it responded immediately so no loading-up whatsoever.
After 30-40 minutes of issue-less riding I again throttled it over 6000 rpm and it bogged just like before. I decided that 6000 RPM was good enough for now but the bogging continued until it died.
When I could get it to run I rode around 2000 rpm back to the trailer. When it died I contemplated the problem. I convinced myself that it was a coil or some other electrical component going bad.
We left the lake and when I got home I read a bunch of threads and decided to check the fuel selector. It was hard to believe that it could run that long if the selector was stopped up but it was worth a shot. I removed the selector and pulled the reserve line first. The reserve line started spraying fuel with vigor, much more than it should have. I tried to get my thumb over the end but it was spraying past it. I unscrewed the gas cap to stabilize it and air rushed into the tank for a good 10 seconds.
I now believe that my problem is the gas tank is not venting correctly. I am not sure where it is supposed to vent. Does that sound plausible? Did I block a hole when I painted the cap?
Also at what point would I ever adjust the trim?
I'm sure I can come up with more questions. I thought that this boat looked very dated but there were at least 3 more like it on the lake this weekend with the same hull.