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RESTO 717 Compression/Rebuild

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TicTacZac

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Hey guys, hoping you can give me some answers about my Rotax 717 engine. I ran a compression test and was at 115 per cylinder dead even. Did not remember to do this while it is in the WOT position. Will these effect my numbers drastically? Next, I just ripped the head off, and the cylinders/walls look to be in great shape! I was going to rebuild but I’m considering simply slapping a new head gasket in and trying another test. Any input? Thanks in advance guys!
 
Did it run? With such low numbers, i would always double check compression with another gauge. Make sure battery you are using is fully charged
 
Did it run? With such low numbers, i would always double check compression with another gauge. Make sure battery you are using is fully charged

Thanks for the reply, it actually ran out of the water really well, fresh battery as well. Bought an accurate tester after making the mistake of buying a Harbor Freight one. Lol
 
By the sounds of it, I should slap a new head gasket on and re-test the engine’s compression. Tonight was my first time taking the head of a Rotax off, I didn’t recall seeing any gasket material either.
 
Here are images of each cylinder. Only worry I see are the burn marks on the sides. Any idea what that is from?


IMG_1438.JPG
IMG_1440.JPG
 
Too many variables here to make any kind of accurate input. However I’d say just run it and see how it feels. If it feels like you’re underpowered use good quality compression gauge, or even better a couple and average them.

Going just from your first numbers it’s a bit low, BUT if you weren’t wot, and your battery was a bit low you’d see this too. Not to mention the accuracy of cheap gauges. The internals look great, but could still be slack. The walls do wear from the rings and are designed to. If this is the case send them off to be refinished or resleeved and then use the correct size pistons and rings afterwards. Sad bit is, if it’s this clean and just worn, chances are you’re at crank rebuild territory too, as it’s no doubt got plenty of well maintained hours on, these again do wear and will leak air, causing all kinds of tuning issues further down the road.

It’s Christmas and cold, and these engines are tiny. If it were me, I’d pull it out, strip it down and rebuild it from the info on this forum. You’ll get far more knowledge from your machine, and it’s a nice way to pass a few winter nights.

Only bits I couldn’t do was obv the crank rebuild and the sleeve re-cutting. Everything else is really easy to do on these engines and they’re bulletproof if looked after.
 
If you are planning to rebuild it at some point and it's running now I'd say go ahead and wale on it till it stops running just be prepared for a full rebuild.
 
Thank you all for the extremely helpful input. After talking to you guys, I suppose I should put it back together, re run a test in WOT with a fully charged battery and accurate compression tester. From there I’ll let you guys know my results!
 
Also there’s no “head gasket “. These use o-rings so they can be reused to check compression again.
 
If the head is still off. Inspect the head's large thick o-ring for any wear or even tears or rips. I would also inspect the medium sized o-rings that sits in the top of the groove of the cylinder and finally, the small o-rings on top of the domes.

Lastly, I would put a silicone grease under the head bolt flanges to keep water out from going down those head bolts and put a pipe thread sealant like LocTite 1177(yellow in color) on the head bolt threads to protect from water intrusion and corrosion build up in between the head bolt threads. Not doing this increases the chance and probability of broken head bolts when it's time to remove them again.
 
Follow the manual on the head bolts, Blue loctite under the bolt heads, synthetic grease on the threads and torque to 17 ft/lbs. the cylinder o-rings get loctite 515.
 
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