Hi, I recently bought a 1997 Sea-Doo GSX. It didn't run and had been sitting for a while. We put on a new starter and a new battery and got it to start for a bit. About a week later we went back to it and it wouldn't start. Tracked the problem down to a bad ignition coil. While we were at it, we replaced the gray fuel lines and rebuilt the carbs with parts from our local dealer. I also installed a new rectifier on it. I went to test it at the lake today and the battery was dead and it wouldn't start. We started to charge it up, but it never made it to full charge. I figured after using it for so long trying to get it to start it had gone bad. I went and bought another battery from Batteries Plus and put it on and it fired right up. I went to the lake to test it and... nothing. It wouldn't start. From the time I put the new battery on to the time I got to the lake was only 1 hour. I even jumped the battery with my car battery (without car running) and it fired up. I rode the ski around for a bit and it ran great. I shut it off and it wouldn't start again. Just one "thuck"from the starter. So this leads me to my question. What could possibly be draining my battery this quickly? I've read a lot of threads about batteries draining in a couple of days, but can't find anything about a battery draining this fast. Any tips or advice would be much appreciated.
97 Sea-Doo GSX with very quick battery drain
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GGuillot
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Couple things you could do. With a multi meter check the voltage at the battery while it's running, you should see about 13.5 volts give or take a little up or down when at idle or revving. With the ski off do a ground current check with the meter. Google online, but you remove the negative wire(s) at the battery and connect inline the meter on the amperage selection. Start unplugging stuff, like the VTS, DESS post, etc and see if the amperage drops. Doing this you should be able to narrow down where the excessive current draw is coming from.
Run down all the ground points, poor grounds can cause issues.
Finally, I've heard the 97' GSX, with that type MPEM has always been a current drain problem when it sits, but not that drastic like you are describing. You've got something else going on that's causing it IMO.
Run down all the ground points, poor grounds can cause issues.
Finally, I've heard the 97' GSX, with that type MPEM has always been a current drain problem when it sits, but not that drastic like you are describing. You've got something else going on that's causing it IMO.
Thanks for the advice. I did what you said and found that my "new" rectifier was drawing way more amps than my old one. I originally ordered it thinking it was causing my ski to run rough, but that turned out to be the carbs. I put it on anyway because i read they go bad sometimes. I plugged the old one back in and the battery is staying charged.
GGuillot
Well-Known Member
Good to hear you found it, I've haven't had a rectifier failure yet, but I've heard about some of the cheap aftermarket ones causing issues.
I think you are correct and the biggest issue with the AM rectifiers are they are hit and miss. I bought 2 cheap ones at the same time as emergency spares and have been using 1 of the 2 for 2 years now in my ski and a friend needed one last year so I gave him the last one in the parking lot at the ramp and it would just blow the fuse so he just rode the rest of the day with his bad one disconnected and not charging. So in my small sample size that is a 50% failure rate, LOL.
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