98 XP Limited hard to start, backfired, and now the hood seperated. Any help please!

[CragarShinoda]

Well, my friend went out to the lake and I let him borrow the XP. He said that it was very hard to start (no surprise since it was not run all summer last year). After a few minutes of trying to turn the motor over it backfired (very loudly, he said). Then he put some starter fluid in the engine and it fired right up. After that he said it ran fine for about 30 minutes, but I will go into more details about that, later. In the past I have noticed that the ski would not want to start easily, sometimes taking a few minutes for the key to even beep. Any ideas? The XP has good compression, and before he picked it up I removed almost all of the gas and replaced it with a tank full of new stuff, as well as draining the oil tank and using a new gallon of Bombardier (liquid gold) oil. Think it might have been some bad gas left over in the carbs? What can be causing the ski not to want to recognize the lanyard?

Anyway, after running the ski for a half an hour or so, my friend noticed that he was taking on water fairly bad. He brought it in and when he got off the ski he noticed that the hood was sitting up about four inches above the upper hull. He went to go open the hood and the hood basically broke off the ski! When he brought it to me he swore that he did not hit anything (I believe him, there was no physical damage), but the top part of the hood had separated from the bottom part where the hinge bolts to. Has anybody else had this happen, or is it just my sort of dumb luck? Thanks in advance for the reply!

 

[CragarShinoda]

Anyone have some advice???

 

[kustomkarl]

I'm sure the carbs might need a cleaning. You might want to check the battery wire connections and especially the ground cable going to the starter area. They need to be clean and getting a good connection. If the lanyard isn't giving the 2 beeps all the time the lanyard and post might need to be cleaned too. Use soap and water then leave it to dry. Don't use any grease or lubes as it should just be clean. Check the lid fro any cracks, it shouldn't have just broke off unless it was manhandled.

Karl

 

[CragarShinoda]

Thanks for the reply! Is there a schematic or how to on removing and cleaning the carbs? Also, I cleaned my lanyard and post, but still it acts like there is no contact half the time. Anything else I can check for? Once the motor turns it turns strong and fires right up.

 

[kustomkarl]

If the lanyard is clean, it just might need to have the post replaced. Check the "Parts" link on the top of the page for a replacement. In the "Premium Section" we have manuals with all the schematics to any repairs including tests for your lanyard post.

Here is some more information on the "Premium Membership";
As a premium member you can down load a authentic seadoo manual from the seadoo manual library. In the library is a variety of manuals for almost all years and models. You can view as many as you like on line as a PDF file, or download it and print it for your personal and private use. There are operator manuals and repair manuals for you to do your own repairs on your seadoo. The repair manuals have everything from troubleshooting, repair procedures to winterizing. It contains wire diagrams torque specs and pictures for disassemble and assemble instructions. In the spec sheets it tells everything needed to maintain oil changes, spark plug gaps, carburetor rebuilds and impeller wear ring tolerances. Click on the "Seadoo Manuals" link at the top of the page for more details. If you need any help or get in a jam, we are always here to answer your questions too. Premium members get priority when it comes to getting quick detailed answers.


Karl