Check Engine Light / Battery Dead

[TheCabralFamily]

Well we pulled the trigger and bought an 05’ Sportster 155, and took it out for the first time. Ran for 20 mins great, pulled dockside, shut it off, started back up and the voltage light came on. Boat ran solid for another 20 mins then the check engine light went on, and dropped into limp mode. I charged the battery for an hour, and it ran great. Voltage light went off but the check engine stayed on. Have never had this happen with a Seadoo before. Appreciate any help ......Thank You

 

[10forty2]

Check all fuses first. Not familiar with the Sportster, but my Speedster had a blown fuse in the charging circuit that kept the stator/rectifier from getting current to the battery. There should be an inline fuse holder/fuse somewhere near the battery. Check that one. Mine was a 30amp blade fuse and had taken some heat as evidenced by the melting. I had to replace the fuse and fuse holder. I also replaced the rectifiers and installed an analog voltage meter so I could see if there was enough voltage being generated to keep the battery charged. If that doesn't do it, you may have a bad stator.......hope that's not the case.

 

[TheCabralFamily]

Great, Thank You! I will check this weekend. Hopefully it is just the fuse. I was able to get a 12V Car (Cigarette) phone charger that shows the voltage so going to try that to monitor the voltage as well.

 

[10forty2]

Great, Thank You! I will check this weekend. Hopefully it is just the fuse. I was able to get a 12V Car (Cigarette) phone charger that shows the voltage so going to try that to monitor the voltage as well.

You'll be able to tell right away, with a voltage meter, if the system is charging. Without the engine running you should have 11.5vdc-12.5vdc and with the engine running you should be upwards of 13.8vdc-14.5vdc. That's how I discovered that one of my rectifiers was bad as well. When I revved the port engine, I got over 12vdc, but when I revved the starboard engine, there was no movement in the voltage. Once I replaced the rectifier on the starboard side, everything was back to 14vdc when running both engines.

 

[TheCabralFamily]

Update: the battery was reading 12.4, and when I started the engine it did not jump up at all, so clearly not being charged. I then found the 30amp fuse directly off the solenoid was bad, and slightly melted. Fuse socket is still in good shape and not affected. I replaced it with a 25amp and it burnt out on strart up. Any suggestions on what would cause that fuse to blow and prevent the battery from charging and the fuse from blowing out?

 

[10forty2]

Update: the battery was reading 12.4, and when I started the engine it did not jump up at all, so clearly not being charged. I then found the 30amp fuse directly off the solenoid was bad, and slightly melted. Fuse socket is still in good shape and not affected. I replaced it with a 25amp and it burnt out on strart up. Any suggestions on what would cause that fuse to blow and prevent the battery from charging and the fuse from blowing out?

Go back with a 30amp if that's what came out of it. If it blows right away again, then you have a short circuit somewhere. My first inclination is to replace the fuse holder, even if it looks good. Since it took some heat, the contacts inside it could be damaged. Then, check all wiring and other connections to make sure there's no bare wires or anything that might be shorted. Next would be to clean and tighten all connections all the way to the battery to make sure there's not just a loose/bad connection. Then, if all that doesn't seem to fix the problem, you may have a bad rectifier/voltage regulator. The only way I know of to diagnose that, is to verify that you have voltage coming from the engine stator. If you do, and it's still not charging, then the regulator/rectifier has to be the culprit. My only advice there is to replace it with an OEM part and not an aftermarket unit. I've read some very negative reports on using an aftermarket rectifier.

 

[TheCabralFamily]

Thank You, with age comes glasses and I didn't have them on. I actually put in a 7.5 Amp fuse instead of how I read it as 25. So I replaced it with a 30amp, and it held up and Battery was charging at 14.0 V perfect;y. What I believe caused the initial fuse to blow was it was the battery was too low, and I was running everything to test out the boat first day and it blew. Now I have the annoying Check Engine light remaining on, any suggestions on how to reset that issue? Thank You....

 

[ski-d00]

If the light stays on, you still have an active code. Once all codes are fixed and no longer active, it will go off on it's own. On the pwcs you can press set 5 times to get codes but on the boats the only way is to hook up to BUDS or other software.

 

[TheCabralFamily]

Thank You for the advice, I'm going to take it in next weekend to check on the fault. It came on when the voltage light came on, and I have corrected the voltage issue but will take it in to get the codes pulled. Was toying with the idea of buying the Can Doo Pro, but hard to justify the cost