Drain plug loose, water in hull!!??

[scorpio67]

Hey guys, i made somewhat of a bonehead move today!! Finally got this troubled '96 XP out to the lake to see how it would do on the water as i had it seemingly running good on the trailer. It will need a starter, but man did it run good and strong. That was the good part of the day, rode for and hour or so, came to shore and took the seat off to find 6 to 8 inches of water in the bottom of the hull.....damn drain plug was half way in. Ski ran fine, but what things should i be doing to protect and or look out for trouble now after the fact. Got the ski out of the water immediately and drained water out, but hope to hell i didn't screw anything up!! Please advise me on what to do (except for make sure the plug is in tight) Thank you!!

 

[Seadoobuddy]

If the ski was running up to the time you noticed the water in the hull then you should be fine. if you want to check it then remove the spark plugs and crank it over (ground the plugs first). If no water comes out then you are good to go again.

Did you forget to screw them in tight???

 

[scorpio67]

I'm not sure to be honest, i swear i had it in tight, but who knows!! I'll check to make sure it does actually still thread in ok. Ya, the ski did run fine and i didn't have any water shooting out the plug holes or anything, it's just that when i saw there was enough water to be up to the junction of the water box and pipe and that the oil filter was submerged, it freaked me out a little to say the least!! That seemed like a lot of water to be splashing around in there. Should i spray it down with anything?? Thanks for your response and for putting me at ease about this!! Yikes!!

 

[Spimothy Leary]

there's nothing wrong with rinsing everything, just don't soak the carbs, frankly the good news is you got a good inside hull clean out of the deal,, in my experience the first failure that comes right after this kind of issue is the starter, since its so far down on the bottom, they generally get wet when the hull gets real full, , sit for a week, then rust up, but if you were going to replace/rebuild it anyway... then perfect timing,
i would pull the starter now since it was in your plan's anyway, and inspect it, or prepare to rebuild it before it gets all rusted up.

also pull the rear electrical box (black) and make sure that its dry inside as well, if it wasn't sealed perfectly it will take on water.

 

[scorpio67]

HA, i guess a good cleaning is a good way to look at it!! Yep, gonna go ahead and pull the starter tomorrow!! I've seen it listed before on here,, but don't remember where they said to get a rebuild kit from!!?? Thanks for the response, i really appreciate it!! This forum is awesome!!

 

[Spimothy Leary]

HA, i guess a good cleaning is a good way to look at it!! Yep, gonna go ahead and pull the starter tomorrow!! I've seen it listed before on here,, but don't remember where they said to get a rebuild kit from!!?? Thanks for the response, i really appreciate it!! This forum is awesome!!

i think the recommended approach is ebay rebuild kit but OEM starter, but not ebay starters, i only replaced one starter and it involved me handing my starter to a buddy and him fixing it.