JimHendrix
New Member
Its a long post... sorry 
Well last week I was visiting my girlfriend's parents in Wisconsin and they gave us their 97 speedster. There are very little hours on this boat as they bought it new and rarely used it. for the past two summers the boat has been with my girlfriend's sister and husband at their lake cabin where, while they did keep it dry docked, they did not keep it covered during the summer, so the seats are very sun damaged (no worries though, I like a good winter project).
Onto the fun part. Yesterday was a beautiful day in Nashville Tn. I was eager to get at least on the lake for a little while. hook up the boat, take her to the boat launch, and back her in. My lady was determined to start the boat up as I would back her in and park the truck and trailer. Well... I park the truck, and go back to the dock only to find her floating aimlessly in the water with what she calls a completely dead boat. She is paddling towards the dock complaining that neither engine will "turn over". So instantly I am bummed out. She makes over to the dock, I jump in and immediately start wondering what it could be. So on instinct, I just pull one of the chokes and hit the starter on the left engine and what do you know, she cranks right up. The right engine was a bit more finicky, but she cranked up too. The right engine died on my once or twice initially while in the no wake zone, but once she "warmed-up" she stayed cranked.
Finally get past the buoys and give her some throttle... (moment of truth) the engine starts to whine and the front end lifts up just as I had hoped. a bit more throttle and I am coasting beautifully at 5,000 RPMs. She ran pretty great the entire day. I did notice the right engine had a tendency to bog down. When I looked at the spark plugs, I assumed they might be the culprit as they had seen better days. I will be replacing them soon.
The lake was fairly smooth however there were a good number of boats on the water... so we purposely got air-born on a few occasions. A friend of mine was determined to put his pontoon in the water around 5. I was about ready to get off the water, but he was in and coming to "our" spot in the water. Well I look out to the West and see nothing but dark dark clouds coming right to us. He gets to the spot and I ride up to him saying we have to go because all hell is about to break loose. He doesn't want to believe it even though its totally obvious whats about to go down. We start heading back, but unfortunately we wasted too many minutes pleading with my buddy to get off the water. Needless to say, we got caught in the middle of a thunderstorm on the lake. The rain was painful, then the hail came. I could barely see more than 20 feet in front of me... it was a nightmare. We get to the no-wake zone and still have 500 yards before we get to the landing. We are by a nice marina with huge expensive boats to our right so I couldn't really cheat on the no-wake part. Well I hear this guy whistling to me and look over to the marina to see a man waving me over and directing me to a big empty slip.
We pull into this slip fit for about 12 speedsters where we are met by two gentlemen and their wives with warm towels and smiles. They couldn't believe we were following the no-wake zone rule even in this crazy downpour. I call my buddy who is still coming in on his pontoon and let him know where to come. He gets to the slip and of course is miserably soaked. But, what started as a scary hail and thunderstorm, ended in a nice evening with new and old friends. We hung out at the marina for about 3 hours until the storm finally past over. Stupid I know to stay out on the water, and in all honesty, the 30% chance of storms wasn't supposed to come until 7 I thought... but of course nature has a mind of her own.
All-in-all a good day. I did have some water in the engine compartment, but it wasn't much. I checked the engine after about 30 minutes of being on the water initially and noticed maybe a cups worth of water in the engine compartment. I didn't check again the rest of the day so it could be coming from anywhere... I do love this little boat though, fun to drive and a blast spending the day with my lady on it.
Well last week I was visiting my girlfriend's parents in Wisconsin and they gave us their 97 speedster. There are very little hours on this boat as they bought it new and rarely used it. for the past two summers the boat has been with my girlfriend's sister and husband at their lake cabin where, while they did keep it dry docked, they did not keep it covered during the summer, so the seats are very sun damaged (no worries though, I like a good winter project).
Onto the fun part. Yesterday was a beautiful day in Nashville Tn. I was eager to get at least on the lake for a little while. hook up the boat, take her to the boat launch, and back her in. My lady was determined to start the boat up as I would back her in and park the truck and trailer. Well... I park the truck, and go back to the dock only to find her floating aimlessly in the water with what she calls a completely dead boat. She is paddling towards the dock complaining that neither engine will "turn over". So instantly I am bummed out. She makes over to the dock, I jump in and immediately start wondering what it could be. So on instinct, I just pull one of the chokes and hit the starter on the left engine and what do you know, she cranks right up. The right engine was a bit more finicky, but she cranked up too. The right engine died on my once or twice initially while in the no wake zone, but once she "warmed-up" she stayed cranked.
Finally get past the buoys and give her some throttle... (moment of truth) the engine starts to whine and the front end lifts up just as I had hoped. a bit more throttle and I am coasting beautifully at 5,000 RPMs. She ran pretty great the entire day. I did notice the right engine had a tendency to bog down. When I looked at the spark plugs, I assumed they might be the culprit as they had seen better days. I will be replacing them soon.
The lake was fairly smooth however there were a good number of boats on the water... so we purposely got air-born on a few occasions. A friend of mine was determined to put his pontoon in the water around 5. I was about ready to get off the water, but he was in and coming to "our" spot in the water. Well I look out to the West and see nothing but dark dark clouds coming right to us. He gets to the spot and I ride up to him saying we have to go because all hell is about to break loose. He doesn't want to believe it even though its totally obvious whats about to go down. We start heading back, but unfortunately we wasted too many minutes pleading with my buddy to get off the water. Needless to say, we got caught in the middle of a thunderstorm on the lake. The rain was painful, then the hail came. I could barely see more than 20 feet in front of me... it was a nightmare. We get to the no-wake zone and still have 500 yards before we get to the landing. We are by a nice marina with huge expensive boats to our right so I couldn't really cheat on the no-wake part. Well I hear this guy whistling to me and look over to the marina to see a man waving me over and directing me to a big empty slip.
We pull into this slip fit for about 12 speedsters where we are met by two gentlemen and their wives with warm towels and smiles. They couldn't believe we were following the no-wake zone rule even in this crazy downpour. I call my buddy who is still coming in on his pontoon and let him know where to come. He gets to the slip and of course is miserably soaked. But, what started as a scary hail and thunderstorm, ended in a nice evening with new and old friends. We hung out at the marina for about 3 hours until the storm finally past over. Stupid I know to stay out on the water, and in all honesty, the 30% chance of storms wasn't supposed to come until 7 I thought... but of course nature has a mind of her own.
All-in-all a good day. I did have some water in the engine compartment, but it wasn't much. I checked the engine after about 30 minutes of being on the water initially and noticed maybe a cups worth of water in the engine compartment. I didn't check again the rest of the day so it could be coming from anywhere... I do love this little boat though, fun to drive and a blast spending the day with my lady on it.
