Little thrust when towing

[Kholt]

Hi everyone,
I'm out on the lake til tomorrow so any help would be appreciated. My 2006 Sportster ran fine all day. Tonight we took it out, and wouldn't pull a wake boarder up. I tried for 20 seconds with it throttled then the engine temp light came on, so I killed it. Tried again without pulling someone, wouldn't go faster than 10 mph. Sounds like it is getting air in the jets, but don't know why. Again, ran fine all day so not sure what would cause the sudden change in performance. I'm not convinced anything is wrong with it...

 

[LionOnABeach]

Are your RPMs up and it’s just not moving water through the pump? And when the temp light came on, what were you revving at?

 

[jeffrt]

Have you checked the grate for weeds? Mine will lose almost all thrust if I suck up some weeds.

 

[Kholt]

Are your RPMs up and it’s just not moving water through the pump? And when the temp light came on, what were you revving at?

The engine was revving pretty high RPMs, so not too surprising the light came on. It seemed the pump pulled water fine, it was just pulling air too when we were going slow.

 

[Kholt]

Have you checked the grate for weeds? Mine will lose almost all thrust if I suck up some weeds.

That a great idea. Let me go look and i'll report back.

 

[Kholt]

Hey everyone, quick resolution (I hope) on this, @jeffrt was right. I looked up in the grate and found some string wrapped around the impeller shaft. I don't know why that wasn't the first thing I checked, but glad you guys were able to help. Ugh, my inexperience really shows through on this forum.