Seadoo GTI Driveshaft Failure??

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Seadoorider95

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Hello everybody, this is my first post so I apologize if it is in the wrong section. Here is my conundrum:

I rebuilt the entire jet pump and installed a new wear ring on my 1999 Seadoo GTI. It ran great, and then after the third ride I noticed jet pump oil leaking out, and the wear ring was all slashed up. I also noticed metal shavings on the wear ring/that general area.

I then bought a brand new housing assembly that came with the bearings and wear ring already installed. After installing that, I fired up the ski on the trailer with the garden hose attached. It sounds like a Diesel engine running and was vibrating a lot more then usual. I shut it off, and took the whole jet pump unit back out. There are more metal shavings and somehow the impeller got a big gash out of it and bent it a little. How could that possibly happen when on the trailer? Is my driveshaft trashed? Or is it something worse?


Also- I made the absolutely idiotic mistake of turning the machine on without the housing unit installed yet. It was only running on the trailer for about 30 seconds before I realized my mistake and shut it off.

Any help is greatly appreciated!
 

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It looks like the driveshaft was not inside the impeller splines but sitting out on the blades. My guess it that you missed the hole when installing the pump.
 
Yes.

I have caught myself doing the same thing a couple of times. You can put the pump in place but have the drive line not in the impeller. On the old fleet I have you can still get your hand on the driveline end and guide it so everything goes together smooth. I'm not sure if this is still possible on all the "new technology" (96 and newer).
 
Good to know. I will take extra caution when reinstalling everything. I ended up purchasing a new driveshaft and carbon ring rebuild kit because things seemed pretty worn down.

The teeth on the driveshaft were pretty messed up as you can see in the photos. And the flywheel guard has a grease stripe around it, telling me that the rubber boot must of been leaking. I’m hoping that it runs better than ever after the rebuild.
 

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The drive shaft end looks good, unless my eyes are getting worse. The end of the drive shaft has a slight ball shape to it from the factory. The tallest part of the splines is the part that meshes fully into the pto flywheel and impeller. The ball shape acts like a simple universal joint because the pto end does move slightly and this can bind up the shaft if it was a straight spline instead of a curved. The engine is on rubber mounts and it does wiggle slightly during operation.

Clean the shaft splines on both ends and give a good look, if there are factory milling marks on the splines, instead of worn metal, the ends are still good.

The only other factor to consider is if the shaft is bent. There is a spec in the shop manual for measuring this but most of the time you just go by feel. A slight bend will show up as a vibration that will change with rpm's naturally. Most people never catch on to a bent drive shaft until the get on another Doo with a straight shaft and realize how much smoother the machine feels in the feet and hands.

As for the grease on the pto guard. I have never taken one of those off a machine that didn't have some grease slung onto it. The ones without grease on the gurad concern me since that indicates the splines probably aren't getting a shot of grease for maintenance.
 
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