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Smoke or Steam from the back of seadoo- VIDEO

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Kfede

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I have an 02 GTX 4-tec it has pretty many hours on it, but it has been maintained regularly. I noticed that it smokes out the back. white smoke. This was at the end of the day after running it all day. I do have to add a small amount of oil after each time I take it out, not sure if that is normal for an older engine. The smoke disappears once it gets out a little above the water, which makes me want to think its steam from the water that cools the exhaust. If it was leaky valves the smoke would only happen after a cold start. Do you think there is any real problem here, I would rather make a small fix now, than rebuild later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToY7sFiiSzE


Thanks in advance for your advice
 
Check your coolant level and make sure there are no little black specs in the coolant bottle. Looks like steam from the exhaust to me. My ski does the same thing. After a hard run when I start to slow down I see some steam which is normal.
 
Doesn't look bad to me sees within normal "spec" like XP said check you coolant not just for stuff in it but make sure it stays at proper level if there is a leak will drop over time with usage or as strange as it sounds try and smell it coolant normally smells sweet so if it smells could be an indication
 
Thanks guys. I checked the coolant, no specs in it, but it is low. Lower than I remember seeing it last year. So coolant may be seeping through a gasket and getting into the cylinder? Makes sense, but doesn't sound good. Is there an additive you can add to the coolant to seal it, like radiator repair (stop leak)?
Is this worth worrying about, or need to be repaired, or should I just keep an eye on the coolant level and let it burn. I'm guessing it will only get worse and eventually need to be rebuilt?
 
That isn't oil burning white smoke. It dissipates too quickly. Oil smoke would hang in the air for a longer period of time.

I would pull the plugs and check them. See below for what it will look like.

If your coolant is low, I would add coolant until it is at the proper mark, then observe the coolant level after a few hours. However, when you do this, you need to make certain your ski is level 100% for the coolant level checks.

If it IS burning coolant, it will really depend on how quickly the level drops. If it only drops a little over a long period of time, then it's an early indication that some gasket somewhere is allowing it to pass into the cylinder. I'm not totally familiar with these Rotax engines yet, so I don't know if there's a path to the exhaust for the coolant to get into and burn off. However, if this were a car, I'd know for certain it is most likely a head gasket. You can get away with letting it get worse, but here's the risk you take.

In an engine with a small head gasket leak between the water passages and the cylinder, at some point that small leak could turn into a full blown head gasket failure. I've seen a few engines where the piston connecting rod in the cylinder that was leaking was bent since liquid doesn't compress. The owners of the cars all said it was slowly losing fluid over a couple thousand miles and that power was down, but they thought they could push it a little further.

When you have a head gasket leak between the water passages and a cylinder, you won't necessarily see signs of water in the oil/oil in the water (milky looking). You can pull the plugs and inspect them to see if one of them is obviously discolored. That will show you which cylinder is leaking. The plug will look like it has white ashy type deposits on it like the picture. Don't put off getting this fixed for too long.

Plugs12.jpg
 
I replaced the plugs before I put it away for the winter. I did a compression test on each cylinder, all of them looked strong. I do know that the plugs did not look white and crusty like that. I did notice the middle cylinder plug had oil on the tip(maybe leaky valve seal).

I'll refill the coolant and keep an eye on it. Thanks
 
You ought to see my Challenger chugging steam out the tail pipe. I went with the wider (yellow instead of red) coolant restrictor to compensate for the fact that the water will have to go through a heat exchanger. This means there is more water being dumped into my water box. It billows steam while I'm cruising all the time. Seems like this is less pronounced when it's hotter out.
 
I replaced the plugs before I put it away for the winter. I did a compression test on each cylinder, all of them looked strong. I do know that the plugs did not look white and crusty like that. I did notice the middle cylinder plug had oil on the tip(maybe leaky valve seal).

I'll refill the coolant and keep an eye on it. Thanks

It may very well be normal. Today while out riding mine, I rode between 40 and 50 mph for an extended time. About an hour. I had some steam coming up from the back of the ski for the next 600 meters of no wake zone. So it could just be typical of your ski.
 
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