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Towing stranded boater

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Austrian Rotax

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Well, saw a boater stranded on the lake about 300-400metres from the boat lauch well I towed him back in and it was an unknown boat launch to me (Bay of Quinte is quite large) so I was wondering my overheat light didn't come on but the cooling system indicator was pissing very little as I idled back in I was wonder im on my third tank of gas for my remaned 717 so it should be broken in but The engine was so hot I couldn't put my hand on it for more than a few seconds maybe 4 seconds think I damaged anything?Also the launch was weed infested and my jet pump picked up about 20lbs of weeds No joke! pics to come. so my question is how much cooling does the engine get if the ski is barilly moving and the pump cavitating? btw with all the weeds stuck in pump obviously I just endlessly cavitated so I couldn't get him right to the dock. The plugs are a very dark brown and there was 50:1 premix in the tank on top of oil pump. When I took out the plugs after I got home white smoke poured out of the cylinders that's why I am worried but the tops of the pistons still look great no indentation at all. going to test comp. when I find my tester. Should I just remove the sensor and put it in some boiling water to see if I get continuity at the male end? Thanks

UPDATE: Both jugs are pumping 130 psi EXACTLY (gauge may not be accurate im not sure of its accuracy it was only a $30 tester). Im thinking because I only just started my 3rd tank of gas the tank is still full pretty much so maybe the compression will go up later and the head/domes were pitted pretty bad so I didn't expect 150 psi SES didn't fix the pitted domes much. when I got the motor I didn't test comp unfortunately.
 
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The weeds were the problem. Towing should have been fine as cooling is a function of the jet pump. I lost a resonator and exhaust hose due to weeds two years ago.
 
Hose melted as did resonator from lack of cooling water. Ski almost sank. Had to beach it to keep it from going down.
 
Wow it's those stories that remind me to try and ride in areas where other boaters are around. . . Unfortunately for me I was the only motor boat within eye shot to help this guy, it was a brutal slow crawl as I didn't want to go over idle speed on a recently broken in motor considering the extra load. Had 5 minutes of fun on my doo today and then 2 hours worth of tow after my pump was full of weeds rescue boat towed me to my launch at walking speed.

So about my 130 psi comp. Does this sound okay for a reman with two tanks of fuel through it? It runs awesome and pulls good no bogging anywhere in the range. I think it may be my gauge as my xp 800 read 135-140 and it starts instantly and runs great

Thanks
 
I had weed problem too on my sporster boat two weeks ago. Overheat alarm went off, so I rowed my boat back, luckily we were 50 feet away from the launch.

It was too hot to touch.

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holy crap !!

And yes take the sensor out and boil it while you have wires attached to it and your multi-meter. You should have continuity when the sensor temperature hit's 92-96 degrees C.
Its also good to use a thermometer to watch the temp and bring it up to a boil slowly without letting the sensor rest on the bottom of the pot.

If you overheat the sensor they don't recover !! I've boiled all of mine when I got a new machine and so far 1 out of 5 worked as advertised. The rest were shorted or open and never recovered. Believe me I've tried messing with them :P

Also try bobbing the the sensor in and out of the boiling water to see that it looses conductivity when you pull it out and regains it quickly when you put it back in.
Try not to keep it that hot from more than a few dips to see if it works properly and then let it cool down naturally.
 
So [MENTION=30425]mel[/MENTION]anix , are you saying if your temp sensor DOES actually blare off while on the water, the chances of it working again are slim? Like if the ski overheats, replace the sensor?


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If it comes on and you react, as in stop and let it cool slowly and naturally like at the end of the test, Its will be fine and it will reset when as cools. But keep running it while hot and it will cook the bi-metalic strip inside them so that they won't spring back properly anymore. That will either short it or make it mostly open. So yeah if you overhead and keep running it hotter than 100c, I would replace it on spec or test the hell out of it. As long as it comes on and goes off when your boiling it and you can repeat that by dunking it a few more times, I would have some confidence in it working when needed.

I've Found many dead sensors on engines that had overheat issues. Well also the beepers didn't work too :P So its kind of hard to react when you don't know.
 
You can get replacement beepers from radio shack as well
 
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Ok ill be sure to test the sensor when I get home, but if these sensors have that high of a failure rate then maybe my motor overheated too, engine ran great though it didnt seize or anything and I only ran it for about 30 seconds + or - a few while it had no thrust so im not sure but it was hot to the touch when I got it out of the water.
 
You can do a compression check to see if it's still healthy and also look at the cylinder walls to see if there is any signs of scoring.
 
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