Temporary Loss of Thrust

[EastonRob]

Yesterday I was out in the Bay (beautiful day, but no fish, alas), and I had a temporary loss of power/thrust from the starboard engine. I imagine I had a temporary impeller blockage, but since I've never experienced this before, I wanted to get feedback from the collective here. Here's the basics of what happened:

Boat ran great/normal for quite a while while we tried a couple of fishing spots. Motored over to another spot, our last attempt to find fish, and moved at idle speed through the group of other boats also looking for fish in vain. At this point, we decided to punt and head home, and so I gunned the engines. Up to about 3500 RPM everything seemed ok, but then it didn't sound right above 3500, and I wasn't getting the power I'm used to. I backed off, tried again, and same result. I shut off the engines and opened the clean out ports. I've had to clean grass out of there in the past, but that's about it. I couldn't see anything in the ports, and putting my hand down there didn't yield anything. I isolated the issue to the starboard engine based on the noise and lack of power, and I thought maybe the reverse gate was stuck in position or something.

I tried accelerating again. In throttle sync mode, I noticed at about 3500+ RPM that the starboard engine RPM's would surge slightly higher than the port, rather than staying synced to port, like there wasn't a load on that engine. Anyway, at some point just running around 18 to 20 mph something cleared up. Noise sounded fine again, power was returned, and all was good all the way home.

So, does this sound like an impeller blockage? I guess running at speed finally cleared it out if that's the case. There is a fair amount of debris on the water surface now (e.g., leaves falling from trees). Whatever the object was I guess it couldn't have been that big.

 

[HangOutdoors]

That is exactly what happens when you have something in your impeller. Sometimes it doesn't take much.

 

[ahenderson432]

I concur. I have had this happen many times on PWCs as well. Full Throttle with minimal thrust acceleration then......wham! Full propulsion like nothing was wrong. Clean Out Ports are handy but don't let you get to every possible area around the impeller.

 

[EastonRob]

Thanks for the feedback. I thought that was what had happened, but I wasn't sure. Now I know!

Glad it cleared up. That would have been a LONG ride home if I had to limp home.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Thanks for the feedback. I thought that was what had happened, but I wasn't sure. Now I know!

Glad it cleared up. That would have been a LONG ride home if I had to limp home.

Don‘t know that it would have helped this time or not, look at the pilot water outlets to make sure there is good / normal flow.

 

[biffdotorg]

Thanks for the feedback. I thought that was what had happened, but I wasn't sure. Now I know!

Glad it cleared up. That would have been a LONG ride home if I had to limp home.

I would say the cleanout ports can reach roughly half of the blockages we experience. As much as we tought them as lifesavers when we have blockages, I find myself jumping in the water and pushing weeds out of the grate with my toes more often than not. You may never get to those blockages from the clean out.

Of course, this time of year fishing, nobody is ready to jump in the water. But for me, it's just easier in the summer to jump in, push the blockage out, rather than open up the cleanouts first.

 

[Dixemon]

Just like everyone else said, sometimes it can be the tiniest piece of grass root, stick, fruit cup ect.. If you cant feel it by hand then do the reverse maneuver trick. it usually works really well for the No feel Ums. Also, the impeller sometime just takes a minute to chew it up, or you stop and it floats back out the intake. Is that something that can be done with the new boats with reverse bucket actuators?

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Just like everyone else said, sometimes it can be the tiniest piece of grass root, stick, fruit cup ect.. If you cant feel it by hand then do the reverse maneuver trick. it usually works really well for the No feel Ums. Also, the impeller sometime just takes a minute to chew it up, or you stop and it floats back out the intake. Is that something that can be done with the new boats with reverse bucket actuators?

For some reason I don’t think so…. I Think the engines have to be running for the gates to operate?

 

[Judge]

Just like everyone else said, sometimes it can be the tiniest piece of grass root, stick, fruit cup ect.. If you cant feel it by hand then do the reverse maneuver trick. it usually works really well for the No feel Ums. Also, the impeller sometime just takes a minute to chew it up, or you stop and it floats back out the intake. Is that something that can be done with the new boats with reverse bucket actuators?

For some reason I don’t think so…. I Think the engines have to be running for the gates to operate?

Just an FYI.... I have a 275SD and my buckets use servo motors that move the cables to control the buckets. When the engine is turned off, the buckets move to their fully opened position.... so the reverse trick can still work.


Also..... thanks to another member on the Forum, I purchased this plunger. Haven't had to use it yet but it is the perfect size for the clean-out ports. If a large chunk of sea grass gets stuck up against the grate, this will create pressure to push debris away from the grates.

 

[leftcoasterfl]

FWIW I had the same symptoms - my clean out plug was not locked in.