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Is there a sealed area under the floor which might be full of water?
Hi All,
Brand new to the forumsAnd new to larger boats. Have previously owned a smaller ski boat (many years ago)
Ive recently purchased a 2001 Whittley Cruisemaster 700. It has been repowered with a 5.7 MPI Horizon motor, and a bravo III outdrive. It has a closed cooling system with heat exchanger.
I have only had it out on the water a few times, and ill admit have run into some problems.....which I am working through.
First problem was the engine overheating after about 15 minutes of about 3000 RPM. Stopped straight away and found a cracked exhaust manifold. We were taking on water. Putted back to shore at about 10 knots (temp is fine at this speed) letting the bilge bump do its work. Pulled the exhaust manifolds and risers off, and found them to be badly corroded inside, and almost fully blocked. I purchased a new set of risers and manifolds for both sides and put them on. At the same time I check the exhaust flappers which were completely gone!. I pulled off the bravo three and found all the perished pieces of the flappers stuck down the bottom. Cleaned them out, replaced the flappers and put it all back together.
Second problem (which actually isn't new), was when we took it out for another driver a few days ago. Even though I had changed the manifolds and risers, and removed the broken flappers blocking the exhaust, it still overheated.........but took a longer time for it to happen. Again we just putted around for the day rather than going fast. No leaks, and at slower speed everything was OK.
When I got it home, I sat down an did a bit of brainstorming to try and figure out why it's still overheating.......only at higher RPM for a sustained period. I decided it was either the raw water pump impellor (albeit I wasn't confident about this), or the heat exchanger.
I decided to start with the impellor, and to my surprise it actually looked to be in very good condition (which I considered a clue), so I went ahead and pulled the heat exchanger off. When I pulled the end caps off, I found the inlet almost fully blocked with parts of cracked and broken raw water impellor (clearly from a previous failure). I cleaned it all out and put it back together (this is yet to be tested, but im certainly hoping ive sorted out the other heating).
My other concern now is actually not related to the overheating, but more just the general performance of the boat. It seems to take AGES to get up onto the plane. Once its there it seems fine, but it takes so long im thinking there must be something wrong. I don't remember it doing this when I took it for a test drive, nor the first time I took it out with my wife and 3 young kids. Im trimming all the way down for the holeshot.
With the speed it takes to get up, I doubt id be able to get a skier up. Is this normal for these boats?. I was carrying a full tank of petrol (about 250 litres), and a full water tank (about 100 litres I think). On top of that we had a few days bags (towels, food etc). There was myself, my wife and my three young kids (aged 4, 7 and 9). At one stage I was doubting it was ever going to get on the plane!!.
I would have thought with the 5.7 Mercruiser and the bravo 3 it should perform quite well. I know its heavy, but still ...its a fuel injected 350 chev......they shouldn't lack power.
I did a compression test on the engine, and got a consistent 190 psi across all cylinders bar one which was low at 140. I squirted 3 or 4 shots of oil into the cylinder and tried the comp test again noting an increase to about 180 PSI......so I point my finger at the compression rings. It doesn't blow smoke that I have noticed and does not appear to use oil.
So - I guess i've got a few questions.
1) Can anyone shed any light on why it might be taking this long to get up on the plane. and if this is normal?.
2) Can anyone give me any info on these boats that might be relevant to a newbie ?
Thanks very much guys...........looking forward ot hearing back from anyone.
Dave
Is there a sealed area under the floor which might be full of water?
I just happen to have one of these also. I am running a 5.7 L 300 hp mercruiser with a Bravo 1 drive and swing a 4 bladed prop. With a full load of fuel 320L and water with 3 people aboard plus everything else you carry I have no trouble getting out of the hole. I have the motor trimmed a little in but not all the way and don't trim the tabs in at all. A friend who has a earlier cruisemaster 23 which is a little lighter than ours runs a 5.7 L 350 MPI which is also 300hp with a Bravo 3 drive and he gets out of the hole may-be 1 or 2 seconds faster than my boat. These boats are heavy and take a little to get up but I certainly don't have any trouble. Not sure if you are running on 260hp or 300hp. When you read about these boats they recommend the 260 hp and I can tell you with how my boat is set up I would not be happy with 260hp. Spoken to a few owner's with the recommended hp and they have said they wish they installed the 300hp. Some have re-powered since and placed the 350 MPI in and are very happy. What RPM are you getting at WOT and what are the prop sizes?
Just a few figures for you, I cruising at 20 knots at 3600 rpm and the boat will fall in the hole at 3200 rpm. I have found that my set up loves to sit at 25 knots my fuel burn at this speed is about 45 plus LPH. You should do better with the fuel injection as I am running with a carb. They are a great boat and handle crappy seas very well.
I few things I have found out since I purchased was the weight with trailer fully loaded to head off to the boat ramp is over 3.5 ton. I don't know what your trailer is made of but if its aluminium your should be ok. I also found out that it is classed as a over wide load its 2.560 mm and once you are 2.5m or over there are certainly extra requirements for you to tow or you will be in trouble if pulled over or involved in any accident. Get yourself a copy of Form 26 which you can down load from the Department of Transport web site and have a read.
There is a gentleman on here called Captain Rednut who plays with marine inboards for a living has helped me out with issues and has his shop on the north side of Brisbane. Well worth having a talk with him if you are in the area.
They are not a full blown fishing machine but I don't have any trouble fishing out of it. I enjoy heading out and spending a few nights out fishing and it comes into its own for this. The son and I do this when ever possible. The wife and I like to spend a night out around Bribie Is. I do a little fishing while she sits back and relaxes and then we have a cook up on the bbq and watch the world go by.
Dave you have got yourself a good boat and has all the comforts you need and the wife will be happy to be out with you which may be not good. LOL
PROS / Brett.....thanks heaps for your replies gents.
Brett - Going by what you said, I definitely have a problem somewhere. If I were to use a number of seconds to illustrate how long it takes me to get out of the hole, I would have to say 15-20. Very poor performance.
Im not sure whether to direct my attention at the engine, or the bravo three. Unfortunately my tacho packed it in a few weeks ago, so id only be guessing at rpm. Having been around engine (and rebuilding them) for many years, id guess im getting about 3500 rpm at about 25 knots? Im also not sure what HP the motor is. Photo below.
The props on the bravo three seem to spin freely when the gearbox is in neutral, but outside of that im not really sure how it could be causing my slowness issues. Being a bravo three there is obviously two props. Photos attached below for reference.
The bottom of the boat is not sparkling clean, but really all it has is the odd scuff mark from the rollers on the trailer. Certainly not enough to cause those problems.
The engine seems to be in pretty good condition to me. Whilst I do admit I have one cylinder down in compression, its not a complete failure - and I don't think would cause a 20 second holeshot.
As far as trimming goes - again I am certain I could probably improve things, but I don't think the way I have it setup would cause my poor performance. I trim to motor down almost all the way, and I don't have my trim tabs down.
It is to the stage where I need to tell the wife and kids to move up the front of the boat while we get out of the hole - then move back down.
Not sure where to head on this one guys......any help for a newby would be very much appreciated.
977B8129-DCC6-4DE3-9D01-F8436A596B19_zpsjgwq3ncc.jpg 6DC7FBA9-ED8B-43C9-A345-9CD34C29DCB2_zpsjv67xikg.jpg 27E4B7C4-B064-451E-B878-E685BBF7EB8D_zps7zdb9l1v.jpg 3BE0ADD8-D2AC-4ED2-961B-6D991C33E1FD_zpscbf2g3x4.jpg
And a small video of the props spinning by hand.
Cheers guys........
Dave
hey guys - I will also mentioned (i debated wether or not to put this info out there for fear of skewing the advice) -........
I took the boat out about 3 weeks ago, and whilst sluggish, i just put this down to being a bigger boat (that was the first time the family and i had taken it out........and the same time it overheated for the first time.
So, part of me getting the exhaust flappers out of the bottom of the Y pipe was taking the sterndrive leg off. Which to be honest with two guys seemed like a very straight forward process.
The extremely slow holeshot I experienced on Saturday gone seemed to worsen a little after this job. In my opinion it was already bad to start with, but it did seem to worsen. Im not sure how, but i guess i need to consider taking the leg off and on has made a difference. Anyone have any explanations for this?
On top that, the wether on saturday was a little windy and choppy at Patterson Lakes (we came in before it got bad). Again, not sure if this would cause it. I made a point not to take off into the wind (IE i changed it up to see what difference it made). Wether i took off into the wind or with the wind didnt seem to make a lot of difference.
Im not sure if any of this has anything to do with it........as i said the holeshot seemed slow before i took the leg off, but did seem to worsen a little after i put it back on. Not sure how i could have mucked that up though.....pretty simple process really.
Im really at a loss with this one guys. Im open to any advice or thoughts about what i could check. I dont think my one low compression cylinder is really going to make this difference.
Does anyone know of any way i can "dyno" the boat to see what kind of power it is generating at the propellor?
Dave
Dave you have something going wrong here for sure. The engine you have should give you 300 hp and this should get you up with no problems at all. It's not going to jump out like a ski boat but a lot better than what you are getting. To really check the propping you need to know what rev's you have. Have you removed the props and checked that they are not slipping (hub bush). Sometimes you may need to take to the shop as they may only slip under load which is hard to tell from just looking at them when they are really bad you can hear when you load up. They will check your blades as well.
Yes there are places that can dyno inboards if you look around. There are a couple of places in the Brisbane area but it would seem that you are down in VIC and there would be facilities some where near you. If it was me first I would get a tacho on her and make sure you are getting the correct RPM. Get the props checked to make sure they are all good. I would be surprised if the boat is propped incorrectly as the previous owners would have had the same problem. The next step would be to get a marine inboard mechanic to look at your rig as there is something wrong with the set up. You can always give Whittney a call and ask to speak to the service manager as they will tell you what props you should be running. The tacho you have is a VDO set up made for Whittney and ask them who can fix.
I am no expert by any means, but if you have the VDO Marine all integrated into one dash, which i had in my Whittley, it gave up the ghost and i quickly found out the problem was common and only way to get fixed was to send to the US. I ended up replacing the unit with 2 Faria Smart gauges with engine diagnostics. The later whittleys seem to come out with individual gauges instead of the vdo cluster. Also the experts may advise whether alignment of Leg with motor would have any effect on power. I wish you all the luck i reckon the Whittleys are a great boat.
http://www.clubwhittleyqld.org.au
I've got a whittely impala I love Whittleys. Our club in Qld is great & willing to share info on boats & problems. Our commodore is Stephen.
Hi All,
Sorry about the delay in reply, its been a hectic week!.
So heres the sate of play as it stands now. The two problems im currently facing are:
1) Overheating
2) Poor holeshot / engine performance.
OVERHEATING
Im extremely hopefull that ive fixed this issue, which was high speed overheating.
I found a whole bunch of debris and broken impellor parts on the inlet to the heat exchanger, which i have now cleaned out. On top of this i found and removed broken flapper components in the exhaust, replace both port and starboard manifolds and risers, and replace the raw water impeller. I have also drained, descaled and refilled the closed cooling system. If it still overheats........god help me!.
POOR HOLESHOT / ENGINE POWER
As far as i see it (put simply), i look at the power / holeshot issues as either being the engine, or the outdrive. Im pretty sure its not the outdrive, so for the moment im focussing on the engine.
An engine needs three main components to work. Compression, Spark and Fuel. All put together at the right time and youve got a running motor.
Im comfortable with the compression side of things. I comp tested (as outlined above) all 8 cylinders. They were all within a few PSI of each other ranging between 190-200, with one of them lower at 140-150. Ideally this is not excellent, however im fairly sure this is not causing the extremely poor performance.
Ive done a bit of work on the spark components during the course of this week. I replaced all spark plugs, and replace all ignition leads. When i tested the ignition lead resistance, some of them were up around 20,000 ohms resistance (very high). All new leads have an average of about 3000-4000 ohm resistance. Obviously with electronic ignition there are no points to change.
The fuel system is next in my sights. I have pressure tested the fuel, with the gauge showing only about 25-30 PSI on accessories, with about 23-25 PSI on idle. I realise that the real story is revelaed once under load. On reading a number of various forums, there seems to be confusing infomartion as to wether these motors should have (on idle or cranking) 25-30 PSI or 45 PSI. It seems to be dependant on which motor you have, which I will admit at the moment im still alittle confused about. If anyone can shed some light on where i might get some documentation about my engine (5.7 MPI Horison Mercruiser with Serial 0M093415), i would be very greatful.
Should i be getting higher PSI on crank / idle or is this satisfactory.
During the course of the week I also installed a tach to show me what RPM im getting. Obviously this will be used to answer the above series of questions about RPM at holeshot etc.
In addition to the fuel.....another point to note is that the person i bought the boat off, left it sitting with the same fuel in it for probably the better part of about 8 months. When i got it (about 7 weeks or so ago), it was on dead empty, but still started. I filled it with 91 RON Unleaded (250 litres) and added a few bottles if injector cleaner / conditioner. Im doubtful that this is causing my problem, but still worthy of note.
So thats the stae of play guys. I believe (nay hope) that the overheating issue is now resolved. Im comfortable with the compression, and comfortable with the spark. The fuel im unsure about......
I sincerely hope i dont need to pull the cool fuel pump system out. I think ill have to lift the motor to get at it!!!.
So to cap it off......
1) Can anyone help with with pointers on the fuel system. Does this PSI sound right?
2) Any other ideas anyone can think of that may be causing the power issue?
Remember, it worked fine the first time i took it out, but not the second. The only difference between those two occasions was new risers / manifolds, new exhaust flappers, about 80 litres more water on board, possibly slightly different trimming, and a slightly choppier / windy day. Other than that all factore were the same.
Thanks very much guys. I look forward to any advice on what i have done so far, and what i can do moving forwards.
Cheers
Dave
Not familiar with these engines but offer the following very general advise:
Overheating:
sticking t-stat?
no t-stat?
you mentioned this motor has a closed cooling system - what condition is the heat exchanger in?
can the cooling system be pressure tested - if so this may indicate a leak or corrosion - if it can't hold pressure it will likely cause overheating problems or at least run warmer than it should.
Slow to plane:
are all cylinders firing?
has timing been checked?
blocked/partially blocked injectors?
blocked/partially blocked fuel filter?
blocked/partially blocked pickup and lines?
Haven't read every sentence, but maybe it's not all engine issues?? (although that low cyl sounds a bit suss)
Do you have a clean portable fuel tank you can hook up to the donk via a new hose? (bypass existing tank, fuel & hose/fittings).
Sorry, can't help with your psi question.
Try & go back to your load/trim conditions from the 1st time/trial & see if the lighter load sees you with similar (better) performance.
Is your prop set correct size/type for this combo of boat/rated power? Check rpm at WOT now that you have a working tacho.
B4 going out, remove props & pin punch aligning marks on prop and bush for both. On return remove & check marks are still aligned. This will tell you if you have spun a bush.
With engine off, check full travel on the throttle/stick corresponds to full travel/WOT at the donk (cable play/adjustment)?
Why would you think it could be the outdrive that could possibly be the culprit? Does it spin freely? Make any gear noises when doing so? Excessive play? Oil good? Excessive filings on the drain magnet?
As for getting a skier up, yes, but it will be nothing like a ski boat
Good luck.
Cheers
Brendon
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Hi Guys,
Juggernaut - I dont believe the tstat is the problem. I pulled the tstat housing off and it looked OK to me. Having said that now that i think about it - ive spent about $2K trying to get this bad boy right. I few extra dollars for a tstat isnt going to have any impact on the wallet.
The closed cooling system is now in very good condition. I have run a descaler through the whole system which increases the heat transfer greatly. Ive used this product in my car cooling system before the great results.It removes all the scale buildup over the years and restores the metal surface back to a very clean one.
The cooling system certainly pressurises. After a day out on the water, if i remove the cap, it hasnt lost any water.
gofishin - Trying to get a separate tank hooked up to the pump is a great idea and i started that process yesterday but got significantly discouraged when i realised how hard the pump is to get to!. I need to revisit this.
I dont think the prop sizing is the problem. It worked great the first time i took it out on the water. Marking the prop positions is a great idea. Ill definately do that.
Yep - checked the butterfly travel in the throttle body. Full throttle on the lever opens the butterfly on the throttle body all the way. Confirmed that.
The reason i thought it could be an outdrive issue is because in between the "good day" on the water and the "slow day" on the water, i removed and refitted the outdrive to remove broken flappers from the exhaust. I cant see how i could have mucked up the reinstall of it (seems pretty simple) - but all the same though it worthy of mentioning.
Another thought - when i replaced the risers and manifolds, i removed the MEFI3 efi computer from the wiring loom. Could it possibly be a relearning thing? (long shot)
I've also decided to invest in some diagnostics software. On top of eveything else i think its a great safety thing to have on the water of something goes wrong with the engine. With three kids under 10 and my wife on board......mitigating as many risks as i can is important.
Im tossing up between:
Rinda Mercruiser ScanTool
Rinda Diacom Marine Software
ODB Diagnostics - MEFI Scan
ODB Diagnostics - Standard Edition
The Rinda Scan tool and the ODB Diagnostics MEFI Scan are just basic DTC scanners from what i can see whereas the Rinda Marine Software and the ODB Diagnostics Standard Edition are nmore feature filled.
Any guidance?.
Thanks Guys.
Dave
Re: Just bought a Whittley Cruisemaster 700 - Have a few questions
Ahh I see the problem.... it's in the name........ Whittley........ LOL just a friendly jibe at Whittleys mate...........I hope you sort it out you got a nice boat there.
Very nice boatOriginally Posted by newbienewb
Congratulation and happy boating .
It is very handy to have one if you know how to use the scan tool.
Rinda is a good brand but around $400-500 and until you find where and what to probe, to test it, and what voltage should be there and here...... hmmm it's your call.
This engines are genely very good but taking to your local marine mechanic would be a better option .
Check the timing .
Gap on spark plugs
Is your throttle body fully open with the control lever fully down?
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