04-28-2014, 02:20 PM
Last year a buddy of mine had a Hewes River runner jet boat given to him by his father in law. He had purchased it brand new and only used it a few times. Due to some family drama it sat parked beside the house uncovered for 10 years...yeah...you heard me...10 YEARS! So when we got it home we had to go thru everything! The floor was toast, seats were shot..etc. Now I being the mechanical guru was given the task of getting the two engines back up and running...I proceeded to go thru and check all the pertinent systems. The amazing thing was that even though the covers were a little oxidized from sunburn...the internals looked brand spanking new! So I had to fog the systems needing lubricated of course. I found that on both motors the cooling water ejection hoses were packed tight with mud wasp goo that was so dry and tight I had to use a drill bit to dislodge it. Initial start up went great but I was pulling fuel from a gas can since I had not yet checked the condition of the tanks. Those babies ran like a champ! Now this is where it got tricky. The previous setup had a separate 5 gallon tank for the little kicker motor...I decided to eliminate it for space reasons...so not knowing any better, I bought new fuel line and fittings and set it up so that the line came from the main tank...to the pressure bulb...to a Y fitting and then to both engines.
I pumped the ball and fired the engines and all seemed well. It wasn't until we were on the Snake above Celebration park until problems ensued...we had just blown up our first decent sized rapid when the main engine conked out...wouldn't start...bulb was full and pumped up but it was not getting fuel for some at the time unknown reason...we drifted across a bowl into some thick weeds and had to use the anchor to pull us clear. I got her running again and all seemed fine until the next rapid. Drifting down rapids with no control is a bit stressful to say the least...even the little kicker motor wouldn't run..."should have been a clue"..we ended up getting towed by F&G to the ramp and going home...later, I found out that you cannot use a Y fitting for two motors. This is why....when the big motor is running it pulls fuel from the point of least resistance...which apparently is the fuel bowls of the kicker motor...once that fuel runs out, it sucks air and dies...So 85 bucks later we now have the problem solved and installed a manual fuel tank selector. So that way its one motor or the other but not both at the same time...so far all is well! So hopefully on our next river outing we can smash thru those pesky rapids and not stall out at very unsafe times.
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I pumped the ball and fired the engines and all seemed well. It wasn't until we were on the Snake above Celebration park until problems ensued...we had just blown up our first decent sized rapid when the main engine conked out...wouldn't start...bulb was full and pumped up but it was not getting fuel for some at the time unknown reason...we drifted across a bowl into some thick weeds and had to use the anchor to pull us clear. I got her running again and all seemed fine until the next rapid. Drifting down rapids with no control is a bit stressful to say the least...even the little kicker motor wouldn't run..."should have been a clue"..we ended up getting towed by F&G to the ramp and going home...later, I found out that you cannot use a Y fitting for two motors. This is why....when the big motor is running it pulls fuel from the point of least resistance...which apparently is the fuel bowls of the kicker motor...once that fuel runs out, it sucks air and dies...So 85 bucks later we now have the problem solved and installed a manual fuel tank selector. So that way its one motor or the other but not both at the same time...so far all is well! So hopefully on our next river outing we can smash thru those pesky rapids and not stall out at very unsafe times.
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