Fast351

I quit wearing nonCGA vests when I heard about a local wakeboarder that drowned after a hard crash with his comp vest still around his torso. I may not ski anywhere near as hard as some of the shortliners around here, but I just wear a CGA approved HO Skis vest. It has sufficient padding to protect you in a hard fall, and it will not come off even if you crash hard enough to flip your eyelids inside out. At 10 years old it's time for a new one though.

@gsmith795 No you don't need WOT on a boat with enough power. My wife usually drives me and I just tell her to "roll into the throttle". It winds up being about 3/4 throttle to make sure the PerfectPass has enough throttle to work with but it usually takes her 3 seconds to get there. Although some people do like WOT with direct drives.

I've been skiing a lot in the very early morning because we're on a public lake, so usually coffee afterwards, and then work. It's summertime now, but when the ice is just off the lake, the coffee comes with me to the hot tub... OK maybe that's a little before ski season :smiley:

I'm 48, 205#, and dual boot guy. I am certainly not the best skier in the world, but deep water starts are no issue. Of course my boat is the vaunted SN196. More power is where it's at. And of course if your driver isn't going wide open, that's the #1 adjustment. If you're stuck with your current I/O, you might look at a different prop. Most factory props are built for top speed but lousy for digging out of the hole, and if it's aluminum, the blades flex. Down 2 in pitch, switch to stainless, and you'll be happier coming out of the hole. Just watch your RPMs since the engine will likely pull past redline with less pitch.

So do the liners prevent blisters or callouses or both? I've done 65 sets in the last 3 months or so, and I have pretty hard callouses on both hands. Doesn't really bother me since there's no blisters, but I wouldn't mind not getting them either.

Wow, I bought a 2001 model year SN 5 years ago for $16,500. With half the hours. That thing must be made of plated gold. Maybe it's the fancy chrome water pump pulley that adds the value.

Man that looks so easy. Some great skiing there.

On side is when you're turning the direction of your front foot. If you're left foot forward, it means turning left (IE 1,3,5 ball). If you're right foot forward it's turning right, IE balls 2,4,6. The reason it's called your on side is because it's easier to turn that way. Your hips are naturally open to the boat so it's easier to get good position. Most people start having much better on side posture, ease of turning, ease of wake crossing, than their off side.

Along those same lines, I have a 2014 Senate Graphite. Same as OP, open water ski at 15 off 32 MPH. Any benefit of getting something newer? I love this ski, it feels really comfortable, and I should probably save my money, but if there is a technical advantage to a newer ski I could be convinced :smile:

Unless these things really are going up in value, $16,900 is way too much. Or maybe it''s just this year, I've heard buying a boat is a challenge because the inventory is so low. Just come out to our lake, they're all there :smiley: When I bought my 2001 5 years ago I paid 16,500 for it. Maybe they are going up.

FWIW, 80 PSI is nothing to worry about. 60 PSI cold at idle is very normal. In general, the rule of thumb for MINIMUM oil pressure is 10 PSI/1000 RPM. The way the upper end of oil pressure is set is there is a plunger in the oil pump with a spring behind it that relieves oil pressure once the spring pressure is overcome. There are 4 different kind of oil pumps: Normal, High Volume, High Pressure, and HV/HP. In order to get high volume they increase the size (height) of the oil pump rotor. Not sure if any marine builders are putting HV pumps in their engines, that's usually used to overcome looser tolerances in the crank bearings in race engines. Then there are high pressure pumps. They increase the spring pressure in the plunger. These are used for very high RPM engines that need more pressure at higher RPMs. Normal oil pumps have their pressure cut off set around 70 PSI. When the engine is cold sometimes the blowoff plunger can't flow enough oil with thicker oil and you'll see 80 PSI at speed. This isn't a problem normally. If you start getting over 80, that might indicate a problem. For more info on this, look here: https://help.summitracing.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/4825/~/do-i-need-a-high-volume-or-high-pressure-oil-pump%3F BTW, I would 1) Figure out if your oil pressure gauge is accurate. Most are not. 2) Be much more concerned if the amount of "oil" in the crank case is growing. That is usually fuel getting in there, or water if the oil is milky. Or maybe the oil was overfilled when the oil was changed.

On a three way switch of that vintage, you select off, ign, and start. Only the selected wire gets powered, which means in the start position, the ignition wire is off (via the key). The way those boats got around that is that they have the starter solenoid feed the ignition circuit while the starter solenoid is engaged. The picture I have attached is for an EFI GT-40 boat, but yours should be almost identical. In this wiring diagram pin 6 on the 8 pin connector is the ignition wire from the key, and pin 3 is start. You can see that pin 3 goes through the neutral safety switch to the S terminal on the starter relay. Basically when this is energized, it connects all the other terminals together. So normally the 6 terminal feeds the I terminal of the relay, which in turn powers the ignition, but when cranking, there is no power on pin 6, so the relay shorts the I terminal to the battery terminal to provide ignition. My guess is either the relay is flaky, or there is a loose wire somewhere in that circuit.

I took it off and put it in a vise, then used a strap wrench with a pipe on it. It took an amazing amount of force and actually bent the strap wrench. I reassembled it with camshaft lube (super viscous but does really well under high pressure like threads) and reassembled with reasonable force. Old filter looked pretty good which makes me think it's been replaced since factory but that filter housing sure was tight!

Mine's not a Malibu, but I took a look at where the engine mounts go. That's where the majority of concentrated high pressure is and that's where it's most important to support the hull. On my boat it's about 40" of spacing.

Weird that a distributor cap caused it to just suddenly die. That's usually more of a "driveability" issue where it runs rough and gets progressively worse. I guess it could be the coil lead down to the rotor. In any case, glad you got it. Boat problems suck.

Thank you, I knew someone would have the answer!

My Nautique 211 was a decent crossover boat. Ended up selling it to buy a 196, and the 196 definitely has a much superior wake, but the 211 was doable, especially at 32+. Wakeboarding was great with built in ballast, surfing required a fat sack in the walk through transom (440#) and having a couple extra people on board was always welcome. I don't think you're going to find a crossover boat with a significantly better ski wake unless one of the newer (2010+) boats that I'm not familiar with fits the bill.

I have a Shoremaster roll in. It's REALLY well built. If you're looking at going roll in, I wouldn't hesitate. In Minnesota docks are a 2x/year in/out affair, and I do it with 3 other neighbors on the lake. I will tell you that the build quality of my Shoremaster is much better than any of the other docks I put in.

I'm doing some maintenance on my boat (a 2001 196) and was wondering if anyone can clue me in on the number of fuel filters on it? It seems like this should be something in the user manual but I'll be damned if I can find it. I know there is one in the FCC (Fuel Control Center) and that the canister spins off using an oil filter wrench. Is there an inline filter anywhere or is that the only fuel filter on the boat? Thanks!

By power down, I meant "turn the system off" on the head unit. In other words, hit the on/off button, but the display is still on. Does the servo remain powered in that case? I will check the other ideas...

I have a 2001 Ski Nautique with a mechanical multi-line Perfect Pass (software 6.5ng). When the head unit is turned on, it functions exactly as it's supposed to. It holds speed, throttles up correctly, etc. When I turn the head unit off, the throttle cable loosens on its own. So the other day my dad was out and hadn't been on my boat yet so I figured I'd show him how it accelerates from a dead stop. Did it twice. First time was normal, boat goes WOT. Second time I had a dead stick for the first 45 degrees of rotation from idle, and the boat only accelerated part throttle. If I unplug the servo, the throttle stays where it's supposed to. Anyone else seen a problem like this? Usually this doesn't bug me as this boat spends its life with Perfect Pass engaged, but it's kind of annoying when you're driving it around without perfect pass.

@A_B I hope you're not shooting the rifle that close. I shoot 3 gun, USPSA, and ski. Unfortunately the season is pretty much the same for all here in Minnesota (I don't shoot indoors, like my lungs too much). I need a winter hobby.

Last session for me was 8 days ago. 53 water 45 air. I'm sure the water temp is in the 40s by now, it's been cold/rainy here for a few days. Thursday is 60 and sunny though. If the wind stays down I'll be skiing. I would expect the water to be mid 40s. Probably last time in a wetsuit, switch to drysuit after that if we get a warm day.

Are you asking whether to change oil that's never been run just because it's been sitting? No, not necessary. No difference between storing new oil in a bottle or in your engine. As for when to change it, change it in the fall. As others have mentioned, get the contaminants and moisture out of it before it sits all winter.