2001 Seadoo Sportster LE. Just got it!

[Bonmotwang]

Also some detail that might help is the part numbers seem to be labeled on the cable sections, so if you remove them you can verify the correct number, or maybe you can see the number on the sheath without removing the cable?

If I can remove the rear end cable assembly I am confident that I can fix it. I have to go across the border to pick up the new parts.

Risk estimate for me please: tomorrow is Mother's Day. I wanted to take wife and kids out just cruising around. If the the oil cable broke, what is the risk? Will the engine die in the lake?


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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

I'm experiencing some difficulty locating a replacement front cable section, could be the part number is subbed in a later year.

You could try contacting SBT since it seems they have done the homework to have the rear replacement cable made, they may also have the front section as well.

In which case, I would purchase these from them, the quality of the rear section seemed as good as the OEM cable, to me.

Once/if you obtain these I can help you to set them up properly, I would work from front to rear on the adjustments, I think.

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

If I can remove the rear end cable assembly I am confident that I can fix it. I have to go across the border to pick up the new parts.

Risk estimate for me please: tomorrow is Mother's Day. I wanted to take wife and kids out just cruising around. If the the oil cable broke, what is the risk? Will the engine die in the lake?


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I think you should purchase a gallon of oil and put 1/2 in your tank then fill the tank to 3/4 full. By doing this, you cannot ruin your engine as long as it is running on both cylinders, and by your description it sounds like it does.

The other thing you should do is disconnect the wire from your oil pump and devise something sturdy to hold the lever just a little open from the idle position. This makes sure the pump isn't running dry, and the oil in your fuel will lube the engine.

Sound good?

 

[USAF_Pride]

If I can remove the rear end cable assembly I am confident that I can fix it. I have to go across the border to pick up the new parts.

Risk estimate for me please: tomorrow is Mother's Day. I wanted to take wife and kids out just cruising around. If the the oil cable broke, what is the risk? Will the engine die in the lake?


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If the cable breaks, the spring on the oil pump should pull it to the wide open position causing it to use more oil than necessary. If the cable doesn't break, but instead doesn't open up like it should, your motor will run lean.

You can use premix gas and you will be fine in case the "lean" condition happens, but if the "break" condition happens, you will really have way to much oil!!

Premix will put you on the water with a large margin of error.

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

I mean to pre-mix by putting the oil in your fuel tank, of course. Try your best to make the oil mix with the fuel, so do something like put the 1/2 gallon of oil in a 5 gallon can and fill the can full with fuel then shake it well, pour this into the fuel tank and then put the remainder of the fuel in on top of that, it should be well mixed this way.

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

If the cable breaks, the spring on the oil pump should pull it to the wide open position causing it to use more oil than necessary. If the cable doesn't break, but instead doesn't open up like it should, your motor will run lean.

You can use premix gas and you will be fine in case the "lean" condition happens, but if the "break" condition happens, you will really have way to much oil!!

Premix will put you on the water with a large margin of error.

Exactly, I have a feeling the cable will break, so it's best to wire the pump lever to a fixed position before filling the fuel tank with premix and leaving for the lake.

Nobody EVER broke a motor by using too much oil but you will have a heavy fog of oil smoke trailing you if both your oil pump is at maximum and the fuel tank is mixed at 40:1, LOL

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

And if you're feeling bad about having to spend a few dollars on repairing your boat, even if you do have to replace the motor for whatever reason, just go look at the price of a new boat sitting on the showroom floor.

Besides, I know you're a tinkerer, and there's no better way of learning how the boat works than by working these bugs out. I've seen my fair share of shoddy work, it's everywhere.

 

[Bonmotwang]

I am putting the throttle assembly back. It is tight and tend it tip to on side a little. Sound like the side if the hull is touching the lower part of the shift assembly.

Also a weird thing happened after I put the 4 screws in and tried to push the shift into forward, just after the shift handle moved about 0.5", I heard a humming sound coming from the back. I pulled it back to N right away. The power was off, the fuel valve was off. Not sure what happened.


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This noise could be the oil cable broke loose at that time. Now I think now I have a reasonable explanation for the broken cable.

Anyway, back to fixing it.

I will confirm the part numbers on Monday or Tuesday with SBT and get them on order. I may order the front end too because it was loose too.

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

This noise could be the oil cable broke loose at that time. Now I think now I have a reasonable explanation for the broken cable.

Anyway, back to fixing it.

I will confirm the park numbers on Monday or Tuesday with SBT and get them on order. I may order the front end too because it was loose too.

Good, I'm sure you'll let us know what SBT says!

 

[Bonmotwang]

And if you're feeling bad about having to spend a few dollars on repairing your boat, even if you do have to replace the motor for whatever reason, just go look at the price of a new boat sitting on the showroom floor.

Besides, I know you're a tinkerer, and there's no better way of learning how the boat works than by working these bugs out. I've seen my fair share of shoddy work, it's everywhere.

LoL. tinkerer, I would take it as compliment :-D.
6 months ago I know zero about boat, zero about jet pump. 1 month ago I still know almost zero about engine.
Lucky I found you guys here!

 

[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

I have another theory here, will confirm tonight:
The last fix I did was bending the 60 degrees elbow to 90 degrees to tighten the throttle cable to have the throttle valve do full travel. But the oil pump cable was tight! So I broke the cable by the mighty force created by the throttle leverage.

Actually I believe this is what happened.
If I understood the structure I would have avoided this silly mistake.


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I think this does not explain why the oil cable broke, b/c both the carb and oil pump will reach limit position simultaneously, they must have the same ratio b/c they are pulled by a single cable.

 

[Bonmotwang]

I think this does not explain why the oil cable broke, b/c both the carb and oil pump will reach limit position simultaneously, they must have the same ratio b/c they are pulled by a single cable.

Right, but somehow the bigger movement broke the last piece of straw.
What is the 3 wires coming from the rear end box for?

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[Bonmotwang]

Unhooked the cable. The lever sprung all the way back. I was turning it back by hand. There is a tight spot in the travel. Kind of at the idle position.


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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

Unhooked the cable. The lever sprung all the way back. I was turning it back by hand. There is a tight spot in the travel. Kind of at the idle position.


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Yes, the spring keeps tension on the cable thus returns the pump lever to idle position. If this lever has a tight spot, can't the spring overcome the friction? If the spring is strong enough to overcome the friction then I think it's not enough force to break the cable.

"What is the 3 wires coming from the rear end box for?"
Are you asking about the electric wires? This is the hall effect TPS (Throttle Position Switch) that signals the MPEM to advance ignition timing by 10* at past 80% throttle. Without this, you cannot achieve maximum power.

 

[Bonmotwang]

I got the cable in hand now. Looking at the strand left, it looks and feels strong enough to overcome the spring for a while. I took a picture of it. Also i took a picture including the adjustable part, which pointing out a temp solution: just remove the adjustable tube totally, put the cable on the bracket directly and use the bracket/cable location to do the fine tune.

I tried the position, without the short tube it is ok, cable radius is smaller now, but not smaller than the throttle cable radius.

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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

I think you're catching onto this quickly! So you have some options to weigh and course of action to prepare for, also a backup plan.

 

[Bonmotwang]

I think you're catching onto this quickly! So you have some options to weigh and course of action to prepare for, also a backup plan.

Hey thanks man. I will continue my work in the morning.
One of the options: Cut out the broken strands, add some 3 in 1 oil into the sheath, put everything back, put a string at the end of the lever for the back up plan.

Is the sign of the cable broken: hey daddy, look at the smoke!

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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

Hey thanks man. I will continue my work in the morning.
One of the options: Cut out the broken strands, add some 3 in 1 oil into the sheath, put everything back, put a string at the end of the lever for the back up plan.


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Also for the backup plan, 1/2 gallon of API-TC oil mixed with 1/2 gallon of fuel to spike the fuel tank in case the string is necessary.

Yes, if you see a plume of smoke this means the oil cable is broken b/c the spring should place the oil pump valve to full open position, this is the way it is designed in case of failure.

What could go wrong?

 

[Bonmotwang]

Also for the backup plan, 1/2 gallon of API-TC oil mixed with 1/2 gallon of fuel to spike the fuel tank in case the string is necessary.

Does it use 87 gasoline? Just 2 or 3 inches of gas left in the tank. I will fill it up in the morning. Do I keep the 1/2 and 1/2 pre-mix in a container?


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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

Does it use 87 gasoline? Just 2 or 3 inches of gas left in the tank. I will fill it up in the morning. Do I keep the 1/2 and 1/2 pre-mix in a container?


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I suggest a minimum oil ratio of 40:1, this is more than you need unless you run hard then it's enough.

I think you don't have to mix 1/2 and 1/2 until you need to spike the tank with oil, thus don't mix them until you must. By mixing them, it will help to move the oil into the fuel tank due to low viscosity. So if you need to spike the tank I prefer to use some fuel with the oil to help move the oil into the tank uniformly.

The tank I believe is 22 gallons, so you need about 1/2 gallon of oil to spike a full tank, or 1 quart to spike a 1/2 tank of 10 gallons fuel.

Just keep this ratio in mind when mixing, too much oil doesn't hurt anything but it's wasteful.

Yes, 87 octane is minimum for this engine, if you run hard then I suggest using 89 octane for safety. I mostly burn fresh 87 and other times 89, and I've also tried 93, and I cannot hear or feel any difference between these. If you are burning 87, is must be fresh, not stale.

 

[Bonmotwang]

Is this the right type of oil?

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[Sportster-2001-951C-Stock]

I can't read the rear label well and I'm not familiar with this one but I can see it does have the low-ash additive package (we need this), so it is designed for use in high temp 2 stroke applications, thus it should meet the API-TC requirement.

BUT, I don't see it's a synthetic base oil so it's not enough for the 951 under severe conditions. It would make a great fogging oil IMO b/c it's not synthetic!

I think you should see there at Canadian Tire, Citgo "sea and snow" synthetic probably in 1 gallon containers? This one should be synthetic, API-TC (low ash additive package).

ie: The oil in this photo will work for your purpose in a pinch, but you should use synthetic API-TC low ash to meet the requirement of the 951 as specified by BRP, especially if you run the engine hard. The synthetic can withstand more heat. Sorry if I wasn't clear on this earlier.

 

[Bonmotwang]

I am back. Was a beautiful day. The whole family went out today. Everything was good, didn't activate any backup plans.

The boat went up to 30MPH at 5500RPM. I was just trying to keep it above the plane. "Above the water" and " in the water" are two totally different "modes"! The boat speed just takes off when I can "latch" it on.

I didn't try more than 5500RPM, still concerning about system weaknesses.
But the 30MPH was absolutely NICE!

I didn't hear anything funny from the engine bay, and opened the engine cover a few times to check, and touched a the cylinder heads to feel the temperature. They are cold!Even after 30MPH flying, but only for a few minutes.

Very hard to determine if engine consumed any oil. It looks like the oil in the tank went down a little from the max line.

The oil cable stood up for me!

When running at 30MPH, I looked back, I didn't see any smoke. Is it normal?

A few minus points:
- forgot to turn on the fuel valve, engine stopped after idling for a few minutes. I was actually very nervous. But the family didn't detect that I turned the fuel on and cranked a few times. All good.
- forgot to unplug the trail cable. Lost right bulb (Sorry man, you told me, but I tried to remember everything)

After I pulled it out of water, I ran the engine for a few seconds to blow the water, but just a few drops came out. Is it normal?
What should I do after every trip for maintenance?

Something about the throttle. The engine sounded not "linear" to me when I push the throttle up. It seems to detect at one point and rev itself up ready for "flying". Is it the low speed high speed switching?
Throttle was at 60% to get 30MPH/5500RPM. Just curious what happens at 100% LOL.



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[USAF_Pride]

Probably your RAVE valves kicking in.

 

[Bonmotwang]

Probably your RAVE valves kicking in.

Is RAVE valves kicking in a normal thing?


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