2022 G23 Supplemental Ballast

[Kenv]

250K and the boat won't steer to the left......What?????

[charlesml3]

Don't be ridiculous. It's clearly a warranty issue due to some component failure.

[charlesml3]

If you dump ballast without a reboot, does steering return to normal?

Yes, it does. I also noted that going to 50% ballast the problem became much less noticable.

[bird_dog0347]

OK I've done extensive testing on this and have it narrowed down. Here are the specifics:

- It ONLY affects the steering to Port while surfing to Port. Steering to Starboard is fine. If the boat is switched to surf to Starboard, everything is fine.


- It is not specific to the Supplemental ballast. I was able to reproduce the issue with Belly and Rear tanks at 100% and both Supplemental tanks at 0%.

- With less ballast, the problem is still there but to a much less extent. I tried Belly and both Rear tanks at 50%, Supplementals at 0% and although the boat would steer to Port, it wasn't as easy as steering to Starboard.

- If Surf Mode is set to OFF, the problem is not evident. Steering is fine both ways even if the boat is heavily ballasted.

It seems to me like the steering servo isn't powerful enough to move the rudder to Port when surfing to Port with the boat heavily ballasted. This is something that just started as I have a little over 100 hours on the boat and just had this problem yesterday.

Some other things I learned:

- When the problem manifests, don't keep jamming the wheel over to Port. This makes it worse. After a while of doing this, the entire power steering system will shut down and it'll be hard to steer either way. The only fix then is a reboot. Instead, sort of "nurse" the rudder to Port. Steer a hair to Starboard, then some to Port and repeat as needed. This will ease the rudder over to Port.

I'll be contacting my dealer tomorrow to get this resolved. I'll keep you posted here.

-Charles

Ok, so this sounds closer to the issues I've had with my P23 the last 1.5 years... and just happened again this past weekend but for the first time this summer as we thought it was fixed in the spring. We have only ever experienced the issue (no power steering in either direction) after turning off the engine while switching riders, and only ever while surfing port side but that's mainly cause I'm the only one who will surf both sides but typically port. This has also always been with 100% ballast full (2021 so no supplemental), have not had it happen with anything less but rarely ride with less.

When we experience it, we just alert the rider that we are stopping, and completely reboot the boat. This has fixed the issue 100% of the time, which leads me to believe it must be a software or sensor issue. Once the issue is cleared, it has never returned until we've killed the engine and started it back up.

[Bert12]

OK, so my dealer heard back from Nautique today and was told this is "normal." What?! A surf boat that unexpectedly can't turn left? That's not my definition of normal. Luckily the mechanic was able to replicate it on his own, so the dealer knows there is a real issue. The dealer is bumping this up to a higher level, but I'm not hopeful.

[pitts12driver]

I had the power steering quit on my 2021 G23 in surf mode all the time! I replaced the boat with a 2022 and have not seen this behavior...

[Kenv]

Don't be ridiculous. It's clearly a warranty issue due to some component failure.

OK...let me re-phrase that....250K and we have a "component failure"....LOL. And you think that's...OK??? If it was a one time glitch....maybe OK...but when you have to power the boat off to cycle the computer because it won't turn left.....Don't you think that's a BIT messed up??

[charlesml3]

So you believe the odd of a given component failure should go DOWN as the price goes up. You should have a talk with the team over at NASA.

[charlesml3]

So after annoying me for 2 days, the problem has gone away. I've had no trouble at all with steering to Port with the boat surfing to Port in over a week. This is one of those problems that's going to be difficult to pin down.

-Charles

[Scooter G]

I'm having this uncanny sense of an accident waiting to happen here. Not only an irritating techno issue, but there are those times, we've all had them, when the irresponsible, un-attentive boat out of nowhere, requires you to make a rapid coarse correction. Usually the surfer is on point and can follow the correction. Not to mention other floating obstacles in the water. Maybe I'm thinking this wrong, and granted, I'm not a lawyer, but this has the potential of paying the light bill for a few years if you were. This is a huge safety concern IMO. Ya think?

[Kenv]

So you believe the odd of a given component failure should go DOWN as the price goes up. You should have a talk with the team over at NASA.

Charles....I only used the 250K price in my post as that is the rough price of the boat IN QUESTION. Really has nothing to do with this exact figure....More of a safety concern on any priced Nautique or any other given brand that this might happen to. I think you know what i'm trying to say.....without bringing NASA into it......LOL

[Bert12]

So I had a conference call with the dealer and an engineer at Nautique. The bottom line is they can't figure it out. The next step is to fly an engineer out here to try to figure it out or send the boat back to Florida. It's a real disappointment. Such a great boat with a gremlin nobody can fix. I missed a third of the summer, so there is no rush now. The next time I can use the boat is June. Hopefully something will be resolved by then.

[jefe]

Humm, I have the exact same problem on my 2022 G23. It is not inconsistent though, If I am at full ballast, 50% or more supplemental, the boat cannot steer to Port. I just figured it had to do with the prop rotation, hull and all the extra weight in a G23 with the supplemental. A 2020 G23 without supplemental, would not show this issue. After reading above, I am not so sure. I never even thought to try to reset the boat, because it was a always a problem thing. Humm.

[bird_dog0347]

I wonder if the ballast bag is pinching or pushing on something when it is full and thus causing the problem, that's the only real possibility here I think.

[macpres]

We've had the same issue on our 2022 G23 with supplemental and our 2023 P25 with supplemental. Dealer can't fix it.