No power...

[Jeffsullj]

I've got a 2003 SAN 210 TE with the PCM 330. Was out Wakesurfing yesterday (with tons of ballast) and after about 2 hours, all of a sudden, the boat had no power and wouldn't go beyond 2500 RPM... If you put the throttle down and the engine would struggle and sound like it was about to die..

It did something similar last weekend, also after a few hours on the water. Last weekend we went ahead and dumped all ballast (integrated and fat sacs) and noticed once we planed out things were fine. (even drove across lake to restaurant & back with no issues.)

On both occasions, no engine warnings & engine temp normal.

Any thoughts on what this could be? I've got it on the list to go into the shop at the Marina.

[WakeSlayer]

It is going into limp mode. I had a small leak in one of my ballast lines for a couple years. I always thought I was taking water through the side vent while surfing. Once the water gets so full in the bilge it was getting to some sensor or something and throwing my boat into limp mode. Were you taking on a lot of water over the back when stopping? or through the side?

[Jeffsullj]

Thanks for the response WakeSlayer. That sounds very plausible... I had the bilge pump on & off throughout the day, but I'm not sure if I did when that behavior started. Would explain why it was fine the next week.

I'll pay closer attention next time...

Thanks again!

Jeff

[WakeSlayer]

I leave my autobilge on, and it would still happen. Hence me digging into it a bit. One of my lines had moved up against my prop shaft and slowly wore a hole through it. Which slowly got bigger. By the time I found it I could almost stick my pinky finger in it. Small holes let a ton of water through.

[runemmitt]

Jeff,

I have the same boat and have experienced the same thing many times. If you take a few minutes and pump out all the water out of your bilge it will fix it. We stop surfing every 15 min and just let it pump out all the way. It either goes into limp mode or a buddy of mine had told me when you get so much water in the bilge the belts cause a vapor causing a vapor lock type response. Whether this is true not sure. You are taking water in through your side vent down through the blower. Have you gone through many blowers? I have replaced one a year thus far cause of this. Anyone know an easy way to switch the blower vent to the starboard side? I have actually fabricated a plastic device to stop most of the water while surfing but it still gets in there. My side vent is under water while surfing at times.

[Jeffsullj]

Thanks for the tips runemmitt & wakeslayer... will pay close attention to this next time I'm out... and take the boat off the marina list too.