Rattle/Vibration/Clanking felt in steering wheel while accelerating when towing rider

[blakehales06@gmail.com]

I took delivery of my 2006 air nautique sv-211 team edition Saturday. During initial acceleration when towing a rider I feel a distinct vibration/clanking through the steering wheel. You can feel it and hear it, actually pretty loud. Soon as the rider is out of the water, no problems. Only does this until rider is out of the water, but does it every time. During the test drive last week I never towed a rider, or inspected the prop (rookie mistake) When marina pulled the boat out of water yesterday, they showed me a very slight ding/imperfection in the prop. The guy told me he is 99% sure this is the issue and even that slight of an imperfection in the prop would cause this rattle/clanking. The marina is taking a look and I'm sure they will make this right. I just would like to have some opinions as I have no previous experience with inboards. My last boat was a 20 yr old I/O and we have chunked the prop a number of times and never felt anything like this. (Of course, with this nautique no other family members will have access to the keys so moving forward I am not concerned about the prop Would a slight ding in the prop cause this?

[DLafont]

With the prop being directly linked to the shaft, as soon as it spins you can feel the vibration coming up the "chain" so to speak. Slight dings can have a huge effect of these boats' props. My mechanic fixed my prop a few years back and the difference was obvious. Welcome to the Nautique family!!

[nyryan2001]

99% chance you have a slight ding, nick or bend in your prop... May look perfect, but it's likely there. May not have been from running aground, could have been from hitting a log or stick while underway.

you can have it fixed in 7 days or so... Remove and send to a shop like Nettles and they will find the issue and rebalance for $100-$200.

[bolinger06]

be sure to check the 4 bolts that connect to the underside of the boat and hold the prop in place are tight also. The water level at our lake has been down and we hit the prop at one time or another and there must have been a slow vibration and it rattled a couple of them loose and then the vibration became quite evident. We took the prop off and then tightened the 4 bolts back up all the way and installed a new prop and it was night and day difference.