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Hey folks,
Newbie to the forum here. I searched all over and could not find much info about the install details of piggyback ballast on a Nautique 220. I did mine this weekend, and figured I would post some photos to help anyone else out. The install was pretty easy, once I figured a few things out, but always nice to see a few photos.
I ordered the kits from Wakemakers - the 600lb front arrow bag, and the 740lb rear locker bags, and the kits included the hoses and fittings. I am first going to say that there is no way they will fill to that capacity on the 220. Maybe on a 230 (for which I notice Wakemakers sells the exact same kit). I bet the front bag only fills to half to its rating, and maybe the back bags 3/4. Anyhow, here it goes.
I started the front bag first, popping the ski locker hatch. I vacuumed it out to make sure there wasn't any gravel or anything that would wear into the bag first. Obviously, screw in the plugs to the several ports on the front of the arrow bag that you aren't going to use. Keep just the top port on the 'stick' part of the arrow unplugged for the vent hose, and the side port on the 'stick' part of the arrow unplugged for the fill hose. Wakemakers instruction says fill through the 'bottom' port but there is no port on the underneath of the bag. I called them to confirm, the actually mean the 'side' port on the 'stick' part of the arrow facing the stern of the boat.
I folded the 'arrow' tabs of the bag and slid it into the locker, and then unfolded them once in place.
Now the fun part - get your skinny friend to worm his/her way up in front of the driver's seat with a screwdriver, and remove the front vent hose from the through hull fitting.
On my boat, it was a black hose with a green stripe. There is another through hull right next to it, that is the front bilge and it is solid black. You can see which is which as both hoses go to the vent and bilge pump which are clearly visible in the ski locker. The above photo, which is sideways, shows the hoses up under the dash. Then, you want to pull that hose back out into the ski locker. On my boat, that required taking some wire cutters and clipping 2-3 zip ties that hold the vent hose and bilge hose together as they run under the dash into the ski locker. Once those were clipped, I could wiggle and eventually pull the hose through so that that the end formerly connected to through hull was now in the ski locker. Make sure the hose clamp is still on the hose, and using a heat gun, heat up the end of the hose till it is soft (but not on fire) and then stuff the female quick-disconnect fitting onto the hose as far as it will go. The heat gun is needed because the factory hose is a bit smaller than the Wakemakers fitting, and it is almost impossible otherwise.
The male fitting then screws into the side (bottom) of the arrow bag, and snaps into the connector you just installed which connects to the hard tank, enabling the overflow from your hard tank to fill/drain the arrow sack from the lowest port.
Then, take the new hose from the kit, which will use the quick-disconnect fitting to mate to the top of the bag, and route the free end of this hose from the ski locker back up under the dash, and up to the through hull fitting that is now free. Put the hose clamp on the hose first, and slide it on the through hull port. As a bonus, if you use the Wakemakers supplied tubing, it is about the same as the through hull fitting and it slides on with just some spit instead of the heat gun hassle. I tightened the hose clamp up good with a socket wrench since the screwdriver never seems to allow tightening of these clamps well.
Clip together the quick disconnects as instructed, and that is it. The above photo shows the completed arrow bag project. Green and black hose on your far right leaves hard tank vent, and connects to bottom of arrow bag. Black hose on top of arrow bag (with blue ring) runs back up under dash to through-hull vent. You will see when you do this that the space in the ski locker on a 220 and smaller boat is no way going to let that full arrow bag fill to max capacity, but it will at least use the most of what space there is.
For the rear bags, it was a little more interesting. First of all, removing the divider panels made it easier to get in there, and that is a good time to do some reinforcement. I installed the 'panel savers' although now that I know what they were, a piece of plywood or other stiff material could have done the trick as well. This is what they look like (image is rotated), below.
I just learned that this website times out, so I am going to post the rest of the rear install in a second post in a moment.
Newbie to the forum here. I searched all over and could not find much info about the install details of piggyback ballast on a Nautique 220. I did mine this weekend, and figured I would post some photos to help anyone else out. The install was pretty easy, once I figured a few things out, but always nice to see a few photos.
I ordered the kits from Wakemakers - the 600lb front arrow bag, and the 740lb rear locker bags, and the kits included the hoses and fittings. I am first going to say that there is no way they will fill to that capacity on the 220. Maybe on a 230 (for which I notice Wakemakers sells the exact same kit). I bet the front bag only fills to half to its rating, and maybe the back bags 3/4. Anyhow, here it goes.
I started the front bag first, popping the ski locker hatch. I vacuumed it out to make sure there wasn't any gravel or anything that would wear into the bag first. Obviously, screw in the plugs to the several ports on the front of the arrow bag that you aren't going to use. Keep just the top port on the 'stick' part of the arrow unplugged for the vent hose, and the side port on the 'stick' part of the arrow unplugged for the fill hose. Wakemakers instruction says fill through the 'bottom' port but there is no port on the underneath of the bag. I called them to confirm, the actually mean the 'side' port on the 'stick' part of the arrow facing the stern of the boat.
I folded the 'arrow' tabs of the bag and slid it into the locker, and then unfolded them once in place.
Now the fun part - get your skinny friend to worm his/her way up in front of the driver's seat with a screwdriver, and remove the front vent hose from the through hull fitting.
On my boat, it was a black hose with a green stripe. There is another through hull right next to it, that is the front bilge and it is solid black. You can see which is which as both hoses go to the vent and bilge pump which are clearly visible in the ski locker. The above photo, which is sideways, shows the hoses up under the dash. Then, you want to pull that hose back out into the ski locker. On my boat, that required taking some wire cutters and clipping 2-3 zip ties that hold the vent hose and bilge hose together as they run under the dash into the ski locker. Once those were clipped, I could wiggle and eventually pull the hose through so that that the end formerly connected to through hull was now in the ski locker. Make sure the hose clamp is still on the hose, and using a heat gun, heat up the end of the hose till it is soft (but not on fire) and then stuff the female quick-disconnect fitting onto the hose as far as it will go. The heat gun is needed because the factory hose is a bit smaller than the Wakemakers fitting, and it is almost impossible otherwise.
The male fitting then screws into the side (bottom) of the arrow bag, and snaps into the connector you just installed which connects to the hard tank, enabling the overflow from your hard tank to fill/drain the arrow sack from the lowest port.
Then, take the new hose from the kit, which will use the quick-disconnect fitting to mate to the top of the bag, and route the free end of this hose from the ski locker back up under the dash, and up to the through hull fitting that is now free. Put the hose clamp on the hose first, and slide it on the through hull port. As a bonus, if you use the Wakemakers supplied tubing, it is about the same as the through hull fitting and it slides on with just some spit instead of the heat gun hassle. I tightened the hose clamp up good with a socket wrench since the screwdriver never seems to allow tightening of these clamps well.
Clip together the quick disconnects as instructed, and that is it. The above photo shows the completed arrow bag project. Green and black hose on your far right leaves hard tank vent, and connects to bottom of arrow bag. Black hose on top of arrow bag (with blue ring) runs back up under dash to through-hull vent. You will see when you do this that the space in the ski locker on a 220 and smaller boat is no way going to let that full arrow bag fill to max capacity, but it will at least use the most of what space there is.
For the rear bags, it was a little more interesting. First of all, removing the divider panels made it easier to get in there, and that is a good time to do some reinforcement. I installed the 'panel savers' although now that I know what they were, a piece of plywood or other stiff material could have done the trick as well. This is what they look like (image is rotated), below.
I just learned that this website times out, so I am going to post the rest of the rear install in a second post in a moment.
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