BowFishing Country banner
Cancel
Create thread New Forums

SIRIous Remodel, our 1648 soon to be inboard JET DRIVE build

2 reading
Jump to Latest
41 - 60 of 533 Posts
#41 ·
Sounds interesting and in excited to see the outcome, but I hope you don't change your mind after you take it out tomorrow. I was thinking you where gonna get something that looked like crap with a good engine and when I saw that I thought there's no way I could chop it up. Maybe you can find a engine later own and stick it in the jet ski body.
 
Discussion starter · #42 ·
adamr2727 said:
Sounds interesting and in excited to see the outcome, but I hope you don't change your mind after you take it out tomorrow. I was thinking you where gonna get something that looked like crap with a good engine and when I saw that I thought there's no way I could chop it up. Maybe you can find a engine later own and stick it in the jet ski body.
Click to expand...
the original plan was, in fact, to find something either old, crappy, or wrecked with a running engine. but after searching for so long, i found that it is next to impossible to find that for a good price with a big enough engine. also if you do find one, alot of the older ones did not have reverse. seemed like there were plenty of 500cc - 700cc's available with no reverse for just a few hundred dollars. the one i purchased was by far the most power with reverse for the best price i have found. after i sold the yamaha, i decided that without any $ out of pocket, i would be more willing to jump on a reasonable price if i found what we wanted. the seller of the polaris was dead set on getting $1,500 for the jet ski alone. i was able to talk them into throwing in the trailer for that price. figured i will sell the trailer for $300-$400 and add that to the cash i still had from selling the outboard, which was quite a bit more than $1,500. so i should have more than enough money for parts and materials for the install process, still without having any money out of pocket to have to justify to my wife. lol. btw, i did not get a chance to take the jet ski out this morning. kind of crappy weather. will be taking it out for sure tomorrow morning and afterwards, will start disassembling.
 
#43 ·
A friend of mine and i put a 120 hp kawasaki motor and jet pump in his 1648 a couple years back, It ran pretty good and would touch numbers in the upper 40's. I think he picked the ski up for 500, anyways it told about a month to put together and up and running. It ran really well, but you have to get used to driving them the arse end would always want to slide out on you if you didnt stay in the throttle around turns at high speed. It would make you pucker up pretty good, you can look up the videos of various stages of the build and running on youtube under the "Sandy North" page. She has all of the videos up for him. He ended up selling last year because it he wanted something bigger. It also had ALOT of problems with sucking up stuff and clogging the pump in some of the dirty trashy water we would run and had one hell of a time tracking down some pesky leaks from somewhere around the pump area. It was pretty good on gas for the speed it would run though. Anyways he sold it for a good price and was able to get something bigger. Good luck with the build hope it all works well for you, we definitly had fun with it.
 
Discussion starter · #45 ·
str28 said:
Its actually the boat in my avatar, i might have some other pics loaded up of it around here somewhere.
Click to expand...
Very cool, I will definitely check it out on youtube. Very interesting info. 2 questions: what type of steering did you guys use, stick or wheel, and did you like it? And do you think 15 more hp will mean much difference in top speed than what you guys were hitting?
 
Discussion starter · #46 ·
LOL. Never mind my steering question. I found the Sandy north channel. Pretty cool videos. It's so awesome to see a Jon boat screamin down a river sounding like a jet ski. Lmao! Would love any suggestions or to know anything you would have done differently, str28.
 
Discussion starter · #48 ·
so, as promised, i took the jet ski for a ride today. the weather was actually no better than yesterday, and was a whole lot more windy. not exactly perfect conditions for cruising around on the lake on a jet ski. lol
 
Discussion starter · #49 · (Edited)
however, as much as i hate to admit it, this thing is as absolute blast! but the ride did not change my mind at all. this thing is still getting chopped up. top speed i saw on speedometer was 53mph. however, at one point, i had it wide open and the speedometer said 26mph. lol, so i'm not too sure i can trust it. at any rate, its fast, and should be more than enough "get up and go" for the boat. i posted a few videos of today's ride on youtube. here are the links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yj0yWOuQ4Yg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBgRxHG78kg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k50PvgF2PPk
 
#51 ·
You post up some pics and any Q's you have and i will try and help you out. The key to getting a good clean running jet is have a extremely clean smooth surface in front of the pump. Some guys have even suggested using a spoon mounted infront of the jet to get clean airless water to it. Thats haw them fast big HP jets run there jets without cavitaion. We never had too much of a problem, i think you saw a short clip of the boat cavitating down the river, but once we did some work around the pump to smooth things out with some HEAVY duty epoxy stuff it took some cavitaion away, it was never really an issue again. Except for one time we got caught out in the middle of rend lake in a thunderstorm with 2 1/2 ft rollers coming in lol. As far as the extra 15 hp I dont think you will see numbers much higher than the upper 40's. We ended up having to rebuild the motor (after we blew it up after some frozen cooling lines one day duck hunting) and we bored it and ported it with a new exhaust pipe on it and never really saw a jump in speed, however seemed to be much stronger through the mid range and hence better cruising mpg around 35 mph. It really had most of the motors pwerband in the last few hundred RPM is when the boat would take off.
 
Discussion starter · #52 ·
destruction has commenced! throttle unhooked. electronic reverse, push button ignition, and bilge disconnected. steering disabled, handle bars and steering column removed. took a break for dinner with family. will try to get some more done on it this evening.
 
Discussion starter · #55 ·
okay, so here is where i stand. i just got in, have been working on it for the past couple hours. i am calling it a night only because i'm tired of working out in the driveway in terrible light and the national league championship series has started. i could pull it in the garage to work, but my wife's pilot takes precident over my project and i dont feel like rearranging the whole other side of the garage. i basically have the jet ski completely ready to cut. this involved disassembling the electronics; display, ignition, reverse, and bilge; the steering and everything that goes with that, console, handle bars, etc.; and the throttle. then, i unattached the fuel filter and the electronics box for the reverse from the hull. all thats left to do is to disconnect the gas and oil fills and then drill out the rivets that hold the top of the hull to the bottom. then i can cut. depending on what time i get home from work tomorrow, i should be able to get this completed. if i can get this done, i should be able to pull the engine from the mounts as early as tuesday. here are some pics. they are not real good, due to the fact that it was dark out, but it is already looking completely different. pretty cool that just about 12 hours ago, i was cruising around on the lake on this thing. lol. if everything goes as smooth as today went, i really dont think it will be that long before we have the boat up and running.
 
41 - 60 of 533 Posts
About this Discussion
532 Replies
56 Participants
Last post:
SIRIousFishing
BowFishing Country
posts
834K
members
21K
Since
2011
A forum community dedicated to bowfishers, anglers and enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about safety, gear, boats, bows, tackle, reviews, accessories, classifieds, and more!
Full Forum Listing
Explore Our Forums
General Bowfishing Discussions Member Classifieds Bowfishing Bows & Gear Lake Reports Northwest Louisiana Bowfisherman