Vintage Grumble

Ol mate of mine is down from Aucks, and was keen to go for a bash (which we did, unfortunately) so we did the dam to dam run again (Matahina to Aniwhenua) all went well on the way up, apart from bad porpoising again, due to ride plate being bent up from rock bashing the last few outings. On the way back my steering failed again, praise allah it was just after the gnarly rapids/pressure waves, but was about as far away from the car as possible. The dude that built it, had used a 3mm bit of ali angle to hold the end of the steering cable under that dash, and it sheered off. I managed to loosen the remaining bit of angle, and wedge the edge of the bit connected to the cable under it, then do it up. I added a cable tie to try stop it popping out. Amazing it lasted the trip home, but it was a bit nerve racking driving back thinking it could fail at any moment. We hit a few things as I was scared to do sharp steering movements, or go too fast, but we made it back. We hit a few things we shouldn't have hit, and I made a few poor piloting decisions, which has led to some hard hits, and some of the worst welds letting go, I've also torn the UHMWPE by the intake, which is a bit of a pisser, not sure how I'll fix this yet, Also, this bit protects the bow/keel/join in the UHMWPE (I dunno boat bit names) and I made a mess of it last weekend (ref: above video) So I have lots of things to fix/upgrade/rearrange/maintain now, so might take it off the road/river for winter and get to fixin! Regards, V "fuck that's a big rock" G.

Another great days boating with @johnnyfive and @keltik. We did the Waimana and upper Whakatane river, and had a go at this little stream, Was surprised I made it that far tbh. Did a little bit of damage to the boat, but nothing major. Keltiks vid of the incident, It was quite a ride. All in all a good hoon, would hoon again, A++.

All the formula Atlantic stuff was 16v I think? And as far as a I know, they were about as good as 4AGEs got, not sure why 20v were not used?

You should consider it.

What's going on here then, you making a medium port?

Ha, you animal, even my fat ass didn't manage that!

Went up the WHK, wasn't a lot of water, it was neat. (Phone vid from inside waterproof case, so looks a bit weird) Also, turns out you need more than 20mm of water to boat. New high score on grate rocks too. Very keen to go waaaaay further up this bugger one day.

The SSS reverse/trim lever showed up the other day, and by golly it's a sexual piece of gear. I'm well impressed with the design and build quality, glad I didn't try make one TBH, Strange thing to be boned up over I know, but hey.

What have you got in the way of engine bay venting? I want to seal mine up as sound tight as possible, but then worry about the motor eating stinky hot air, wondering what the best thing to do is?

FINALLY got around to listing good old lazza, https://www.trademe.co.nz/2975638612 You should buy him.

Hello fellow OS member, I'm interested in a vehicle on a yard in glenfeild, and was wondering if someone might be able to give it a good look over for me? (it's a 600km round trip for me) The yards open 7 days a week, so y'all can just stroll in anytime. I just want to know general condition, if it looks like it's been serviced, dents/scratches, not rusty underneath, that it doesn't smell like darts inside, and that it doesn't make any weird noises. Cheers boss, Regards, VG.

I did some more boring stuff, Put a chunk of 50x6 ali angle under the dash to stop the over centering, it's IMPOSSIBLE for it to happen now. Then I got the shits with the foam tape sealing the engine cover, as it would move around and get sticky goop all over the place. I removed the tape, and cut out a slab of the EVA foam that came with the boat, and glued it to the underside of the lid, this now stops a bit of sound and vibration coming out, AND seals the lid. Fuck I'm clever. Next I made a plate to seal up a big ass hole the last owner cut in the seat/firewall (for engine/oil filter access) I sealed the lid with foam, and then put a chunk of EVA foam along the back of the seat to seal the engine bay. The other thang I done, was put a propa morse clip on the trim cable (hose clip failed last outing) This was a total bastard, due to space/location/tool access, but I got it in there. The mounting point wasn't wide enough, so one bolt is just clamping a big ass washer. This will do until I go to manual levers, which I have ordered, and will fit in the depths of winter I guess. Bloody rippa. Regards, VG.

From MoOOooOo to MOOOOOOOO. I'll have to get that last 10-15% of throttle working now.

So had a bash at J5s private wet spot on Sunday, and the porpoising was nowhere to be seen, which made boating much more pleasant, and VG very happy. BUT on the last run of the day the porpoise returned, turns out the actuator end of the trim cable is only held in place with a hose clip, and had moved (I thought the last owner was talking about the unit end, DUURRRRRR) so i've ordered the correct morse cable retainer to secure this. I'm now trying to decide if I bother making the ride plate any wider or longer, or just put new gruntier supports on the current one? A longer one would protect the unit better, but would also get more of a hammering when running over shit. Hmmmmmmmmm. And seeing as a boring update is even more boring with no pics, a pic of the manual reverse/trim lever I hope to get, I just need them to make it backwards (my boats RHD) and for a 30 series cable on the reverse rather than the 40 they use. SO PRETTY. Oh, also I was way too excited about getting this doofer, a cam cleat, to hold the bow rope, no more tying it to the hand rail! Regards, VG.

Talked to the old owner the other day, he had problems with porpoising when he originally built the boat, took him ages to work out, but it was the nozzle being forced up by the jet blast, because the trim cables outer sheath was moving (due to not having the correct clips, it now has the proper morse clips). So I checked this, but its solid as a rock. So I've cut the ride plate supports, jammed 12mm of flat in there, and it's now basically level with the bottom of the boat, and the trim nozzle can go alllllllll the way down. I'll find out on Sunday what effect this has had. It will start bow steering if too much, which is also bad. Once I find the sweet spot, I'll make a new plate and supports, and I'll make them GRUNTY AS FUCK. Bonus Sharns: Weirdly, this boat has not only electrically actuated trim, but also reverse! I'll probably go to manual levers for both at some point, as being able to go in and out of reverse quickly is very handy, and currently there's no indication of where the trim nozzle is at. Regards, VG.

Ok so I've got a bit of a boat boner at the moment. Had a bit of time, so fitted a spring washer and loctite to the bolt that came loose on the steering. I also put a hose clip (will replace with a rope grip) on the steering push rod doofer, so it can't over center. I then got carried away and removed the corner dash bit, and fitted the switches and display to the lower dash, it looks a billion times better IMO. I'll get some flat bar that goes right across the dash welded in, and then put marine carpet behind it. The other night I started looking at the porpoising situation. The ride plate is about 4 deg up from parallel to the bottom of the boat, which seems wrong. It's also now touching the trim nozzle before it gets to the bottom of it's travel, so I've pushed it up a bit in the last outing, but not much. Unfortunately it's not adjustable, it's welded in, and i think the bent tube is bending. For testing purposes ima cut the tubes, bend the plate down, and ram something in the gap. I'll make a whole new set up if it fixes the problem. I was thinking about wedging the unit down to help, but noticed it has a wedged plate on it already (bolted to the adapter) it's roughly 12mm thick at the top, and 8mm at the bottom. Bonus Sharns: This thing puts the idle up if you input steering, so it actually steers at idle. I'll look into doing away with it at some point. The ECU also runs the bilge pump occasionally, to stop your jet ski sinking, also sort of pointless in this, as it's got a big dog auto/manual pump, so will also remove that at some point. It's also not connected to a hose at the moment, lols. I'll just have to work out how to keep the ECU happy when removing them. Regards, VG. P.s. if anyone knows anything about unit and ride plate angles, please school me.

Ah crap

So in the last week, I started tidying up a few things, first was the trailers rims. It had three different rims, and two different sizes of tyres, so I purchased two new rims, and used the best OG rim and odd tyre as the spare. OCD appeased. Then I re-routed the accelerator cable to the finger throttle on the steering wheel, as the cable was in a dick of a place. I also changed the placement of the steering connection, to get more throw and easier steering, as it was super heavy and only went like 15 deg each way from center before. Interior shot, (I plan to do away with the little corner dash bit, and just mount the one gauge and switches in the dash bit the steering column comes through.) The steering mod made it way better to pilot, but as I discovered today, it can over center to the left, and start going right again. This caused a couple of small incidents today, so I will have to fix this. I also completely lost steering today while blasting between some logs/stumps (which was quite exciting) because a bolt had come loose on the end of the column, an easy fix, but I need to go around and loctite a few things for safety. Random pics (only two I took) from today, The big issue with this boat, is it porpoises like a mad cunt, even with the trim hard down, and my 80kg bro in law on the bonnet. I think the jet unit or outlet needs to be aimed down or something? Trim tabs seemed like an idea, but are probably no good for gravel/rock bashing. But yeh, apart from those few issues, I had an absolute friggen blast today, this jet boating malarkey is a hell of a lot of fun! That'll do for now, Love, VG.

I'm pretty excited to see the video of Dave loosing his earmuffs. And gosh darn, what a hell of trip that was, AAA+++ will definitely trade again.

Nah I'm just screwing with ya, I completely lost my mind and purchased another boat, An equatence of mine built this 4ish years ago, and about a year ago he mentioned he may sell it, I expressed interest. Then like the week after I got the red boat, he told me he was definitely going to sell it, so for the last couple of months I've been pestering him, and finally sealed the deal a few days ago. It's a 3m wattscraft hull, UHMWPE lined, grunty stainless intake grill, has nozzle trim, and has had reverse fitted too. It's pretty much exactly what I want, for the river exploration I want to do. Its all perfectly usable as is, but theres a few things I will change, and a few things to do to finish it off nicely. River adventures are not far away now!

Now that the motor runs beautifully, let's replace it! Got this bad boy, its near on 800cc, makes 110hp, and best of all, NO CARBS! It's from a 2005 Seadoo 3D, and goez hrd 4 wat it iz.

Boat launching, so you can miss out the boring stuff at the beginning, and get balls deep into the goooooooooood stuff. I was yarning to a dude yesterday, and the jet boat Barry's say the upper Whakatane is a perfect place to learn skinny water driving, as there's lots of runoff, and no big rocks. Barry's reckon if you can do the upper WHK, the Motu is easy(ish)

Is there still a way to get to the river by the rail bridge? Might have to investigate.

I hinged my bets by using blue, red and silver top parts in mine, so as long as black tops aren't judged to be the best, I'm covered.

So have you decided RWD big ports are actually the best engines?