To celebrate Independence Day I did one of the most 'Murican things I could do - bought a jet ski that was essentially marketed as a 300 dollar trailer with a free jet ski on it from a dude way out in the sticks and nowhere near water.
So what we have here is a 1989 Ultranautics Seaflash. It was essentially an early version of what all modern jet skis are: a big, boat looking PWC that was built with ocean riding in mind, so designed to be hefty and hard to flip when you're crashing through waves. Ultranautics is best known for the Wetbike, which was essentially a snowmobile for the water, you steered with the front ski and ran atop the water on hydrofoils.
Anyways, despite a super dry rotted tire on one side of the trailer we made it the 60 miles back home without issue and set about prepping for repairs. The paint has been baking off in the Texas sun for who knows how many years and a good clean up was in order to minimize the amount of old paint dust we got everywhere.
It actually cleaned up pretty well, the hull seems to be in good shape and after removing the years of crust, it actually looks pretty decent still.
I recently moved, and now that I have a garage I feel like I am well on my way to a proper GRM household, ie. I have a garage filled with "almost working" vehicles.
So now for the nitty-gritty: The previous owner stated that the engine would turn over but he wasn't getting spark. One new battery later and we had verified this diagnosis. Luckily, he gave me a brand new copy of the 1985-1991 Suzuki marine engine service manual. Unluckily, the motor we have in this craft does not appear to be in this manual despite being from 1989. Suzuki names their engines based on horsepower and they have information about a DT55 and DT65, which are both 3 cylinder engines. The engine in this craft is a 2 cylinder 60hp engine. From what I could find online (which is very little) it appears that Ultranautics had Suzuki build their older DJ60 outboard engine (which Suzuki sold in the early 80s) and then Ultranautics made some modifications to put it into their lineup of jet boats, bikes, etc. I can hardly find anything about the DJ60 online because it seems that google thinks DJ60=FJ60.
So we started systematically going through the wiring harness to identify where all the wires go and found a few items of note:
- The emergency kill switch is missing (not a big deal for getting it running out of water but will need to replace)
- The choke and starter are operated off the battery and work great, everything else (ignition and bilge pump) appears to run off what I assume is a magneto under the flywheel. Also none of these parts are working.
- The ignition coil is not getting any voltage from the CDI. It is unclear whether this is due to the CDI being busted or that it is also not getting any power.
Also on a side note, the engine is extra funky because it's sideways. The flywheel is on top (right under the rider's butt) and the head faces backwards. Not sure what motivated that design but it is certainly different.
So at the current juncture I have an unknown problem with the ignition system. So this weekend I'll probably go ahead and pull the whole harness and system out of the boat to try and better diagnose the components and connections. Definitely learning as I go here so if anyone has some suggestions for diagnosing one of these old "Pointless Electronic Ignition Systems" (their words, not mine), I'm open to input from the hive. My current understanding leads me to want to see if the CDI is getting the requisite power and if it is then replace the CDI (if I can find the right one). If it all goes to E36 M3 then at least I have a good trailer to get a better jet ski with later...
