Bust out another thousand

got the boat out of storage and on the water today. Well its doing the same thing it was doing in the fall. Surging/sputtering. Starts fine, idles fine, as soon as I give her a little gas it will wanna go but then sputter. This started happenening last fall and I brought it in. They hooked it up to the computer and it didn’t register any issues so they said no problems. Got it winterized and stored it for winter. I was trying to get the gas as low as possible since I wanted to store it empty so thought maybe a low fuel issue. Just put in 20 gallons of fresh non oxy. 2016 Suzuki DF140. Its under warranty but who knows if repairs will be covered. Sheldon are you certified to work on Suzuki? I’m 100% certain you could fix it and I trust you over any other mechanic but would want to take it to a certified dealer in case warranty covers repairs. I’m thinking its gotta be a fuel problem. Clogged up filter maybe…. anyway annoying problem.

Tight lines to all those that have your boats out. Saw about a million boats on Minnetonka today.

Sheldon helped me work thru a similar issue last year
on my motor. Most of my issues ending up being fuel issues. It took a few weeks to get the issue worked out. It was running great at the end of last season. I hope it still is running well when I get it out next week. If Sheldon can help you out I’d give him the business.

certifiable,not certified,however,all gasoline engines run on the same basic principles,compression,spark,air/fuel as long as it is delivered on time and in proper amounts it will run.
do not continue running it until its fixed!! you can burn a piston from being lean,too much timing etc.

it can be many things,cracked/fouled plug,sticky/plugged injector,failed coil,etc.
if you are capable,pull the spark plugs in order,take pictures of the side of the plug and the side that faces the piston and post them,I should be able to see which cylinder is giving you fits.
from there we should be able to determine if its a fuel or spark issue.

one thing I am seeing more of is plugged injectors even with good fuel being used,the dang tolerances in injectors are so tight the least amount of gum/varnish/water can cause them to stick.
if you are lucky you can save them by shocking the fuel system with a high powered cleaner but it must be mixed in a separate tank and hooked to the engine,no sense of using high amounts to treat a large tankful.

another thing I am seeing is the armature on the fuel pump becoming corroded and not making contact with the brushes,they immerse the fuel pump in the fuel to aid in its cooling.
again,water/varnish and the like is causing this corrosion,a new pump is the best and only fix when this happens.
slow pump speeds from poor contact cause low fuel pressure hence poor performance.
unless zuki’s are running a fuel pressure sensor on their motors a computer scan wont show low fuel pressure as the problem.

this is what gripes me about most shops,they forget the basics and if the scanner doesnt show a problem they think it should be fine.
dont take me wrong,there are lot of fantastic shops out there with great mechanics,it just takes time to dig out the root cause and some shops dont dedicate the time it takes to do so.

Do you have a fuel filter? If so start there,I would bet filter related. Even just the snail inline under the hood could cause you a headache! If you have a small boat gas tank one that after filter changes and you’ll know for sure you have good clean fuel getting to engine!

Best of luck figuring it out. Ain’t nothing worse than motor problems.

Deuces wrote:

Best of luck figuring it out. Ain’t nothing worse than motor problems.

Ever been bullhead fishing?

Had the same problem with my f150 yamaha and it was under warranty. But the dealer couldn’t figure it out either. Ended up pulling the injectors myself and shipped them out to get them ultrasonic cleaned and flow check found out that one was bad. Replaced the bad one problem solved. Good luck it can be frustrating but just have to eliminate one thing at a time. Also going on that it’s 4 years old have you changed your water separator filter ?

Back when points were common in outboards. I had an Evinrude 55HP that was a great outboard. This was the only problem in ever gave me in 10 years of service. Identical probem to yours. Started and idled fine soon as throttle was advanced it sputtered.

Three different outboard mechanics checked it out. All pronounced there was no problem. Finally a friend of mine said lets pull the flywheel off and see for ourselves. Since he had a wheel puller it made the job easy.

Soon as the flywhel came free the problem was obvious. A set of points were broken. It had two sets of points. Low speed and high. Called marina for new set of points. 26.00 they quoted. Took broken point set to auto shop. Got the points for less than 2.00. Installed and outboard ran trouble free until the day I sold it.

Needless to say I lost quite a bit of respect for local marine mechanics. As a couple of knuckle buster back yard mechanics fixed what they could not find.

Get rid of your kids and the money flows like water. An outboard repair will seem like pennies

Crappie, you’re going to have to take it back to the dealer and get a little firm with them.

I totally agree, I’ve had this problem over and over again in that today there are a LOT of “technicians” who are really just parts changing monkies. They computer tells them which part to change and they unbolt the old part and bolt on the new one. This works fine as long as the computer is right.

It’s getting really hard to find the service places that still have real mechanics instead of parts changers.

I’d say take it back and have a polite but firm conversation with the service manager. If possible, first take the boat out and shoot a video to show the problem so you can demonstrate what happens and when it happens.

Tell him the symptoms and tell him do NOT consider this problem fixed until he has in-water tested the outboard both to reproduce the problem and to confirm it is fixed. Running it on water muffs means the prop is not under load so this does not confirm either the problem or the fix.

FWIW, I’m going to put my chips on the “bad fuel injector(s)” square.

Now that so many seasonal engines are EFI, the problems with EFI are really coming to the forefront the last 5 or so years. These EFI engines HATE occasional use and plugged up injectors are a really really common issue. Guys used to sell these engines as the solution to all problems compared to carbed versions, but now the holes in that theory are starting to show. All mechanical objects have failure points, the EFI’s main failure point for the seasonal user is really becoming clear.

Grouse

Also, check the cheapest obvious fix. I know since the same thing happened to me last year. It was a faded cracked hose and fitting at the motor causing it to collapse the line, and draw too much air when it was under load. But i started with the filter which had water in it.

Does it only do this after it’s warmed up?

I had the same motor with the same issue but only after it was warm. It had to do with the fuel line collapsing where it ran along the back (it has insulation on it but that wasn’t enough). I replaced the fuel line and it was good to go.

I second what TheFamousGrouse said. Get their top mechanic out in the boat on the water with a laptop hooked up and then recreate the problem. It won’t do it without being under load.

I would bring it to Rapid marine in Ham lake and ask for either Chad, or Ernie to look at it.

thanks for all the suggestions. I brought it to J&J Marine yesterday. Im done working with a particular marina. Never again.

Sheldon if this whole SIP/virus business wasn’t going on i probably would have just brought it to you. Would love to share a bullhead and whiskey dinner too

“It’s getting really hard to find the service places that still have real mechanics instead of parts changers.”

Amen. So many people working in shops these days have zero intuition on diagnosing and fixing things. I had tires changed and they broke a lug. He calls saying that they need to put a whole new brake package on because the drum is rusted stuck and they want to saw it off. I went to the shop to look at the bone dry drum and ask if he put any penetrating oil on he says yea and holds up a can of brake cleaner. I asked if he heated it and he said it would bend the drum. I told them to try something before calling again.
Amazingly, it was somehow ready to go shortly after.

An entire repair shop that doesnt know how to deal with rust.

tindall wrote:

“It’s getting really hard to find the service places that still have real mechanics instead of parts changers.”

Amen. So many people working in shops these days have zero intuition on diagnosing and fixing things. I had tires changed and they broke a lug. He calls saying that they need to put a whole new brake package on because the drum is rusted stuck and they want to saw it off. I went to the shop to look at the bone dry drum and ask if he put any penetrating oil on he says yea and holds up a can of brake cleaner. I asked if he heated it and he said it would bend the drum. I told them to try something before calling again.
Amazingly, it was somehow ready to go shortly after.

An entire repair shop that doesnt know how to deal with rust.

Falls back on your outboard compnies not enforcing rules. asked you big name dealers how many certified techs,and not online trained! cost money to send them to class. some of these big dealers play by different rules then the little guys!