biglar155
Jetboaters Admiral
- Messages
- 1,577
- Reaction score
- 2,142
- Points
- 277
- Location
- Fredonia, WI
- Boat Make
- Yamaha
- Year
- 2009
- Boat Model
- SX
- Boat Length
- 23
Well, in spite of 57 degrees when I woke up and a forecast high in the low 70's I decided to take a vacation day and get the boat out today.
The morning started out pretty darn cool so we let things warm up a bit and didn't leave the house until 9:30. In a rare fit of trying to minimize our time away from the house (due to leaving our new dog in her crate while we're gone) I fueled the boat last night and had it sitting in the driveway ready to go. (Normally it's at storage and we spend about 20 minutes or so loading it up and hooking up and then stop for gas along the way.) That was actually VERY nice. Note to self: Do that again.
About 10 miles in to our 70 mile trip to Oshkosh it dawned on me the one thing I forgot: Boat ramp cash. We needed an even $5. All we had was a $20 and two singles. Never fear though! This crisis was easily averted by a stop at Wal-Mart for doughnuts!
Back on the road, I was happy with the way the Expedition pulled. This is our second trip out for the year and our second trip with the X. (Never called it that before just trying it on for size.
) The 6-speed helps it make use of its power much better than the Suburban's transmission did. I no longer have to choose between slowing down while going up a steep hill and having the engine sound like it's about to jump through the hood.
One thing that bothered me on our first trip was that she seemed a bit "wiggly." I couldn't quite put my finger on what was going on but it didn't feel right. So last night, after looking closely at the situation, I flipped my draw-bar around so that the trailer tongue sits about 2" lower than before. MUCH better. (Plus I can back in the driveway now w/o scraping the rear frame of the trailer.
)
Our launch at Rainbow Park in Oshkosh was uneventful. We really have things down to a science when it comes to prepping and stowing the boat. Guests have commented that they can see they just need to "stay out of the way" 'cause everyone else knows what needs to be done.
We headed toward Lake Winnebago and pulled into the little harbor at Menominee Park. We tied up at the dock there and had a lunch of homemade subs and other goodies. (Just didn't feel like grilling today.)
After that we walked over to the free Zoo they have there and went through it. It's actually pretty decent. No charge and a quick walk-through takes about 30-45 minutes.
Back at the boat, we broke out my son Matt's remote controlled boat and buzzed it around near the dock. The ladies sat on the lawn chatting while the boys and I sat on the swim platform of the boat playing with another boat. (Does it get any better? I suppose we could have been tied alongside an even bigger boat...
)
After that we cruised up the Lake Winnebago shoreline. The air temperature wasn't much above 70 but the sun was shining and the water temp was 80. On Winnebago this means that the water had a lovely green scum on the surface. Yay.
I let the boys drive for a bit and it was while Matt was driving (sitting on my lap) that we had "our glitch for this mission." We were running about 28 MPH or so (normal cruise for us) when all of a sudden we got a vibration that was enough to rattle your teeth. Matt's eyes got as big as saucers but I calmly slowed us down and said "Well, we sucked something up."
First I tried the reverse move. No help at all.
Next, I reved one engine at a time and found it was the port engine.
I pulled the clean out and did a quick feel around but found nothing.
I decided to up the ante on the reverse move so I used the starboard engine to get us going backwards, shut down the port engine and put it in forward to open the gate. Sort of a "power" reverse move. This still didn't help.
I would probably have started to worry at this point, but after all of the stories I've heard here over the years, I knew I had something jammed in the impeller.
I pulled the clean out port again and carefully felt around each blade of the impeller. Sure enough - there it was: A plastic cap (probably from a water bottle).
Luckily I was able to pull it out with my fingers. Unfortunately, I was not able to take the suspect aboard for further questioning as it slipped from my fingers and drifted past the impeller.
I corked her back up, fired up the engines and all was right as rain again.
We got back to the dock and realized we had a first: No one needed to use the porta-john so no one has to clean out the porta-john this time!!!!
Our return to the dock had potential to be a little hairy due to a crosswind, but we've got our methods down-pat pretty good and we were on the trailer and on the road in no time.
Normally we drop the boat at storage before heading home but we wanted to let our doggy out so we went straight to the house. More good news: Rose managed nearly 8 hours in her crate and didn't mess! Good Dog Rose!
So even though it was a little cool and swimming/tubing was out of the question, everyone still had a good time. (And bonus, there was less excrement than normal to clean up!)
The morning started out pretty darn cool so we let things warm up a bit and didn't leave the house until 9:30. In a rare fit of trying to minimize our time away from the house (due to leaving our new dog in her crate while we're gone) I fueled the boat last night and had it sitting in the driveway ready to go. (Normally it's at storage and we spend about 20 minutes or so loading it up and hooking up and then stop for gas along the way.) That was actually VERY nice. Note to self: Do that again.
About 10 miles in to our 70 mile trip to Oshkosh it dawned on me the one thing I forgot: Boat ramp cash. We needed an even $5. All we had was a $20 and two singles. Never fear though! This crisis was easily averted by a stop at Wal-Mart for doughnuts!
Back on the road, I was happy with the way the Expedition pulled. This is our second trip out for the year and our second trip with the X. (Never called it that before just trying it on for size.
) The 6-speed helps it make use of its power much better than the Suburban's transmission did. I no longer have to choose between slowing down while going up a steep hill and having the engine sound like it's about to jump through the hood.One thing that bothered me on our first trip was that she seemed a bit "wiggly." I couldn't quite put my finger on what was going on but it didn't feel right. So last night, after looking closely at the situation, I flipped my draw-bar around so that the trailer tongue sits about 2" lower than before. MUCH better. (Plus I can back in the driveway now w/o scraping the rear frame of the trailer.
)Our launch at Rainbow Park in Oshkosh was uneventful. We really have things down to a science when it comes to prepping and stowing the boat. Guests have commented that they can see they just need to "stay out of the way" 'cause everyone else knows what needs to be done.
We headed toward Lake Winnebago and pulled into the little harbor at Menominee Park. We tied up at the dock there and had a lunch of homemade subs and other goodies. (Just didn't feel like grilling today.)
After that we walked over to the free Zoo they have there and went through it. It's actually pretty decent. No charge and a quick walk-through takes about 30-45 minutes.
Back at the boat, we broke out my son Matt's remote controlled boat and buzzed it around near the dock. The ladies sat on the lawn chatting while the boys and I sat on the swim platform of the boat playing with another boat. (Does it get any better? I suppose we could have been tied alongside an even bigger boat...
)After that we cruised up the Lake Winnebago shoreline. The air temperature wasn't much above 70 but the sun was shining and the water temp was 80. On Winnebago this means that the water had a lovely green scum on the surface. Yay.
I let the boys drive for a bit and it was while Matt was driving (sitting on my lap) that we had "our glitch for this mission." We were running about 28 MPH or so (normal cruise for us) when all of a sudden we got a vibration that was enough to rattle your teeth. Matt's eyes got as big as saucers but I calmly slowed us down and said "Well, we sucked something up."
First I tried the reverse move. No help at all.
Next, I reved one engine at a time and found it was the port engine.
I pulled the clean out and did a quick feel around but found nothing.
I decided to up the ante on the reverse move so I used the starboard engine to get us going backwards, shut down the port engine and put it in forward to open the gate. Sort of a "power" reverse move. This still didn't help.
I would probably have started to worry at this point, but after all of the stories I've heard here over the years, I knew I had something jammed in the impeller.
I pulled the clean out port again and carefully felt around each blade of the impeller. Sure enough - there it was: A plastic cap (probably from a water bottle).
Luckily I was able to pull it out with my fingers. Unfortunately, I was not able to take the suspect aboard for further questioning as it slipped from my fingers and drifted past the impeller.
I corked her back up, fired up the engines and all was right as rain again.
We got back to the dock and realized we had a first: No one needed to use the porta-john so no one has to clean out the porta-john this time!!!!
Our return to the dock had potential to be a little hairy due to a crosswind, but we've got our methods down-pat pretty good and we were on the trailer and on the road in no time.
Normally we drop the boat at storage before heading home but we wanted to let our doggy out so we went straight to the house. More good news: Rose managed nearly 8 hours in her crate and didn't mess! Good Dog Rose!
So even though it was a little cool and swimming/tubing was out of the question, everyone still had a good time. (And bonus, there was less excrement than normal to clean up!
)
