Sucked up a stick and jammed impeller, first time pulling pump.

[TreeRX]

Sucked up my very first stick while leaving my slip, in the marina (no wake speed). Sounded like a wood chipper, so I killed that engine. Went out on one engine, and was thankfully able to remove the stick from the clean out hole. The stick was about 3/8" diameter and 4 inches long. Started the engine back up, and heard little bits get chopped up and shot out. All is good. About 20 min later I sucked up another stick cruising at 30+mph. Extremely loud grinding sound. Killed engine and reached into clean out hole again...

Ended up sucking up a larger stick, about 1.5" diameter this time. 2 sticks in 1 day! Extremely loud grinding sound. Killed engine and spent about an hour trying to pick it apart while drifting in the river. Couldn't get it out. Bump started motor a few times to try and get at the stick from a different angle. Ended up seizing and I couldn't start the engine. Shit. Picked at it a bit more, and was able to restart the engine. Tried to just gun it and chop the stick up...Horrific cavitation. Had to limp back on one engine...Shitty way to burn extra fuel. I spent several hours reaching into the clean out port with various tools. I managed to pick pieces off the end of the stick, but it wasn't budging. Ended up having the marina haul my boat. Gave it one last try from the intake grate. No luck there either.

I decided to pull the pump. A huge thank you to everyone in this community that shares their experiences. This forum is a huge reason why I bought a Yamaha boat. Pulling the pump is easy:
- Disconnect the bucket cable via quick release.
- Disconnect steering cable.
- Remove 4 bolts.
- Pull pump.
- Remove stick



Once the pump was pulled, I was able to easily remove the stick with 1 finger. I would like to upgrade my intake grates...There's always debris in the river I boat in. I don't know how all the jet skis don't suck shit up.

There was a little damage to the wear ring, but nothing that seemed significant...I wanted to get my boat back into my slip ASAP and decided to just see how it goes. I've seen people run with deep gouges in their wear rings with no cavitation.




What I did do is spend some time cleaning up all the metal faces before reassembling.

This is the grease you're supposed to use on the spline: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B085D8KFVC/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s02?ie=UTF8&psc=1


This is the gasket maker I used: Amazon.com


I checked the intake screen while the pump was off and it was clear of debris.


Don't judge how dirty my boat is...I always feel a bit ashamed when I see how clean everyone else's boats on this forum are haha. Then again I don't trailer, my boat's been slipped in brackish since April 14th.

One bit of guess work during this: One page on the service manual states to torque the jet pump bolts to 15 ft. lbs. Another page in the same service manual says to torque to 25 ft. lbs...I went with 19 lbs. Why? Because I was born on the 19th, and that was good enough for me.

I never wanted to pull the pumps before, and now I'm going to make it annual winter maintenance. Happy boating everyone.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="

" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

[Dave burke]

That’s lousy luck. Well done on pulling the pump. It really is easy and this forum helps a lot.

In terms of intake grates, do a search and see what you find. I don’t recall seeing anything specific on this other than people saying screens are generally a bad idea because they inhibit water. These pumps take in a lot of water. But I’m going from memory.

 

[TreeRX]

That’s lousy luck. Well done on pulling the pump. It really is easy and this forum helps a lot.

In terms of intake grates, do a search and see what you find. I don’t recall seeing anything specific on this other than people saying screens are generally a bad idea because they inhibit water. These pumps take in a lot of water. But I’m going from memory.

I considered a screen, but thought it might make it easier for a plastic bag or something to completely block the grate…in my mind I’d like to get 3 extra bars welded on (1 between and 1 on either side of the existing grates). I’ve seen jet boats in Alaska put heavy duty mesh screens on their intake grates to prevent rocks from getting sucked up when they run through super skinny water (literally a few inches deep)…but those are completely different and designed for it.

 

[scokill]

There isn't a way to put a screen or the like on the grate. It would restrict flow and/or cavitate. The waterflow is pretty tight tolerance.

 

[Scottintexas]

glad to hear it was an easy fix, thanks for the video, boats are about having fun !

 

[sunbyrned]

When this happened to me the first time, I learned that you can sometimes (most of the time) spit those things out too without having to pull the pump everytime. For me, I throw it in reverse and it usually works right away. Others have other methods. I have found one thing that helps tremendously is to not have the engines running if you’re having to move about in the boat. That’s when it happens most to me since the boat isn’t pushing stuff out of the way. You’ll figure it out.