[SFA]

While I have significant Yamaha motorcycle experience, I'm a newbie on these PWC’s. I purchased a 1996 1100 Yamaha Wave Venture this week to ride at our beach house in Jupiter, FL.

Day one was interesting – getting out through the Indian river inlet around to the beach seemed pretty treacherous – but determination got me there. After about 30 minutes I had enough comfort to start jumping the waves etc…. it was an absolute blast – every bit as much fun as I thought it would be!

Day two, the rough water the inlet exit was still a little scary but not as much as day one. The ocean was still rough on the beach side so there was a lot of wave jumping etc. As you would imagine a bunch of water rolled over the front end at various times.

After about an hour of this type of riding – the front end started doing something really weird….. It started to handle as if the whole front end was full of water! Not knowing what was going on I beached it and looked all around for the problem but did not find anything – no accumulation of water anywhere?? After a few minutes on the beach I took it out again to see if the problem was repeated….. it was for a few minutes but then seemed to just go away. To describe this problem in a little more detail – in rough water the front end wanted to dive rather that top the waves, and it became very difficult to steer. It also seemed to loose power at the same time too. In calm water it just doesn’t have as much power and does not turn as well.

This was repeated twice while at the beach yesterday. Finally with the ocean getting rougher by the minute, I decided to ride it back into the inlet. With the problem gone temporarily I rode without any problems in the inlet and inter-costal calm waters for another half hour. At one point I went up to where the river meets the ocean and was capsized. It was upside down for about 5 minutes – but fired right back up when righted (thank God!).

However the problem with the front end reappeared a few minutes later in calm water. I rode it for another hour until it ran out of gas, trying to get a better understanding of what was going on. The problem did not go away this time.

Can anyone explain what may be causing the problem that makes the front end want to dive, slowing down the PWC, and diminishing the maneuverability? I'm a little concerned about bringing it around to the beach side again with this problem. It would be damn near impossible to ride it through the inlet with this problem, and it would not be an easy feat to get it out of the water if I get stuck on the beach side.

Thank you in advance for any experience you can share.

 

[bpann1]

You need to inspect your jet nozzle and the cable attachments that go to it, it sounds like you are havin trouble because something is broke. do you have trim control on that boat I can't recall. If not on of the two bolts that hold the nozzle may be gone or lose or your nozzle is cracked. check it out and let me know:thumbsup:

 

[SFA]

I think I figured it out…..

I think I figured it out….. There is a shroud that comes down over the nozzle as shown in the pic below that I have deducted is the reversing mechanism. This shroud seems like it was getting lodged in either the down position or half down position. There was a piece of wire there as an attempt to keep it in the up position, and the lever for reverse has a cable that goes back to this shroud which as been disconnected (I think it is a missing some linking pieces to tie the cable to the shroud too). I tried reverse the first day and it didn’t work, but I didn’t care much….. didn’t seem like it be much fun riding in reverse anyways…

To me it seems like if this reversing shroud was even partly down at higher speeds in the forward direction – the PWC would act as if it wanted to dive, or the front end were full of water.

I called around to some of the area Yamaha shops and the best anyone could do to look at it was a week, (some said they couldn’t even look at it for 3 weeks!) We are only on vacation for another week so I’m going to try to fix it myself later today.

Before I start messing around with it - I’d love to get confirmation that this is in fact the reverse mechanism – and that it is OK to disable or disassemble it.

Thanks again for your comments.

Paul Fisher
Finishing Talk

 

[bpann1]

yep there is your problem your reverse gate is not properly connected to the cabling system. Yes just disassemble it and remove it it will not affect you at all.

That is what you do until you can either replce the cable or inspect furthr on the shift lever.:appl:undoo the bolts that hold it on and undo the linkage. The linkage can be removed by sliding the collar back, it has a collar spring, and pulling it up off the rotater ball.

 

[bpann1]

there should be only the two bolts right and left then the cable collar

 

[bpann1]

there might be two more hiding for the pivot of the gate maybe maybe not just take it all off

 

[SFA]

Thanks for your speedy response Bpann - You Rock! Headed to the garage now to do my first "Mod"

 

[bpann1]

Cool Cool:appl: