Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Well I have been having some problems with my boat and the other day with a POS mechanic trying to scam me. you can read about the mechanic here

http://forums.iboats.com/showthread.php?p=2850615#post2850615

Basically I had a mechanic straight up try to rob me the other day when I brought my boat there.


The boat has been running great the past couple days. Then yes I took it out and it ran great for about 4 hours then after going through a very long no wake zone it started acting up again. Backfiring, not wanting to go over 3 or 35000 RPMs, just over all running like crap.


I get back to the dock and check the fuel water sep and its about 80% water and 20% fuel in there. I have already changed this thing 2 times in the past 3 months (since I bought the boat) and have never saw 1 drop of water in it. I have been changing it because there was a little bit of debris in there and I just wanted to get it out.

The boat is at a little less than 1/4 tank right now. I have never gotten it this low. I usually keep it at 3/4 to full .



Could this much water show up in the filter from me letting the tank get down to 1/4? Is it possible for the water to have not gotten into the filter till now either because the tank is low or because of some other reason?

If not then I bet the scam artist mechanic put it in there. I hope not because if this has been in there the whole time then this is most likely my problem.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Oh my, time to drain the tank and pressure test it for leaks, hopefully just a problem with your vent or filler cap and not a bad tank, I don't think it would matter if 1/4 or 1/2 or whatever because the water is heavier and seperates to the bottom as you can see in your jar.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Gas is lighter that water, so if water is in the tank it will be at the bottom of it.

The fuel tank has a pick up tube so it is drawn from the bottom of the tank, or else you would run out of gas with a half tank.

So if water was in the tank, it would be drawn out first before the gas got to it, (provided the tank was level).

Check your deck fill cap and the hose connecting it from under the gunwale. My hose clamp was loose and water around my deck fill was leaking thru the fiberglass and stainless deck fill into the hose filling my tank with H2O.

Could also be entering from the tank vent on the side of the hull. They sell inline check valves for the vent so water can't enter the tank thru it.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

So you guys are saying that its not all in the filter now because I ran it down to 1/4 tank? It had to be introduced into the tank recently?

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Yes sir, there should be zero water in the tank. It is getting in there and the fun is to find out where.

You can siphon the remaining water out of the tank until you get clean gas. Disconnect the inlet line to the water separator and into a pail until its clean gas. Don't have to empty the tank because at some point it will be straight gas.

Then have to look where it is entering the tank from.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

The amount of water in the tank has nothing to do with how full of gas it is. The water sinks to the bottom and back of the tank, just like in your picture of gas in the jar.
All you have to do is raise the bow of the boat so the aft end of the tank is lower than the front, remove the pickup tube in the tank, use a cheap electric fuel pump with a hose and a small diamter copper tube hooked up to go into the tank and pickup the water out of the bottom of the tank.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Sorta, the fuel pickup tube may not go completely to the bottom so 1/2" of water would have to accumilate before it reached the tube, so now you have enough water in the tank that the tube is beginning to draw it up.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Deleted

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

check the sep again for any water using a clean glass container, then stick a straw into the bottom liquid and taste it.Any salt would mean the tank vent may be the culprit.picking up salt spray.no salt, it`s either rain water or city water

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

I don't know the mechanic or your situation, so I would look for possible entry points before accusing him of doin it.

The fuel tank vent hose should be routed from the vent on the side of the hull, then up, as high as possible without kinking the hose under the gunwale then down to the tank. This will help prevent water from going backwards into the tank.

The deck fill has a o-ring inside the cap, if it is broken water can travel down it. When you wash the boat down or from rain.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

LAC_STS said:

Ok but this is my problem

My new engine has been running like crap intermittently. Yes it ran great for 4 hours then after going through a very long no wake zone it ran like crap backfiring and chugging over 3K RPM.

Click to expand...

LAC_STS said:

Since I picked the boat up from the guy it did run great the 4-5 miles back to my dock and it ran great the first 4 hours of yes trip before starting acting up again.

Click to expand...

Sounds like it's doing the exact same thing it did before you took it to him. You think he may have snuck the water in there before he knew you would be bringing it to him?

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Im really hoping that it was in there because that would probably be why it has been running like crap sometimes.

I was just thinking it might have been him because I have checked the filter three or four times over the past month and never found a single drop of water in it.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

I doubt he put it there.
not smart enough.
however if your using E fuels your gas is now junk as its super saturated with water and phase seperating meaning the crap thats trying to burn is way low on octane.
dont belive it?
grab your vodka bottle,preferably schmirnoff silver label,pour out exactly 2 Oz.
carefully mark the bottle,pour back in exactly 2 Oz of water, now check your marks.
back n the 70's this is how I found out that water molecules are smaller than ethanol and bind to them.
its also how I found out my dad was marking the bottle as well
was a nice science disscusion between belt licks.
its also how my buddy about that time found out about phase seperation.
do it to many times with the liquor bottle and the water all of a sudden forms a seperation line at the bottom and is now a dead giveaway.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

Not sure I comprehended that Rodbolt, what I'm thinking is he said it acts up when navigating a large no wake zone, I'm thinking during these times is when the water settles and gets drawn up the dip tube, at other times when fuel is being sloshed around the waterous mix burns ok mystery solved?

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

What I was swung is that it ran great until after I tried going again after putting around the no wake zone.

When it runs like crap it will run good when under about 1500 rpm. But over that it starts backfiring and stuff. So I only noticed it was running bad again after I left the no wake zone when I tried to get up on plane.

I'm about to go to the boat and pump all that out and put fresh gas in it.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

like I said, if its already in the carb it may idle or run ok at low speeds,low fuel need.
but with watery debris covering the main jets or in the secondary metering rod well it will run lean when you need more fuel.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

It's very simple, dissassemble and clean the carb, flush the fuel lines and fuel pump, clean the water out of the tank and put on a new filter. Then run it and see how it works.

Re: Mysterious water found it fuel? Might be so happy its there!

try the vodka post, see how much the marks change.
then keep doing it 2Oz at a time until it phase seperates.
then figgure how much this 1 fith of a gallon could hold and figgure how much 2 gallons of pure ethanol can hold.
20 gallons at 10 percent means 2 gallons of pure ethanol.the vodka is about 40% by volume.
this 2 gallons of ethanol sitting in the tank vented directly to the atmosphere will simply suck moisture out of the air 24/7 until it supersaturates itself and phase seperates.
it can be rapid,sudden and lead to several gallons of brown watery crap on the tank bottom.
the molecular attraction of water means when the dip tube hits a puddle of it it will suck that entire puddle.
back in the 70's I thought that simply carefully measuring the amout of vodka removed and replacing it with a carefully measure same amount of water would work.
that science lesson was painful but long remembered.