UPDATE, BACK ON THE WATER AFTER A LONG BATTLE
The guys at GML Motorsports located in Bakersfield, Ca. do not shy away from boat repairs of any year make or model.
If anything, they welcome the challenge, with Years of combined experience in all aspects of the automotive and marine field they were able to diagnose and resolve my issue where as two other supposed “specialty boat repair” shops FAILED.
Jesus and Lance at GML have grown the Motorsports Garage to work on all sorts, jet ski, boat (any size), two stroke or four stroke, motor cycle, compressors, tractors, diesels, well you name it.
So, my 2000 Bayliner with 7.4 MPI, MEFI3, BRAVO set up started surging one day. I like any other gear head dove into as many forum as I could, read everything I could get my digital hands on, tested, NO CODES at all not even one, swapped out everything, no luck, finally took the GML for the win.
They were able to trouble shoot multiple things, the heads valve guides were shot out, not detected by the leak down test and compression was decent, not great with 300 hrs on it but decent enough to be ruled out.
After head were off decided cylinders looked a little more scuffed than I would have liked apparently the previous two owners never kept up on the maint which made a lot of sense once I pulled manifolds, etc.
Had engine rebuilt to .030 over, using waaay better internals than stock materials, better rods, pistons, lifters and a mild cam upgrade. Lance himself took care of this service in house.
Once back together they found I had bad new replacement injectors, had original ones serviced and swapped back in offending units, which led to finding injector driver was shorted out and shooting fuel into engine as soon as key was on.
Maic Salazar Diagnostics was able to repair circuit on Mefi3 ECU, Bob at OBD Diagnostics was able to reflash with an upgraded tune, so with it up and running the mystery, no code throwing surging was gone. Time for a sea trial, ran great for approx 45 min then it pulled power, felt like limp mode, but fortunately the guys at GML were on the water with me that day and were able to diagnose. Apparently the “marine grade” plug wires were failing, the spark was burning through the boot, arching on the manifold causing the engine to pull timing. GML recommended MSD solid core wires, cut to length wires and the high temp boots, once installed second sea trial went as planned. 2 hrs on the water rowing through the rpm band at various levels, cool down and restart cycle, top end and bottom end with load cycles, winner winner chicken dinner.
I am sure I am leaving plenty out as this dynamic duo went the extra mile to fix this 30 foot express cabin cruiser where two other supposedly pro boat shops failed. If you need it done and done right the first time take it to them, I could have save myself a bundle had I done so the first time around not to mention the down time.
