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2275 RL W/ YAMAHA 150 4 STROKE PROP PROBLEMS

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wannabe captain

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Hi, Im Barry and I just signed up for this Forum. I've owned boats of various types since I was 16 years old, never very mechanically gifted, but able to spot problems fairly easy. Just not good at solving them. I just purchased my first Bennington tritoon model # 2275 RL a couple days ago. A elderly couple had just trailered the boat after hitting an object messing the aluminum prop up pretty good. I was at the ramp looking at another bennington when I heard them say they were going to sell it ASAP They purchased boat motor and trailer new in mid 2008, and to my surprise it only had 22 hours on it and in mint condition, other than the prop. The motor being a 2008 model as well is a Yamaha 150 Four Stroke, fuel injected. Since the prop was beat up so bad, I didn't even take it for a spin before i bought it. The couple were not the boating kind, and just wanted to dump it. After getting the financial part of it completed, I brought it home to clean the toons and get a new prop before my maiden voyage.

First problem getting the toons cleaned. They said only left the boat in a slip for a couple months, but "MY GOSH" I put aluminum bright and after setting for a short time washed it off with my power washer and if didn't seem to faze it. Called a local marina and told me about Super Chief AB-50 and tried that spraying it from a gallon sprayer mixing from a few ounces as they suggested up to 50/50 mixture. The stronger worked better and all the algae and funk is off for the most part, but stains in some areas just aint budged. The man told me that I bought it from he had found some product called "SHARK SKIN" and applied it last year,

Second problem came from getting a aluminum 15" prop from a prop shop to use till he could fix the two damaged ones that came with the boat. When I installed the prop and launched the boat it was cavatating at all speeds, I had family with me so I babied it around till we got ready to come in for the day. When it would hold, top speed was about 23 mph at WOT and 6 grand on tach.

Today, the man who runs the prop shop locally, ends up being a neighbor of mine and he took my old one to the shop after Church, and straightened it best he could and brought back to me this afternoon.

Put the repaired prop on, loaded up more family that came in to try the new ride out and finally it held and got up to about 33 mph at 6g's with trimming a bit, and i mean very little bit. Prop would still cavatate some but im sure the right style and pitch in stainless steel would help solve that problem. Im hoping some of you have had similar situations and know the best type prop and pitch for tubing, skiing and site seeing.

Third problem (I Think), the motor is mounted in the next to last hole in transom for its lowest position. Im hoping some of you that know a whole lot more than me can tell me if lowering to its lowest position on the transom will allow me to trim the motor some and maybe help on performance. The couple told me the boat would run in the low 40's WOT, with 6 people and a couple of kids. I hope that the right prop and lowering motor may help with th e performance.

Last problem, so far since I've had it two days now. Trailering boat this afternoon, my spotter who was trying to make sure boat was between guides and on straight, miss judged and pontoon on the driver side ended up on the top of the guide and bent the metal rail and busted the guide board screws out. "I HOPE YALL ARE STILL WITH ME HERE AND NOT LAUGHING YOUR BUTTS OFF AT ME" I STILL NEED SOME HELP HERE. LOL.

The inside guides were spaced about four inches from the inner pontoon, and im thinking they need to be closer, if not touching while the boat is on the trailer.

Sorry for the novel here, but im a simple minded guy and just went through the chain of events on my newest pleasure craft.

Any and all help and suggestions will be greatly appreciated;

THANKS

BARRY
 
I have to ask...

Are you sure you're cavitating and not ventilating?
 
Hi wannabe, wow, where to begin. If the pontoons are stained, you will want to acid etch them and then polish and apply shark HIDE. Do a search on here and you will find several posts relating to that. Now, lets adress prop concerns, cavitation and ventilation are often misunderstood. Cavitation does not happen on pontoons, ventilation does when the prop is not far enough in the water, allowing air to be sucked in just above the prop. So looking at your motor when trimmed down, your cavitation plate shoud be a few inches under water. So moving your motor down may be the fix for that. You won't see much benefit with a stainless prop, just a lighter wallet. Talk to the old owner, see which prop gave them the best performance, get another to match that one. My guide bunks are about 3" from the toon in front, and 1-2" at the rear, to guide the nose on. I think if you get them too close you may ding your toons. I hope some of this helps, and if all else fails, talk to the guys at your local marina, they do this all the time ;)
 
It doesn't sound like the prior owner would be much help.

Also, you CAN cavitate in a pontoon boat if the circumstances line up correctly; since cavitation is really only a situation where the blades spin at a speed that allows the pressure behind the blades to drop too much. Props with too little diameter are a big cause.
 
Ahh yes Eric, you are right, i forgot the "generally" in my statement. Since the original owner stated 40mph and Barry is running a 15" prop, i didn't think cavitation was a likely suspect. :)
 
The problem here is that there are sometimes multiple factors that can make tracing the root cause difficult.

If the original prop is pretty badly beat up it opens the question of whether the mechanical linkage from motor to prop is still sound.

More likely though, at least in terms of an outright guess; the prop itself is to blame. If the edges have been thinned (knife edged) by contact with sand, or if the blades have been chewed down, you could get cavitation in a situation you usually wouldn't.

Understand, I'm neither a mechanic nor a hydraulic engineer. I'm simply basing this on what I've seen and heard.
 
ericscher said:
I have to ask...

Are you sure you're cavitating and not ventilating?
Click to expand...
Im really not sure of the difference between the two, but now that you said that, it must be ventilating. Thanks for the correction and any help solving the issue would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Barry
 
Geoffrey & Brenda said:
Hi wannabe, wow, where to begin. If the pontoons are stained, you will want to acid etch them and then polish and apply shark HIDE. Do a search on here and you will find several posts relating to that. Now, lets adress prop concerns, cavitation and ventilation are often misunderstood. Cavitation does not happen on pontoons, ventilation does when the prop is not far enough in the water, allowing air to be sucked in just above the prop. So looking at your motor when trimmed down, your cavitation plate shoud be a few inches under water. So moving your motor down may be the fix for that. You won't see much benefit with a stainless prop, just a lighter wallet. Talk to the old owner, see which prop gave them the best performance, get another to match that one. My guide bunks are about 3" from the toon in front, and 1-2" at the rear, to guide the nose on. I think if you get them too close you may ding your toons. I hope some of this helps, and if all else fails, talk to the guys at your local marina, they do this all the time ;)
Click to expand...
Thanks for the response! I will do a search, as you suggested to get the stains off. I really don't know what is the proper way to describe the prop issue. The prop I tried first, was the one my neighbor, who owns a prop shop had and I tried it while he repaired the one that came on the boat. This was a 15 pitch and the only one he had in stock that would work on my motor. it would just rev up the rpm's and the motor would not push the boat much at all, when i hammered the throttle. When I gradually pushed the throttle down it would not rev up as bad and would push the boat better. Even at about half throttle it would do the same rev without pushing when I tried to open it up. All the time the motor was completely down with no trim. Any time I tried to trim, same thing happened. Just rev up and no speed.

Sunday, when the prop was repaired that came on the boat and reinstalled, it would take the throttle being hammered down to WOT, but would still rev up without pushing the boat when I tried to trim. I could never trim enough that the trim gauge would ever show anything but down. The gauge seems to be working properly and moves up when trailering the boat. The original prop does not have a stamp marking the pitch size, but the prop man said its a 15.

I am wondering if a higher pitch would help, and if you can trim a pontoon much. Mine does have the lifting strakes, if that makes a difference.

I will adjust my guides as you mentioned and see if that will help, as soon as I can get it straightened back out.

Thanks

Barry
 
ericscher said:
The problem here is that there are sometimes multiple factors that can make tracing the root cause difficult.

If the original prop is pretty badly beat up it opens the question of whether the mechanical linkage from motor to prop is still sound.

More likely though, at least in terms of an outright guess; the prop itself is to blame. If the edges have been thinned (knife edged) by contact with sand, or if the blades have been chewed down, you could get cavitation in a situation you usually wouldn't.

Understand, I'm neither a mechanic nor a hydraulic engineer. I'm simply basing this on what I've seen and heard.
Click to expand...
The prop guy got the original one pretty straight, but it is fairly sharp around the edges. He is not a pontoon guy, most of his business is fishermen. He thinks a stainless would help, he just doesn't have the experience with pontoon's to know what to suggest. I would like to know what brand and size pitch that works best for this boat and motor.

Thanks;

Barry
 
wannabe captain said:
Im really not sure of the difference between the two, but now that you said that, it must be ventilating. Thanks for the correction and any help solving the issue would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Barry
Click to expand...
It could be either one. Ventilation is when it sucks air down from the surface.

Cavitation is where the low pressure area behind the blades reaches a point where the water can boil at ambient temperature.

I'll stop by the marina today and see what they usually suggest for the 150hp Yamaha on a 22 footer.
 
We have the same same pontoon it sounds like. The dealer we bought ours from installed a 14.5 x 17 when it was new. I personally thought it performed fine after some prop damage and vibration we switched to a yamaha 14.5 x 15 stainless cant believe the difference . To my suprise the 17 should have never been on that motor.Good Luck hope this was some help.
 
After having so many problems with the performance issues of the motor, which I assumed all along was the prop and motor location on the transom, I called

Bennington Tuesday. After voicing all my concerns, I asked them while looking at the motor in the shop, what the transom height on the boat was. Gave them model # and serial # and told them of the three pontoons and lifting strakes. The answer to my surprise was 25". Measured the motor, which is a Yamaha 150 4 Stroke Fuel Injected, and as expected 20" shaft. I called Bennington back later and talked to another person just to confirm that the transom height was 25", and the other person verified that. Called Yamaha and doubled checked the shaft length and was told 20". Since I bought the boat used I called the couple I bought the boat from and made sure that they bought the boat rigged with the motor, and was told they did. They were as shocked as I was when I informed them of the problem. They said they had complained of the handling and the performance of the boat to the dealer and the dealer came out and checked it over. The surprise to me is that when the dealer ran the boat with them it registered 42 mph at 5900 rpm, and backed it up with a gps at 37 mph. This information was documented on a check sheet and given to the owners. They also complained of the steering and was told that was just the way hydraulic steering works.

The motor when trimmed completely down, puts up a rooster tail just like it would be if trimmed up. The steering of the boat is like the motor is trimmed up, the way the boat handles. When turning the boat at higher speeds the prop seems to ventilate. It also does this when you hammer the throttle from a slow speed. It doesn't seem logical that anyone in the boating business could miss all this when they were testing the boat on the water with the owners.

I called the dealer the boat was purchased from and explained the situation. I was as polite as could be and also explained that I was certain it was an honest mistake on their part. The response was their was no way that boat has a 25" transom and they have been dong this for a long time and know what they are doing. They also told me that they test drive every boat they sell and they would not make such a mistake. I asked them to verify what I said, and too call me back after they call Bennington.

AS of now, I have not heard back from them. Im going to call this afternoon if I haven't heard back from them.

The couple I bought the boat from are not to blame, they are as nice and I think honest as can be. I told them I called the dealer and what was going on to this point, and they informed me that they would do anything they could to help get the situation resolved.

I think that the dealer should offer to trade motors, and think it would only be fair to charge me the difference of a 2008, which is on the boat with 24 hours, for a new motor with a 25" shaft. I don't know the price difference of the two motors new, but I think that would be the right thing to do.

Any idea's how to get this problem taken care of will be greatly appreciated!!!!

Thanks

Barry
 
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I apologize for never getting to the marina, but it sounds like a moot point.

I don't think you'll be real happy at the cost of a motor swap unless they do it at no cost to you.

If it was me, I think I would look at two possibilities:

1) Modifying the transom, or;

2) Buying a jack plate with sufficient range. Manual jack plates are much less expensive than hydraulic ones. Either way, they allow a range of adjustments beyond what a transom does and are intended to let you set the motor at an optimal height.
 
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Sounds like all the documentation and paperwork are in place and the previous owners are on board with helping, Sounds like if they keep on denying any wrong doing that a court case would be in order if the previous owners would be willing to go along with it.

And someone corret me if I am wrong but it would not even entail a complete engine swap, just change the extension housing and shaft between the engine and lower unit from 20" to 25" unit.
 
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Wild and Free said:
Sounds like all the documentation and paperwork are in place and the previous owners are on board with helping, Sounds like if they keep on denying any wrong doing that a court case would be in order if the previous owners would be willing to go along with it.
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The only downside to this thinking is that it won't help much in the short run. A suit like this will take 2 yrs at min. to see mediation. Documentation from Bennington stating the serial # and same from Yamaha presented to dealership may be your only option before seeking counsel. That is, if the dealership will accept responsibility.
 
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