BigDaddy74,
Keep a close eye on this after you have the water separator replaced. On my 2020 22SRX, we had this happen twice with under 50 hours of use in the engine. The first time was in 2020, dealer replaced the engine water filter and the carbon EPA filter under port side bunks. Engine ran great. In 2021, same issue again and water in the EPA separator. This time after consulting Bennington and another mechanic at their main marina, they relocated the EPA exhaust that exhaust under the deck of tri-toon. The location initially was sucking up water into the EPA canister. They relocated the exhaust about eight inches over that is protected by the shielding. Bennington is aware of the issue. With 15 hours of ops this should not be happening with you Bennington.
Word of caution in jumping to conclusions. Your issue might not be the same as the OP’s. Most Bennington’s do not have this problem, so it is more of an outlier on their overall lineup.
For the OP, it might be a faulty part issue. Might be a dealership rigging issue. Might be something similar to yours with EPA canister placement, etc. Currently we don’t know what caused the OP’s issue - nor does the OP.
For instance, in year 2 on our 2017 24’ SSBXP SPS 200 Mercury Verado Pro, we had a fuel-water seperator alarm go off and motor went into limp safety mode: almost identical to what the OP described. Happened 4th of July fireworks night while on the lake for fireworks…full boatload of friends and family. Bad timing!!!
Dockside the next day I realized that where/how it was rigged, my fuel line and seperator was inaccessible without removing the entire bracket (should be able to almost plug and play on our Mercury design). Further, it seemed like the electronic sensor wires from the fuel/water sensor were “pulling” back hard on the sensor. Rigged/wired WAY too tight. So tight that the tension had dislodged the sensor causing a gap for water to get into it.
Got it into dealership. The dealership looked it over and basically appologized. They totally agreed with what the problem was, and said that was not a Bennington problem (which was my assumption up to that point as an inexperienced boat owner). They openly said it was them rigging it poorly when it arrived. May apologies followed…
Thus, the dealership had rigged it poorly, and the way they rigged it caused the failure.
As a result, they re-rigged the line, sensor bracket and sensor, and replaced my fuel/water sensor & filter.
It had nothing to do with Bennington, boat construction, EPA canister, Mercury or the filter part(s) itself. Once corrected, no problems since. I think we would need to hear back from OP after it is taken care of and inspected to really know the underlying cause.
but is right on point for this diagnosis.