Need input of owners smarter than me....

[stbentoak]

2015 QCW fixed tower boat 200 HP 4cyl Yamaha. Overall been a great boat!

#1 Where we boat on a river it is very weedy/shallow late in the year. Prop gets wrapped almost every time out as we cross shallow sections to get to deep sections. Should I trim up to go thru weedy areas? Go faster or slower? Or live with it and do the best we can?

#2 Along with the above, my intakes for the impeller cooling water get plugged about 40% of the time and the motor beeps for about 30-60 sec while I reverse and try to wash the ports clean. Does this beeping hurt anything? Reversing seems to clear it well enough, and it never actually stops "peeing" But a constant worry when we sometime are far from port. Anything I can do with the intakes to make the less susceptible to plugging?

#3 Lastly, I have a Garmin basic "Fish" depth finder that does work well but would like to have a "Simrad" type of unit that I could plot a course on and then stick to it relatively closely.. especially for night boating. I realize I may not get this built into the dashboard, but has anyone done an arm mount one and how hard is it to install? Any unit/arm combo that anyone would recommend? Would this have to be Dealer installed? Thanks for all responses and insight!

 

[Jack M]

In the areas that we have that are simiular to what you are dealing with, I trim up and go slower . I'm sure others have different opinions .
My question is how often do you change your impeller ?.
There are several ,members here that have mounted an additional Simrad or Garmin , on a Ram Mount or simiular . You should be able to do that yourself.

 

[DVW]

#1 For weeds trim up and go slow except when you put it into reverse to clear the prop.

#2 Yamaha intakes are kind of fine and get plugged with the a certain type of weed and time of the year. I have thought about cleaning intakes with a brush on a stick but then the season passes. My previous Honda was less sensitive to intake plugging but then the pee hole would plug. I have had to listen to the beeping for up to a minute without further problem. Yamahas are kind of idiot proof unless you are a complete idiot. You are smart to keep an eye on the peeing.

#3 I replaced my basic Garmin fish finder with a same size Garmin lake map GPS/fish finder. The screen is kind of small but big enough as long as I do not split the screen for both functions.

 

[Diver5855]

How I did mine railblaza

 

[GarySWI]

2015 QCW fixed tower boat 200 HP 4cyl Yamaha. Overall been a great boat!

#1 Where we boat on a river it is very weedy/shallow late in the year. Prop gets wrapped almost every time out as we cross shallow sections to get to deep sections. Should I trim up to go thru weedy areas? Go faster or slower? Or live with it and do the best we can?

#2 Along with the above, my intakes for the impeller cooling water get plugged about 40% of the time and the motor beeps for about 30-60 sec while I reverse and try to wash the ports clean. Does this beeping hurt anything? Reversing seems to clear it well enough, and it never actually stops "peeing" But a constant worry when we sometime are far from port. Anything I can do with the intakes to make the less susceptible to plugging?

#3 Lastly, I have a Garmin basic "Fish" depth finder that does work well but would like to have a "Simrad" type of unit that I could plot a course on and then stick to it relatively closely.. especially for night boating. I realize I may not get this built into the dashboard, but has anyone done an arm mount one and how hard is it to install? Any unit/arm combo that anyone would recommend? Would this have to be Dealer installed? Thanks for all responses and insight!

We live on a canal that connects to our lake. The canal is a dead end and we're the third house from the south end.

The city weed cuts in the canal every week but the problem we have is the duckweed that forms a carpet.



I have a Yamaha motor and can confirm that the intake screen has very narrow openings. My old boat an my neighbor had Mercury motors and never had a problem. I would love to find some intake screens with slightly bigger openings. I've even thought of buying a 3D printer to make my own.

I use an extendable painters pole with a stiff brush on the end. After every outing I immediately clean the intake openings. You do NOT want to let the junk harden in the intake screens. It is much harder to remove if that happens.

When I go out I trim the motor up until I'm in deeper water.

I have had the high temperature alarm go off a couple of times. I clear the weeds, reverse and proceed.

I've recently engaged with the city, who maintains the canal. I don't have much confidence that they will address the issue.

The attached photo is from this week...a particularly bad day. I and my neighbor do run water aerators and it helps a little.