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View Full Version : My LSV has automatic, automatic ballast!



Razzman
04-28-2008, 11:05 AM
So we took her out yesterday on the maiden voyage and everything went smooth with the exception of a few things, the biggest being the rear ballast bags will fill themselves! :shock:

I noticed it felt a bit sluggish coming on plane so i was looking around and low and behold the starboard bag was full and the port as half full! Checked the switches and they were all off!

Drained them, made sure switches were off and continued on our way. To make a long story short it did it twice more! And to make matters worse the bags will not drain all the way! :x

The cooler leaked water all over the carpet, water was coming out from around the fitting, not the clamp. The bilge pump never came on yet when i hit the switch it drained for almost five minutes! Back to the dealer i guess! :x :(

Miller_Time
04-28-2008, 11:36 AM
sorry to hear about the less than perfect maiden voyage. But the automatic automatic ballast is an easy fix. The problem is more than likely the solenoid bypass switches are in the wrong position. Under your v-drive cover under the rear seat there is a plastic cover. Underneath that cover is your v-drive unit and right on top of that should be your ballast manifold with the 3 solenoids. there will be a small black lever on each switch, these will manually open the solenoids allowing water in. You need to close the switches to allow the solenoids to work again. This will stop the bags from filling on their own, and only fill when you want them too. I cant remember which direction the switches need to be, but your owners manual will tell you which position to put them in.

Also as for the bags not emptying all the way. This happens on our lsv too, your getting some air into the empty pumps and they loose their prime. Usually to completely drain our bags, we have to pick up the end of the bag and sometimes put a little pressure on the bag to force all the water down to the pump. Kind of a pain but we only do this at the end of the day before we put her up for the night so its not too bad.

As far as the cooler I haven't used ours yet, but I know the drain line is supposed to go a hole down to the bilge and I had noticed ours wasn't in the hole, so I fished it down into the hole. Might wanna double check and make sure that hose is down into the bilge.

Also havent had to use the bilge pump on ours yet so I'm no help there. But I'm sure your dealer will get you taken care of right away, SC always stands behind their products!

Razzman
04-28-2008, 11:46 AM
Thanks i'll check that out! I didn't figure it's any big deal. I was too tired last night to really check it out after putting the boat up. I'm sure the dealer will fix whatever's wrong, they are pretty cool.

cab13367
04-29-2008, 12:24 AM
So we took her out yesterday on the maiden voyage and everything went smooth with the exception of a few things, the biggest being the rear ballast bags will fill themselves! :shock:

I noticed it felt a bit sluggish coming on plane so i was looking around and low and behold the starboard bag was full and the port as half full! Checked the switches and they were all off!

Drained them, made sure switches were off and continued on our way. To make a long story short it did it twice more! And to make matters worse the bags will not drain all the way! :x

The cooler leaked water all over the carpet, water was coming out from around the fitting, not the clamp. The bilge pump never came on yet when i hit the switch it drained for almost five minutes! Back to the dealer i guess! :x :(
Razz,

Miller time took care of your auto filling ballast question. I'll address your cooler leakage issue. Same exact thing happened to me. I'll try to explain this in words but it might not come across. The drain fitting is "L" shaped and the bottom of the "L" sits on the carpet. The problem is, the vertical part of the "L" is too long so no matter how tight you tighten the plastic nut underneath, it doesn't press the flange of the drain fitting against the rubber washer between it and the cooler hard enough to form a watertight seal because again, the bottom of the "L" is resting on the carpet. So you have to find a thicker rubber washer. That's what I did, plus I put some silicone sealant on the rubber washer for good measure, and that did the trick.

Hope that makes sense.

Al

Razzman
04-29-2008, 10:04 AM
Cab that makes perfect sense and i kind of suspected something like that. I looked under and saw movement and water seeping out around the fitting. I'll do as you did and that should fix it, thanks.