1980 HydroStream Vamp resto-mod

Yeah its kinda crazy. Each cylinder has its own wire from trigger to switch, then switch to coil, then then coil to ground. The each switch has its own power, ground, kill, and jumper.

My other motor has like 7 wires total in it.

 

USPS has found my starter motor! Says out for delivery today. So might get this thing running tonight and installed on sunday.

 

New starter is in, everything is all wired up. Once I get off work I will pull the motor out a bit so I can try to fire it up!




Put all the cowling on also, I still need to strip the mercury name plate on the front of the motor and paint that soon. Once I get the motor onto the boat, then I will do the work on getting the lower unit and mid section all cleaned up and painted.

 

No go on starting it last night. I decided to be safe and wait till its on the boat, the stand the motor is on is pretty sketchy for the weight of this motor and the last thing I need is for it to tip when it finally does start.

Today I have a concert, so tomorrow I am going to pull the boat out and swap the motors.

 

Finally getting this new motor on this weekend. I ordered some lift rings for the motors so I can lift them off with my gantry crane now and not have to bear hug it off the back. The lift rings thread into the top of flywheel and give you a nice place to hang it from. I got 2 rings so I can hang both motors from the crane while I swap them.

I also have another project I need to get done though. My daughters dance team has their big parade on the 7th, my truck is the lead, 2 coaches will be riding in the bed and I need to setup the sound system to be a little cleaner. I ended up ordering a new speaker system, its a JBL partybox 320. It will eventually go into the boat for beach parties, but for now I need to make a pole mount for the bed rails of the truck that lifts the speaker up out of the way of the coaches. Then I need to mount a pair of seats into the bed, Im not going to put the seats all the way up to the header rail, but rather they will be mounted right around where the wheel wells are so the coaches are not too far away from the dancers.

 

The trailer wheels almost match your truck. LOL

 

So we are still in the non-running stage. Something is goofy in the new motor side harness and I need to call CDI to get to the bottom of it.
I get no spark still, so I swapped the switch boxes, still no spark. I disconnected the kill wires (orange) and I get spark. Seeing as thats odd since both harnesses are new, I test the wires. I get a continuity with ground one of the 3 wires, but not the other 2. Seems odd since all 3 of those wires branch off the same orange in the boat side harness.

But carb kits will be here on Wednesday, so I should be able to get the carbs taken care of then.

 

Late night soldering tonight. I decided to swap out the keyed switch for the one that came in my other control box (need to do it anyways when I put in that new box). When I pulled the old control box down, I checked the orange kill switch wires again, they all read 1.2 volts with the key on.
So new keyed switch has been soldered in, just need to paint some liquid electrical tape onto the terminals. But I tested voltage again, now I am at 1.9 volts on the orange wires with key on, and ground with key off.
So I am thinking that the old keyed switch was faulty, I just never knew because the old motor didnt use the orange wire as a kill, it used a white wire (that the new motor does not use).

 

Carbs all cleaned out now, man those were crusty in there! The bowls were full of rust, dirt, and white corrosion from the last owner using ethanol fuel.

So, just need to install them, and sync them.

Also got a new starting battery, A bigger grp 27 to replace the grp 24 thats in there now.

 

No work done on the boat this weekend, its been crazy, my kids were in a shooting at the park, so have not had much time to anything really. I took next week off to clear my head, hoping to get the boat running in those days and spend some peaceful time out on the water.

 

Hey, hope you get rid of the anxiety if you have some at this time. I read your posts on this topic in other threads, and I think something like that would shake me up pretty good, so I hope you are doing okay. There is really no emoji for a situation like this, but I'll give you one anyway.

 

My wife and daughter seem to be the most affected right now. Someone let out a firecracker last night and my daughter could not get into the house and hide in her room fast enough. My wife is just not sleeping and is very fearful of the park. We are having the kids meet with school counselors this week when they go in, the school has a on staff "crisis team" that deal with this kind of things, and they will be on site for the first 2 weeks or so if anyone needs to talk. My son seems ok, him and his friend were not there, but sped off to the park on their scooters to find the girls when they heard the shots. I always told him in a dangerous situation, me and him are the protection for the girls. No questions asked, we get between the threat and the girls.
My son will be going to the school counselors with the neighbors daughter. She wants to talk to them, but she wants my son with her when she goes.

I am working with some of the other neighbors along with police, fire and some of the local businesses to have a "take our park back" block party. Just get all the neighborhoods that use the park to come in and show that this is our park. I think this would make all the kids feel a little safer being able to see all the adults that are there for them.

 

Damn...

Sorry you, family & community have to go through this.

 

Wow. Your son is being raised right. I like the part where your son will go to the counselor with the neighbor daughter. I really like that.

 

It finally runs! The brand new stator that I had installed was faulty, I was able to hack together the old one, it will run with it, but it wont charge the battery. So another new stator is on its way and should be here monday. Hoping to get this thing on the water later in the week.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/b0kFm8j_Wnc

 

Got the new throttle/shift control installed, this version didnt have a trim switch built in like my other one, so I just surface mounted on next to it. Long ago they made a trim switch that fit to this handle, but they are hard to find in good working condition.

This control was in pretty good shape, but it needed the neutral detent roller and the high idle lever. Luckily those are available new and pretty cheap.
I also used the front accessory plug on the control to run power to my gauges. Before I had them spliced into the harness inside the control. This just makes it easier to work with if I need to disconnect it all.

I put the prop on the motor to prep for taking the boat out later this week with my dad. Turns out the last owner lost a couple parts for the prop when they took it off for storage, so for now I have the prop from my 85hp on there. Not ideal, but it will work for now until I can get the replacement parts.

 

New stator is in, and the motor fired right up! So we are good to hit the water now (again). I put all the cowling back on, now I just need to vacuum up all the dust and sand and stuff thats in the boat.

The rub rail that I order last month finally shipped the other day, so that should be here on thursday for me to put on. Hoping to get a few more good weekends out of the boat before it starts getting too cold. Im going to try to keep taking it out till we have ice, but the motors cold weather starting is going to be the big limiter.... wont know that till I try starting it in cold weather.

 

Rub rail is on and all nice.

Now I just need to figure out a new prop. I have 3 props in various stages of shit... The best of the 3 is the one that came with the motor, but its missing a single washer that I need.
Found a decent deal on a 13 inch 19p prop on Amazon, comes with the washers I need (they are pictured, so hopefully they come with). So I ordered that prop, going to run the old 13 inch 19p prop with the new washer kit until I know everything is working right.
Prop is ordered, should be here saturday. Perfect timing for taking the boat out on sunday with my dad.
I do want to do the water pump and lower unit oil saturday also, so I will have my dad come around then and we can get those taken care of quick.

(My parents is in town for a week, so we are cramming family and boat time in as much as we can)


Also going to order a tach to replace my speedometer. My fish finder has a speedometer on it, and I would really like to know what my engine rpm is at while towing the tubes.