Dmcastino

The carpet in our 03 Elite was out of the boat for a minimum of 3 years straight, we put it back in last year and didn't have any issues with shrinkage or anything. If only our cover snapped on that easily!

Been a while since I actually posted anything here rather than just lurking, but I figured I'd give you guys the heads up on this deal. I've never personally used a Hyperflex wetsuit, but all the reviews I've read so far have been extremely positive and currently they are on the website www.theclymb.com which is one of those "deal of the day" type websites. Basically right now their wetsuits are on sale for $100-$120 and pull overs are $30 or less. My roommate and are both ordering one and thought I'd share! If you want one, act fast because they are only on the website for 2 more days from the time I am posting this.

You're friends should really have gone to the same school you did

I was afraid that would be the answer haha, thanks Kevin!

So I've really gotten into footing over the last summer and I figure its time to invest in a barefoot suit of my own. Of course, like all things boating related, they aren't cheap . So I'm wondering if any of you have experience with the barefoot shorts which are $70-$80 as opposed to $200-$300? I'm still young, hence my body is willing (I think) to take a little more abuse If it means saving 100 bucks, and I've actually done plenty of tumble ups on the boom in just a swimsuit and a life jacket and it didn't bother me, but I'm wanting to start learning tumble turns and long line deep water starts and I'm wondering if not having the full suit will make this more difficult due to having a life jacket on to catch on the water and what not.... Any thoughts? Thanks!

Killer deal on handles, definitely be ordering one, good looking out!

I'm not familiar with the Forefront either, but if it has some sort of riser on one side, say meant for regular footed riders, you could always just mount your bindings on the board backwards if you are goofy footed. Also, I share your opinion of Hyperlite, they warrantied my friend's bindings more than once (old BOA system left a lot to be desired in my opinion.) and his bindings were at least 2 years old

Some people only pull the plugs and drain the water, but others will run antifreeze through it for added insurance in case there is any water than managed to stay in the block after draining. This was my first year winterizing a boat and since its not even my boat, I went ahead and ran antifreeze through it, it wasn't difficult but it helped that the boat is a direct drive. I just pulled the water hose off of its thru-hull fitting and ran 4 gallons of RV antifreeze through it with the boat running and at its normal operating temp. Then I shut the boat off and checked behind the boat to make sure there was plenty of pink antifreeze on the ground that had come out of the exhaust. Not very time consuming really, only costs about 20 bucks in antifreeze and its definitely gonna help me sleep better at night.

Coping with winter should be cake in Utah! Come to indy where the only skiing is on little hills on snow thats is more suited to a pina colada than skiing, then you can ask how to cope with winter!

Woa, almost $900 bucks, thats nuts! I've never priced out heated storage, but I can't believe they can charge that just to keep your boat in a barn. I second enzo101mo's suggestion of finding family/friends with a place, or even making new friends with big garages haha. This year one of our club officers managed to get us indoor storage at her friend's parent's friend's place that is like 3 min from where we dock the boat, he's giving us the code to the garage so I can get in and tinker whenever necessary and all we have to do in terms of compensation is teach his kids how to wakeboard next spring

I don't have any advice for you on getting the boat inspected, but I can shed some light on the other question about getting used to driving an inboard. Yes, its 100% normal for an inboard to seem different/weird and have to get used to driving one if you are used to I/0s. My family lives on a lake and we have had a I/0 since before I was born and still own one today (couldn't talk them into an inboard back in 04 when we got the new boat ). But through the last few years, we usually end up on my friends' families' boats during (04 Malibu Response, 05 Avalanche, 06? Ski Nautique Team 196.... in other words, all inboards) the day because they are better for watersports and/or my bro is using our families boat. It definitely is a completely different feel and you definitely have to be conscious of what drivetrain setup is in the boat when you are docking the boat as inboards have very poor steering response at idle, and in reverse they will back up and turn to one direction and one direction only. They will most likely corner a little differently than you are used to as well due to the shape of the hull being different, however it wont be quite like driving a flat bottom direct drive, when I drive one of those I feel like they have almost zero "body roll" compared to the others. All in all, inboards can be a little more annoying to drive at low speeds, but personally its totally worth the trade off because they handle better at operating speeds and offer such a better wake for watersports. You will get used to it, no worries!

I might just go get a few more gallons of anti freeze and do the whole process over again haha. I REALLY don't want to screw this up... Yes, I do believe you can, I just drained it first to be thorough I suppose and then you know exactly when its antifreeze coming out and not water.

Well since the coolant made it through the exhaust, that means it hand to make it through the motor as well right? I'm just not to familiar with the cooling systems of boats and am not sure if the coolant will flow out the exhaust even if the thermostat isn't open with coolant going through the motor, like a bypass around the motor or something? As for the plugs, are you sure there are that many? I believe I remember seeing the Scorpion motor hand that many, but we just have a 350 mag tow sports or mpi or whatever. I looked pretty hard and only found 4 blue plugs

Well since its been calling for sub 30 temps for the next few days, we decided it was time to pull the IU team boat out of the water yesterday and since A. we had a trailer tire not holding air B. weather forecast was calling for 25 degree weather last night and we hadn't talked to any boat mechanics yet to get it winterized and C. we don't like wasting money, the elected me to go ahead and do the winterizing. I had done a lot of reading on it, and it seems simple enough, but this was my first time so I just want to run down the list of what I did with you guys to put my mind at ease since I'd rather not crack the block of a boat I don't even own Took the boat for the last spin of the season, I wakeboarded a little since I have a rule about taking the boat out for the season without taking a last ride . For the record, 42, intermittent sleet/snowish stuff, and 15+mph winds does not make for good boarding weather! Anyway, I put fuel stabilizer in the tank before we headed out so that it would mix around well and get run through the motor. Then we pulled the boat out of the water and with the motor still warm, I pulled out the 4 blue plugs I found and then two water hoses with quick disconnect things on either side of the block and drained all the water I could. Then I put them all back and removed the water hose from the thru-hull fitting and ran a long funnel down to into the hose. Next I turned the boat on and poured the antifreeze through the funnel and had someone watch exhaust for the AF coming out. We ran through I got about 2-2.5 gallons into the funnel and they said it started coming out of both exhaust pipes, so I added the last of the third bottle for good measure then quickly shut off the boat. We did other things too, but I'm mainly worried about the block cracking. So what do you guys think, should I be good? The boat had been out of the water for a bit so the engine had cooled off a bit, and obviously I couldn't watch the temp gauge while dumping antifreeze, so I'm not sure if the motor was fully at operating temp or not, should I be concerned about this even though I definitely had plenty of AF coming out both pipes? Also, what's everyone's opinion on whether or not I should drain the AF out of the block or leave it in? We were leaning towards leaving it in. I'm already glad I did this myself (assuming of course I don't cause any damage ) because I found the transmission cooler screen was pretty well blocked with a leaf, some gook, and several good sized pieces of an old impeller that apparently broke in the past and nobody bothered to track down what happened to the remains , hopefully this is why our trans oil was disappearing. Thanks again for the continued help everyone!

Nice vid Dura, some good riding! I had to go back and reread your post to see that the footage was from August, I was like "there is no way these guys are still trunkin it in Utah, the must be REALLY hardcore!"