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Hi All-
I've got a 1986 (I believe) Suzuki DT200- The motor has been absolutely fantastic for so many years, but I think she's on her last leg. I've brought her back from the brink of death several times and I'm hoping to pull off one last miracle. Here's the situation:
On our last trip out, she was under a lot of pressure- pretty fully loaded boat, in the Gulf of Mexico, pushing pretty hard. I was running about 3 to 3.5k RPM .. Motor started bogging down, and when I came off plane, she konked out. I was not able to get her restarted. I used the trolling motor to get back to the boat ramp. Once out of the water, I emptied the water separator, siphoned off a bunch of fuel in case there was water in the tank. I replaced the plugs and checked oil levels. I did all the easy stuff I could do while I was not at home (this was while on vacation at the Gulf).
When I put her back in, the motor cranked right up and actually sounded pretty good. I went for a short test run .. all sounded good, so I throttled up and got on plane. When I came off plane, I would hear a knocking / banging sound coming from inside the motor. Definitely not good. Motor also did not want to idle at all .. it felt as if one of the cylinders was dead.
I was able to idle for about 4 miles to get from our condo to the boat ramp (twice) .. and like I said .. at Idle, she really just wanted to quit. Motor sounded very weak at idle, but sounded healthy at 1500 RPM.
Now I'm home, and I've pulled the cylinder heads. The heads look great, the tops of the pistons look great. They all appear to move appropriately as I spin the flywheel by hand, but I can obviously only see the tops of the pistons.
My next step was going to be to pull the cylinders (which, I guess on this motor are detachable from the engine block). I would do this so I could check the push rods and the rest of the internals. I guess my question is, should I do this .. is it possible to remove the cylinders without removing the entire powerhead? It looks like there are a couple bolts on the bottom of the cylinders that will be difficult or impossible to access without removing the whole powerhead .. but I'm not sure.
Is there anyone with meaningful experience doing powerhead work on an old DT200 that would be willing to work with me on this?
Thanks!
Chris
I've got a 1986 (I believe) Suzuki DT200- The motor has been absolutely fantastic for so many years, but I think she's on her last leg. I've brought her back from the brink of death several times and I'm hoping to pull off one last miracle. Here's the situation:
On our last trip out, she was under a lot of pressure- pretty fully loaded boat, in the Gulf of Mexico, pushing pretty hard. I was running about 3 to 3.5k RPM .. Motor started bogging down, and when I came off plane, she konked out. I was not able to get her restarted. I used the trolling motor to get back to the boat ramp. Once out of the water, I emptied the water separator, siphoned off a bunch of fuel in case there was water in the tank. I replaced the plugs and checked oil levels. I did all the easy stuff I could do while I was not at home (this was while on vacation at the Gulf).
When I put her back in, the motor cranked right up and actually sounded pretty good. I went for a short test run .. all sounded good, so I throttled up and got on plane. When I came off plane, I would hear a knocking / banging sound coming from inside the motor. Definitely not good. Motor also did not want to idle at all .. it felt as if one of the cylinders was dead.
I was able to idle for about 4 miles to get from our condo to the boat ramp (twice) .. and like I said .. at Idle, she really just wanted to quit. Motor sounded very weak at idle, but sounded healthy at 1500 RPM.
Now I'm home, and I've pulled the cylinder heads. The heads look great, the tops of the pistons look great. They all appear to move appropriately as I spin the flywheel by hand, but I can obviously only see the tops of the pistons.
My next step was going to be to pull the cylinders (which, I guess on this motor are detachable from the engine block). I would do this so I could check the push rods and the rest of the internals. I guess my question is, should I do this .. is it possible to remove the cylinders without removing the entire powerhead? It looks like there are a couple bolts on the bottom of the cylinders that will be difficult or impossible to access without removing the whole powerhead .. but I'm not sure.
Is there anyone with meaningful experience doing powerhead work on an old DT200 that would be willing to work with me on this?
Thanks!
Chris