We bought our 2002 Speedster last year, and have enjoyed it ever since. Haven't had any problems. Late last month, I took it to a shop for its annual. (I didn't use the shop the previous owner had; this shop I'd found was a lot closer for me.)
During the service, they separated the stator from the impeller and found this:
Yup, those are two of the tines from the HydroSurge grate, embedded into the stator blades.
(Mind you, at this point, I didn't know anything about the HydroSurge; I learned all of this afterward, while researching the problem and solution options. Seeing how much trouble there is with the HydroSurge, I thought you all would be interested in my story.)
According to the shop, these tines have been in there for quite some time -- far longer than I've owned it -- based on the corrosion on the broken grate:
As you'd imagine, the tines did some damage to the impeller, the wear ring, and the stator, seen here (note, some of the repair work, while I'll discuss next, has already begun in these photos):
(Impeller & wear ring damage)
(More impeller & wear ring damage)
(Stator damage, where a tine was embedded)
(Stator damage, where a tine was embedded)
Mind you, since we've owned it, we never noticed any change in performance -- it's always run well, as far as we knew. The shop believes the way the tines were embedded, they were just spinning around in there the whole time.
Naturally, the shop could have easily taken me for a ride -- for over $2500 in parts & repairs -- to replace the impeller, the wear ring, the stator, and all the related miscellaneous hardware. Instead, we talked and they gave me their honest opinion and recommendation (imagine that!!!) ... they said, as long as it's been performing well, which it obviously has been since we had no idea there was even a problem, then they'd go clean up the damaged areas (grinding/blending/smoothing the ragged edges) and put it back together. They said I could save even more if I replaced the grate myself, since it's an easy job.
I researched the parts, and thanks to all of you on this (and other) forum(s), I decided to get the stainless steel 11-tine grate. The rivers we boat in are very shallow in many areas, and who knows what debris might be lurking down there? I've received it in the mail, just haven't had a chance to install it yet.
I'm really excited to get it back out on the water, just to see if it performs / sounds / runs differently than before -- since we've only known it to run with the ingested tines.
So there you have it -- another victim of the HydroSurge! Boo!
P.S. ... since it's my first post, it's inevitable someone will ask for a pic of the boat, so, here she is:
