School me on pwc

wikdsvt

wikdsvt

Club Member
I am looking at New PWC. I'd like to stay under $12k I have a 2 place trailer for my 2004 GTI, but I don't know if it is large enough for the newer PWC's.

Iwant a 3 seater, No Turbo, NO Supercharger, 4 stroke PWC! Mainly because of the maintenance of rebuliding the supercharger/turbo after 20 hours

I'm considering the Kawa 12 or 15. What else should I be looking at and why?
I'm leery about seadoo's.
What about Yamaha's?
My understanding is Honda no longer makes Jet skis.

Also, I would like 2 keys. One beginner key and one all out key.


I will use it 80% on inland lakes. I would like to take it to lake St. clair (maybe) one weekend or up north a week each summer.


(Yes I know PWC are sold out in Michigan, but 2021 will be in stores in 2 weeks)
 
wikdsvt said:
I am looking at New PWC. I'd like to stay under $12k I have a 2 place trailer for my 2004 GTI, but I don't know if it is large enough for the newer PWC's.

Iwant a 3 seater, No Turbo, NO Supercharger, 4 stroke PWC! Mainly because of the maintenance of rebuliding the supercharger/turbo after 20 hours

I'm considering the Kawa 12 or 15. What else should I be looking at and why?
I'm leery about seadoo's.
What about Yamaha's?
My understanding is Honda no longer makes Jet skis.

Also, I would like 2 keys. One beginner key and one all out key.


I will use it 80% on inland lakes. I would like to take it to lake St. clair (maybe) one weekend or up north a week each summer.


(Yes I know PWC are sold out in Michigan, but 2021 will be in stores in 2 weeks)
Click to expand...


How fast are you looking to go? If top speed isn't a need then the older 2 strokes are good. I just sold my 2001 Yamaha XL800. It was a 35-40 MPH ski. The older hulls that are 2-3 seaters are much smaller than the newer hulls. Also, there is a big difference in manufactures as far as how wet of a ride you will have depending on hull/bow design. Yamaha has Powervalves (similar to Seadoo with the Rotax) and can be problematic if it is gummed up/sticking. This basically keeps the exhaust tuned to keep it in the right powerband. Lastly, how much work do you plan to do on the ski yourself/what level of repair are you comfortable with? Some skis have Nikasil coated cylinders so a simple top-end rebuild can be expensive it the head needs the cylinder lining recoated.

With that all said, I have always enjoyed Kawasaki for all my toys. I have 2 standups that are 750 2-strokes, kawi is very simple to work on.
 
Sold out?!!!!! Hmm it seams everyone on the lake this year for got to read the watercraft law book also . It’s nuts this year
 
... Save your money ...BUY USED for your starter machine ...HUGE DEPRECIATION the second you tow it away from the dealer
 
derbydad276 said:
... Save your money ...BUY USED for your starter machine ...HUGE DEPRECIATION the second you tow it away from the dealer
Click to expand...

Don't buy used right now. Prices are crazy. People are getting 200% + what they had them listed at last year (and didn't sell).
 
1BADAIR said:
Sold out?!!!!! Hmm it seams everyone on the lake this year for got to read the watercraft law book also . It’s nuts this year
Click to expand...

The next person I have cut in front of me instead of behind when they clearly don't have the right of way I'm going to throttle up vs down and send a flare at their ass! Lol
 
wikdsvt said:
I am looking at New PWC. I'd like to stay under $12k I have a 2 place trailer for my 2004 GTI, but I don't know if it is large enough for the newer PWC's.

Iwant a 3 seater, No Turbo, NO Supercharger, 4 stroke PWC! Mainly because of the maintenance of rebuliding the supercharger/turbo after 20 hours

I'm considering the Kawa 12 or 15. What else should I be looking at and why?
I'm leery about seadoo's.
What about Yamaha's?
My understanding is Honda no longer makes Jet skis.

Also, I would like 2 keys. One beginner key and one all out key.


I will use it 80% on inland lakes. I would like to take it to lake St. clair (maybe) one weekend or up north a week each summer.


(Yes I know PWC are sold out in Michigan, but 2021 will be in stores in 2 weeks)
Click to expand...


There are plenty to choose from and really it all depends on what you find comfortable in speed and ride. I would not let a super charged machine steer me away, if you have ever ridden one they are incredibly quick. I'm not sure where you are getting the 20 hr rebuild from either, seadoo is 100 hrs or more depending on the year produced and the main concern in the rebuild is swapping out the bearings which with some mechanical know how i'm sure you could tackle. I am a Kawasaki stand up guy, I have more than i would like to admit and have ridden many machines. If I were to buy a sit down it would be a sea doo hands down. In our area dee's marine is the best and is who I would be talking to.
 
mustangjoe87 said:
There are plenty to choose from and really it all depends on what you find comfortable in speed and ride. I would not let a super charged machine steer me away, if you have ever ridden one they are incredibly quick. I'm not sure where you are getting the 20 hr rebuild from either, seadoo is 100 hrs or more depending on the year produced and the main concern in the rebuild is swapping out the bearings which with some mechanical know how i'm sure you could tackle. I am a Kawasaki stand up guy, I have more than i would like to admit and have ridden many machines. If I were to buy a sit down it would be a sea doo hands down. In our area dee's marine is the best and is who I would be talking to.
Click to expand...
I meant 200 hrs..
 
We have always had Yamaha and SeaDoo. We currently have a 3-Seater SeaDoo GTX 1500 and a 3-Seater Yamaha 1100. Both are 4-Strokes. We don’t ride them every weekend as we keep them up north, but both currently have around 100 hours on them. The Yamaha goes 49 mph and the SeaDoo goes 58. They are very reliable and we’ve never had to do anything to them. Compared to older 2-Strokes, they use far less gas and you don’t have to worry about always filling them with 2-cycle oil. A friend of ours is up with us this weekend with his fairly new supercharged SeaDoo and it is definitely quick. It comes out of the hole fast and pulls to around 71 mph with ease... with the additional speed comes more fuel. We put 6 hours on them today with a lot of full throttle riding. Both were full of fuel when we started. I used a tank and a half of fuel on my NA SeaDoo compared to his nearly 3 tanks.
 
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I guess the biggest question is what you want out of it. If your looking for the most speed out of a non supercharged ski, and not worried about the features/options I'd say the Kawa STX 160 is a no brainer. Best price/performance out there. The downside of that ski is it's gonna have manual reverse and no trim. There's always rumors of kawa pulling out of PWC's too. So parts/warranty could be an issue in the future. If you don't care about either of those I'd go for that ski hands down.

If you want trim and electronic reverse/neutral I'd look at the Yamaha GP1800R HO. It'll probably put you right at your 12k budget though. The kawa should be around 10kish I think.

If you want to do spins and jumps I'd go for the Sea Doo Spark.
 
My opinion is this. Smaller ski’s are way more fun, older sea doo’s like the XP’s, gsx’s the rxdi’s are a total blast to ride and most are going to be in excelent shape at even $2000 with a trailer. The rxdi gets a little more expensive than that, but $3500 has you on a real nice low hour one. Yamaha’s to me are more reliable, but also boring to ride. It all depends on what you wanna do. For a first ski, I would go with a older 110hp 787 ski and call it a day for a little bit. Jet skis aren’t for everyone, and even the cheapest of the new ones is going to have a huge impact on your bank account, especially if you decide you don’t actually enjoy it like you were thinking you would.

Right now is not the time to buy one tho, and I hope the market comes back down to reality soon.
 
In the 12k range I'd be thinking about a 10 year old jet boat. Mostly because when you get to larger ski the only difference is you get more wet.
 
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