Ice and jet motors

[muskie24/7]

Hey Red, Will the ice floating on the rivers cause the Jet motors to clog? I was thinking the boat would push the ice to the sides and things would be OK! But I'm new to this and not perfectly sure. I won't go out if the ice is big enough to damage my boat! I busted my other boat the other day using it as a ice breaker at the boat launch. I ended up with a busted boat and no fishing anyways! sucked to be me that day...LOL:o

Thanks...Brian

[Red Childress]

It depends on how you are busting the ice as far as clogging the jet intake. The 2 areas I usually bust out has ice ranging from .5 to 2 acres worth of ice........when I am cutting slabs with my old outboard jet-boat, the ice will gather along the transom as I drive through it becasue there is nowhere else for it to go. That scenario will disrupt the intake flow and drive the RPM's way up with little water going through the pump. You can use your net to haul out the big chunks of ice or just keep 'putting' along until you get to open water.

Sometimes the ice is so thick that you will actually drive the bow of the boat onto the ice. That is when your spud bar will come in handy so you can either 1) push the boat off the ice 2) have your buddy keep the throttle open and chisel while he drives you 3) I have stood on the very tip of the bow and jumped up and down to break it.

The last time I broke ice, I started planing my boat on "half plane" to create the largest wake possible while driving right beside the ice I wanted broken.......the wake served as a mini-tsunami and broke the ice in large pieces. Then I just pushed the large pieces out to the current. On cold days with highs in the single digits, you have to move quickly before it re-freezes.

How did you manage to bust your boat up on the ice??? Actually poking holes in the hull or what??


I bet my new inboard jet would work beautifully because it weighs 2x more than my outboard jets do and the intake is located at the bottom of the hull therefore reducing the amount of "transom ice" that would block my intake.

[muskie24/7]

Hey Red, I'm talking about when I'm running the boat with floating ice everywhere! will the jet suck the ice in and clog it up? I'll get into the other boat story later! I don't want to start the day off in a bad mood from telling a story about how dumb I was!!! ...LOL

Brian:o

[Red Childress]

I have hit chunks the size of a flattened bath tub and the boat goes right over them......the keel seems to push them down enough and the intake goes right over them. It does not take much force to sink them since it is just water floating on water.

[Jasm2]

Slush is more of a pain then leaves/ice imo. With leaves you can usually just shut the motor down and they will drop off of the boot. Slush sticks to the bottom of the boot like a sno-cone!