Starting Issue - Carb

Good Morning.

I am looking for some assistance or confirmation of a potential issue with my carburetor. I will also edit this post with the exact carburetor information once I get home tonight.

Symptoms:
The issue that I am having is that my motor will not start after it has sat through the week waiting for the weekend. At the beginning of the season when I started the boat this way I figured this was just an issue of the boat having sat for an extended period of time over the winter. The boat was stored during the winter/early spring (February) with a full tank of fuel and Sea Foam Fuel additive.
I have been through two tanks of fuel in this boat so far this year.

I have had to use a small shot of starting fluid into the air breather of the carburetor routinely every weekend we've been out. We normally arrive at the lake on Friday night and once this initial shot of starting fluid is used on Friday night it is not needed the rest of the weekend. The engine runs strong and does not sputter at anytime.

It doesn't help the fact that I am new to this but I don't believe this should be a continuous issue with having to start the boat this way every time the boat sits throughout the week.

Could the carburetor be losing its prime? As in the fuel evaporates or flows back to the tank throughout the drive back home (90 minutes)?

Thank you for all your assistance!!!

Nabes

Nick, what boat and engine do you have?

Like Brian said, after that first start that's a problem, I'm assuming the next day you still have to pump the throttle a few times for a cold start, right? And it starts fine?

I have the 1986 Ski Nautique with the 351W motor in it. I haven't had time to run by the storage unit tonight to get more information on the carburetor.

The interesting thing about it is that once the engine fires off on Friday night I don't have any issues with it starting the next morning. I will get some more information and see if the things you guys have suggested help me out.

Thanks again for the help. I also understand the fact that the starting fluid is not a permanent fix and shouldn't be routinely used.

Nabes

63 Skier wrote: Nick, what boat and engine do you have? Like Brian said, after that first start that's a problem, I'm assuming the next day you still have to pump the throttle a few times for a cold start, right? And it starts fine?

When you are at the boat, with the engine off, look into the carb while you pump the throttle and see if you have gas squirting from the accelerator pumps.

In order of my guess at likely hood

Does your choke work?   It should be closed when you get to the boat, then open slowly after you turn on the ignition... you should be able to see this by removing the spark arrestor.

You should also check the clear tube coming from your fuel pump for the presence of gas.. if you have some then you have a fuel pump issue.

Sometimes you can confuse a no gas issue with a too much gas issue... if you have dripped a lot of gas into the manifold over the course of the week then it wouldnt start either. If this was the case cranking it over with the throttle held fully open (be ready to close it should it catch) would be an indication that you need to adjust floats or change/clean needle/seat assemblies

I have often had this problem on boats with plugged or badly adjusted (heavily lean) idle circuits. I havent really thought through why but if the carb is idling off the transfer slots and not the idle circuit it can be very hard to start after some down time. Fix to this would be a rebuild and proper adjustment.