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New Steering Cable Won't Advance

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SkiDoc View Drop Down
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    Posted: December-01-2021 at 9:15pm
I successfully removed the old cable in my 2007 Ski Nautique. I had tied a rope to the old cable, and I pulled it through towards the helm. I attached the rope to the stern end of the new cable. I advanced the cable through the hole at the helm while a friend kept tension on the rope from the engine compartment. The cable got stuck somewhere between the hole at the bow and the engine compartment. I pushed and he pulled, but it didn't move. I pulled it back and it moved freely.Then I took a lot of slack in the cable while I was under the deck so I could rotate the cable (it's pretty stiff and has a natural curve that I thought could send it in the wrong direction). No luck. I pulled it out and tried again. I had placed duct tape over the coupling nut and the tape remained intact. I got my flexible fiber optic camera to see what was going on, but couldn't really see. Then the camera ran out of juice. Any suggestions? Thought about removing the in-floor cooler, but it looks tightly attached (glued?). I'm suspicious that the rope (<1/4" nylon) is in between 2 wires/cables just forward of the engine compartment, so it's found a "false" path, or a path only a small rope can use. So I thought about pulling a larger rope through and attaching it to the new cable. I'm really at a loss. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
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KENO View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote KENO Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-02-2021 at 8:01am
Juice up the camera and try again Wink

But anyway.........here's an old thread in the link below.

It deals with a 2002 steering cable, but that hull and yours aren't a whole lot different and you'll find a post from Fl Inboards talking about things like drilling a hole in the air box so you could use a hand to help guide the cable by the cooler and an inconveniently located zip tie.


All of the pictures are long gone, but maybe it'll help
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TRBenj View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TRBenj Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-02-2021 at 8:58am
Have done a ‘09. There’s no trick that I know of… but certainly a massive PITA (as many steering cables can be). Probably the worst I’ve done, there just isn’t much room to guide or see much. Definitely a 2-person job. No other advice other than to keep after it.
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Donald80SN View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Donald80SN Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-02-2021 at 1:08pm
It was many years ago that I did one on my 1980 SN.  I had the rope in the boat that remained when I pulled the old one out. Seems like, it tried one way and it was difficult so I went the opposite direction and it went much easier.  The whole time making sure I had something left behind to pull though. Basically, if you are working back to front try front to back. 

I
1980 Ski Nautique SOLD Back to Cypress Gardens
2002 Sport Nautique, GT-40, FCT2, Cover Sports, Tower Bimini, Inc., Wet Sounds Audio System, Star Gazer Wake Edition S.
1968 Ski Nautique, Project.
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Jonny Quest View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Jonny Quest Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-02-2021 at 5:23pm
Note to Correct Craft engineers and builders:

A cable / wire tunnel or tube would really be a nice touch...

JQ
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote SkiDoc Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-02-2021 at 9:32pm
Thanks to all for the suggestions above. We had success today!! I changed several variables, so I'm not sure which one did the trick. First, we juiced up the camera, but that never really helped. Next, we removed the new cable from the entry point in the floor in the bow where we left it yesterday. We attached 2 ropes to the aft end 1/4" guide rope and pulled them both into the bow using the 1/4" guide rope. I wanted a thicker/stronger rope to pull the cable towards the stern, and I wanted another "backup" rope in case the rope we pulled broke or the knot came untied (probably overkill, but it seemed like there were rough spots under the floor fraying the original 1/4" rope. Losing the guide rope would have been a disaster. Pulling 2 ropes into the bow was as easy as pulling 1, so why not have a little insurance?). With a backup rope in place, we felt much more confident to pull the cable more forcefully toward the stern. Yesterday, I had duct taped the coupling nut on the cable/rod junction to help "streamline" it to get through any narrow spots. Maybe there was too much duct tape, so I reduced it a lot. I reintroduced the rod and the cable into the hole in the floor of the bow (nearly impossible) and had my friend put tension on the (thicker) rope in the stern immediately in order to make sure that rod/cable continued pointing toward the stern (the cable has a natural bend that probably created a loop under the floorboards yesterday when we weren't as confident to apply lots of tension). He kept strong tension while I forced more and more cable into the hole in the floor in the bow. It passed through to the engine compartment first try. There's no sugarcoating this. It's a total PITA. Working under the bow in very tight spaces with small clearances and sharp edges causing bloody hands, arms, and forehead; hard flotation foam falling into eyes, ear canals, and mouth; forcing a stiff cable with a natural bend on a straight path blindly under the floor between the cooler and stringer where the throttle cable, bilge pump hose, and gate cable (?) travel. Really?? I don't want to get out my lane (I'm not a boat designer), but I hope there's a really good reason this cable couldn't have travelled through the gunnel or had some kind of conduit to travel through under the floorboards. Or maybe some give us some kind of access through the floor or cooler. Hopefully, the other cables, ducts, hoses and wires are still intact after this s**tshow. Get ready for cussing, gagging on hard flotation foam, bleeding, and a rotator cuff strain from holding your arm in an awkward position while shoving a stiff cable blindly into a tiny hole. Good luck! BTW, with all the grunting, cussing, "push harder," "I can't get it in the hole," and cries of "Yes, yes, YES!" when it finally passed through, the folks on the next dock over were getting pretty curiousWink I recommend starting this only with a good sense of humor and plenty of beers.
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TRBenj View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote TRBenj Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: December-03-2021 at 8:04am
Originally posted by Donald80SN Donald80SN wrote:

It was many years ago that I did one on my 1980 SN.  I had the rope in the boat that remained when I pulled the old one out. Seems like, it tried one way and it was difficult so I went the opposite direction and it went much easier.  The whole time making sure I had something left behind to pull though. Basically, if you are working back to front try front to back. 

I

Rotary cables are easiest by working the front end through the conduit (the ram doesn’t need to go through). Rack cables are the opposite- the ram is a PITA to feed but it’s a heck of a lot easier than feeding the rack through.

JQ, Cc has had conduit for the cable since the early 70’s at least. It’s about as large as they could manage with the other space constraints. It’s shared with the other mechanicals (harness, control cables, etc) which inevitably cause snags during replacement.
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