FAE downtube gone

While boating over the weekend, I lost the Y-pipe (downtube). I have a feeling on know why. When I installed the FAE system, I could only get one of the outer hose clamps on each side to overlap the 90 deg elbows coming off the exhaust outlets. My exhaust outlets must be farther apart than others or the elbows were not long enough. Anyway, the tube is gone and now I don't know if I should be running the boat without it. I am worried that there are no exhaust flappers on the boat anymore that water could get up into the engine (especially in reverse) and cause some damage.

Any thoughts??

Here are some pictures of after the install but before I lost the Y-pipe. Only the outer hose clamp on each side made contact with the elbow coming out of the exhaust openings.

ok to run the boat without exhaust "flappers".. your exhaust manifolds are full of water and hot gases while running (even in reverse) will keep water from going all the way up and through the manifolds into the block.. i would also contact FAE and let them know of their inherent design flaw for fitting your application.. that piece that jettison itself probably floats, might go look for it.. good luck!

just dont run the shower if your boat has one. you will hydrolock it after some time of running the shower... trust me, I KNOW!!

i would not run without flappers. If you need to temporarily, rig up some flappers of some sort, or install new ones before you run the boat.

Mine fit together almost perfect, I was also able to just U-clamp it to the platform brackets so I know mine is not going anywhere. They can probably send you out a new one pretty quick, just measure the distance between existing elbows and they can fab one up at the right size for you.

This was the first weekend I tried mine out. VERY IMPRESSED! Not for the C02, but for the noise reduction. Can hardly tell the boat is on.

I think I hear the blower more than the motor now...

I had the same issue this weekend as it was my first time out with the FAE, lucky for the bracket on the swim platform or mine would have been on the bottom of the lake. Ours is going to need some modifications to fit properly.

The sleeve that mounts the FAE to my exhaust pipe did come undone on mine after using it for two straight days and not re-tightening everything in between. I have a SAN though so the down pipe stayed attached to the boat. I am going to add another hose clamp and re-tighten everything and I think I will be good. I did like the noise reduction and cleaner air while surfing. I went behind my buddies Tige 21V without it and felt like I was choking on fumes the whole time. My suggestion is to check your hose clamps after each and every day and you should be good.

Thanks for the post. I have had mine out a couple of times but after reading this, I think I will recheck my install. I wonder if this is just a flaw with MC install design fits?

I just got off the phone with Dr. Mann from Boatpipes.com. He is going to make it right - great guy.

We (he and I) think it is because I have an L-18 engine in my X30 and the distance between the exhaust openings may be larger than that on the MCX and RTP engines.

The unfortunate thing is that the downtube is the only uniform or standard part on the FAE. Depending on exhaust opening distance, the elbows are varied from 5" to 7", according to Dr. Mann.