STRAINER

[larglo]

Hi all,

I'm beginning, with some of you all's help, to understand what may have caused my overheat problem. One of the causes may have been not having a raw water strainer between the sea cock valve and the oil trans cooler, what ever you call it, thing and right after that the raw water pump.

My question is,,,,,how many of you have such a RW strainer installed on your boats.

I will be checking lots of things this weekend to determine what may have caused the overheat problem and will start first checking to see if the oil cooler housing, where the oil cooling hoses go in the RW inlet hose, is stopped up. From there will go to the RW pump and check it. Looks to me like that's as far as my problem should go?

I have learned a lot about my boat with all of your help, just how things tick. The more I learn, the more confident I become and I think it may be worth while to keep my Trojan.

I think it's a good idea to install that RW strainer and will order one right away. along with a 145 deg stat to replace the 160 deg that was in it.

I also think installing a hose, or oil drain kit to make it easy to drain the oil, would be worth while. I have a few ideas on how to do that also. This will make the Trojan more enjoyable for me and my wife.

I sure thank all of you here on the forum that has helped and given your time to me. With my lack of knowledge and my health going South, it has made a big difference, I assure you.

Thanks,

Larry

[alexander38]

Larry start with the pump first and a 165 degree is fine for fresh water us guys in salt use 145's is due to salt hardening faster the hotter it gets. But if it was me start at the pump and follow the flow from there.

[Stripermann2]

Larry, let's start with flow first.

I had an overheat issue with my boat on plane and under load, when I first got her, with the starboard engine. Everything checked out...new rw pump, circulating pump, thermostat, etc.

I decided to pull the seacock off and low and behold, I find that the through-hull to the seacock was clogged with growth, shell barnicle, restriciting the opening to a mere 1/4"...you won't see this from underneath the boat. Dissasembly will show it. You can have water flow out the exhaust at idle and low speed but under a load (demand), there will be less volume of intake cooling water to be sufficient to keep the engine cool.

The oil cooler for the trans can be prone to clogging. Simply remove, inspect, clean or replace. How are the manifolds and risers? Are they hot enough that you can't lay your hand on them at idle? They should be warm but not HOT.

I believe in strainers. I have all, engines, generator and a/c.

[MattSC]

Larry,
Another option for draining your oil. I use the following oil drain pump, which extracts oil through the dipstick. It's very easy to use, works pretty quick once you warm the oil and no mess. It does get pretty close to all of my oil capacity. I change every 40 hrs and at the end of the year before haulout.

http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wcs/st ... sNum=10440

I also have a raw water strainer installed on my F-26.

[larglo]

First of all, the oil manual pump does look good, and will give it serious thought.

The oil cooler and the two tubes coming from it. I assume one tube is "in" and the other "out"? At first I assumed it was water that flowed through them,,,,but later thought, perhaps it's tranny oil? If it's oil, can I disconnect them without the oil flowing out of them?

My boat hasn't been out of the water since I bought it 21 months ago. I don't have a trailer. I never thought of the sea cock having an over growth that may be clogging it up, but that just may be the case. Is there a way I can check it while still in the water? Could I thread a pipe into the valve long enough to not allow water not to enter the boat, and then stick a rod down to clear it out.
Would it be safe to open the valve just long enough to check water flow? My bilge pumps works great!

My son will be helping me this weekend to check all of this, and may go to West Marine first to get the strainer and new water hose.

I want to thank you all again, for your help.

Larry

[captainmaniac]

Make sure you can open and close the seacock easily before you pull your hose from it (just incase you have to shut it in a hurry)!!! As for oil drain kits, the one posted by MattSC is what I use, but there is another one I have seen that is a 'permanent' mounting that you screw in to the oil pan drain plug that is more effective than the vacuum pumps ... will see if I can find it anywhere and post the link.

The drain plug setup will get more oil out of the system without having to bend or work as hard, and eliminates one (small) challenge with the vacuum systems re fishing the hose down the dipstick tube without it just curling up on you and sucking air instead of oil.

[Stripermann2]

Larry, I've pulled the seacock valve out while in the water. Water will flow in, but not at a gushing rate. You will be able to tell how clean the opening is once yopu've unscrewed the valve. You can then scrape and rod out the opening, then screw the valve back on (with some silicone sealant).

Get yourself some wooden dowel plugs at WM. They come is assorted sizes. You can stem the flow if necessary by inserting a wooden plug into the throuh-hull... no worries.

[captainmaniac]

Here's the closest I can find to what I was referring to. There are probably a few different places that make these things, and there are different models based on engine model, year, and/or size. http://www.hardin-marine.com/p-13338-e- ... hread.aspx

You have to drain the oil before you first start using this sytem, as you install this by pulling your drain plug and screw the bottom end of this hose in to the oil pan drain hole instead.

The idea is this : The upper end of the hose gets capped off, and you would strap or tie it to something higher in the engine area (so it is not sitting in the bilge). When you want to change oil in the future, you take the cap off the end of the hose, hook up a vacuum pump to it, and let it suck away. Guaranteed you are sucking from the bottom of the pan, so you will get that much more oil out plus a bunch of the crud from the bottom of the pan that a normal dipstick tube-type extraction pump will miss. When extraction is complete, disconnect the vacuum pump and put the cap back on the end of the hose (and then pull / replace your filter and refill the engine oil of course!).

The ones I saw a while back did not use flex hose like this - they actually had molded / shaped metal (aluminum perhaps) tubes much like a dipstick tube, but it still attached via the pan drain plug hole.

[captainmaniac]

Actually just found this too ... http://www.iboats.com/Jabsco-Permanent- ... w_id.38803

A bit more money, but possibly more pump friendly than systems designed to let you just drop the hose out a bilge drain hole...

[aweimer]

First of all, the oil manual pump does look good, and will give it serious thought.

I have this one. Works like a charm, for the lazy guy that wants to have the 12V do the work. Warm the engine up, then drop this in, takes about 5min to suck it dry (7 quarts for me). Super easy.

http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wcs/st ... sNum=10440

One container holds both engines and the genny for me. One trip to the oil shop to empty it.

[foofer b]

LARGLO,

I HAVE THE PERMANENTLY MOUNTED DRAIN HOSE CAPTAINMANIAC refers to. It makes oil changes are a breeze. I have a clip on the intake manifold that holds the capped end of the hose out of the bilge, the other end screws to the drain pan under the engine I attach a small pump that is driven by an cordless drill, which has a drain hose that pumps the old oil right into a jug , ready to be recycled. Takes three minutes.

[gjrylands]

The vanes on the impeller will break off over time and will need to be replaced. The impeller may have been replaced, but the pieces will end up in the trans oil cooler and can restrict the flow of water. You should check your cooler to see if it is being blocked.
You can use a wet/dry vacuum to suck the pieces out of the hose if the cooler is in a spot that is hard to get to.
You can also check the hose on the suction side of the pump. If it is worn out, or not the proper hose, it can collapse, restricting the flow, while the boat is under load and the pump is trying to pump the maximum flow of water.

[randyp]

Larry, I think you're on the right track about the strainer being fouled. Since you're in fresh water you may not have an issue with barnacles, but you MAY have an issue with zebra mussels. These little buggers were brought into the Great Lakes in bilge water on large ships, and have fouled many a boat's and utility's water intakes. They can be spread around by trailer boats coming out of these waters (if they don't wash of the boat's bottom before relaunch). As for tstat, my raw water cooled F-26 is on a fresh water lake and it hardly ever gets over 120 F. It's worked find for over 33 years on the same lake. Raw water cooling will run cooler that fresh water cooling. The manual suction pump for oil changes works fine, just be sure the oil is warm enough before you start pumping. You may not get it all out, but you'll get enough to make the change effective.

[mr elevman]

a friend at ower marina had a very badly worn impeller and a dammaged trans coller . the impeller was 3 years old and the trans cooler was 8 years old and never clened or had the small pencle zinc changed when he splashed this year he forgot to open his seacock witch cased the impeller to disinagrate and compleatly clog the front of the tranz cooler when he realised what he did he opened the seacock and to my serprise still pulled water and wound up exploading the front end of the trans cooler witch wouldnt have made the season anyway due to the insides of the cooler witch was so eatten away from the salt water and sand it mite have leaked internaly and mixed salt water with the tranz fluid i have strainers and just the amounf of sand thats picked up not to mention the grass mud plastic ect

[larglo]

I can't thank you all enough for all your comments and suggestions. We went out to the boat yesterday and took off the hose on the bottom of the raw pump and then at the tran cooler, the front of the cooler was full of impeller blade pieces. We then removed the pump and removed the rear housing and the impeller was in shreds. Then headed for West Marine and got a new impeller, water hose, anti-freeze, and ordered a strainer. The 145 deg stat was a smaller diameter, so will get one on line some place. I may even try Auto Zone?

We found the drain plugs under the rear exhaust manifolds, but when removed, not water came out,,,,dry.
Found much smaller brass plugs on each side towards the front of the engine, and when removed, water came out for 5 to seconds. Could not find any plugs in the rear of the engine, which I thought was odd, as that is where water would be with the engine slanted as it is?

That evening, I found an older thread, in which, I think "ready123" in describing an earlier post about where the plugs were located, that, that was right where they were and indeed there were no rear plugs.
So we felt confident we had all our bases covered.

I think in winterizing the engine, I will leave it disassembled until spring and just pour anti-freeze into the stat opening, turn the engine over a few times to make sure the anti-freeze gets through the system and let it go at that. Then, this spring re-assemble it all and install the strainer.
I will also leave the bilge heater installed and on, as a back up. I paid a small fortune for that thing last year so will definitely use it.

Any suggestions on this would be helpful too.

Thanks,

Larry