Closed cooling and water pump life..

[Ryan23]

I had a water pump fail on one of our motors at our last disaster of an outing. It's a Magnaflow cam driven pump with a 8 vane rubber impeller. I can't help but wonder if airing the boat out so much caused a water starvation problem? I'm wondering if repeatedly sucking air could have caused a premature failure of the pump? I know the impellers were replaced about 2 years ago. Upon disassembly, all eight vanes were shredded off. I found 5 1/2 of them :( .

Going to a closed cooling system would at least keep the engine side of things kosher, regardless of conditions. Are the seawater pumps in CC apps a little more durable? I'm going to fuel injection anyway, so there is another reason for me to consider a closed system.

Ryan

[Sofa King]

I just went through the same thing. All 8 vanes were missing. Replace the housing as well iffin there r any traces of wear (not completely smooth inside) and backflush a couple of times. Hopefully no pieces are stuck in the Tstat.

Sofa King

[gcarter]

Ryan, this is what I did w/ my Minx engine.
I, for one, love closed cooling. There are a LOT of people here who disagree with me.
Notice first the Johnson crank driven sea water pump is extremely easy to service. Then notice the Meziere( http://www.meziere.com/2005_catalog/16.pdf ) electric coolant circulating pump and utilizing the SM crossover. The electric pump only draws 11-12 amps at 55 GPM....that's right, 55 GPM!! Also you never get a temperature spike when you slow down like you do with a belt driven pump. Belts...oh yeah, I lost one going this route. In fact if I could find the bracketry to orient the alternator and PS pump in the same plane, I could get by with only one belt. Neat huh?

http://www.donzi.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=20477&d=1146928687

[BigGrizzly]

I also swear by closed cooling systems, all my boats have them. I don't have the electric pump, but that is a good idea. On the 502 the raw water intake is 1 1/4 inch and with the blower pully I can't use the crank drive. However on my Corsican it is a crank drive. as to the circulating pump i have never had to replace one yet. No durability for the raw water pump it will remain the same with either raw warer or closed colling. one way to extend the lifr is to prime the pump befoe starting the engine. trailer boats can easily with a garden hose. in the water boats ceank wcoil wire off.

[Ryan23]

George -
Slick looking setup! Do the Johnson pumps use a rubber or bronze impeller? For the price of admission (~$130?) maybe I ought to replace my cam driven pumps with crank driven ones. Did you have to fab the bracket or did it come with it? The rebuild kits for my Neovane pumps are ~ $150ish.

Ryan

[mrfixxall]

Ryan,stick with the magniflo,the first one i put on lasted 15 years with changing the impeller every year..(option i do) besides youll have to plug the hole in the timing cover if you switch and will have to mess with belts..

[Ryan23]

Ryan,stick with the magniflo,the first one i put on lasted 15 years with changing the impeller every year..(option i do) besides youll have to plug the hole in the timing cover if you switch and will have to mess with belts..


Maybe my eyes are deceiving me but it looks like his pump is driven directly off the crank. Why would I have to worry about another belt? I'm not sweating the timing covers, they're like $15 a piece. I probably have a few floating around in my garage anyway.

Just straight up replacing the pump vs rebuilding my Neovane would take any real room for error out of the equation.

Ryan

[gcarter]

Thanks Ryan!
I bought my Johnson pump here;
http://www.marineexhaustmanifolds.com/rawwater.cfm
This company also sells on eBay.
The impellor is rubber and cost about $45.00. There are probably cheaper places to buy it.
It comes w/the bracket. I painted the pump and powdercoated the bracket, along w/all my other brackets.
The thing I enjoy about it besides getting rid of a belt is the ease of maintenance. You can change an impellor in 10 minutes.:eek!:

[gcarter]

The Meziere pump costs a bit more than the Johnson....... (a lot more). But it has a 3000 hour life expectancy. When I was doing my research, I called Meziere and talked to some one in the engineering dept. who told me they were running an operating cycle test on a vibration fixture and had passed 1400 hours.
I reckon I have about 2930 hours to go.:wink:

[Ryan23]

The Meziere pump costs a bit more than the Johnson....... (a lot more). But it has a 3000 hour life expectancy. When I was doing my research, I called Meziere and talked to some one in the engineering dept. who told me they were running an operating cycle test on a vibration fixture and had passed 1400 hours.
I reckon I have about 2930 hours to go.:wink:


Yeah, the Meziere's are not cheap but they are a good pump. I run one on my Chevy LSx powered Mazda RX-7 :yes:

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/scoobywrx/LS1/fd5.jpg

Ryan

[mrfixxall]

Maybe my eyes are deceiving me but it looks like his pump is driven directly off the crank. Why would I have to worry about another belt? I'm not sweating the timing covers, they're like $15 a piece. I probably have a few floating around in my garage anyway.
Just straight up replacing the pump vs rebuilding my Neovane would take any real room for error out of the equation.
Ryan


me duh!!!! i didnt look at the pic...

[mrfixxall]

Maybe my eyes are deceiving me but it looks like his pump is driven directly off the crank. Why would I have to worry about another belt? I'm not sweating the timing covers, they're like $15 a piece. I probably have a few floating around in my garage anyway.
Just straight up replacing the pump vs rebuilding my Neovane would take any real room for error out of the equation.
Ryan


me duh!!!! i didnt look at the pic...but i do have one of those pumps tho..

[gcarter]

Yeah, the Meziere's are not cheap but they are a good pump. I run one on my Chevy LSx powered Mazda RX-7 :yes:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/scoobywrx/LS1/fd5.jpg
Ryan
That's a nice install!!:eek!: :eek!:
.......but about changing those spark plugs.........:wink:

[Ryan23]

Thanks Ryan!
I bought my Johnson pump here;
http://www.marineexhaustmanifolds.com/rawwater.cfm
This company also sells on eBay.
The impellor is rubber and cost about $45.00. There are probably cheaper places to buy it.
It comes w/the bracket. I painted the pump and powdercoated the bracket, along w/all my other brackets.
The thing I enjoy about it besides getting rid of a belt is the ease of maintenance. You can change an impellor in 10 minutes.:eek!:

Just got off the phone with them. He's going to give me a call tomorrow with the bolt pattern dimensions just to make sure everything will line up. Apparently there are a few different patterns for that Johnson pump. I've got a pair of Vette derived LT1's in here, so who knows. The bracket is only $16, so that's no biggie. In the end, I think this will be the cheaper/higher capacity route, especially if I swap over to CC.

If it's not too much trouble, would you mind PM'ing me or posting up some part numbers for your cooling setup? I'd have to move the tank itself elsewhere as it would foul on my planned FI setup but I don't see that as being a problem.

Ryan

[Ryan23]

That's a nice install!!:eek!: :eek!:
.......but about changing those spark plugs.........:wink:


Believe it or not...10 minutes. I've done it on a hot engine at the dyno. The headers are RX-7 swap specific, which means they are 10x easier than on a Camaro ;)

Ryan

[gcarter]

Ryan, here are the folks for the HE...and other things. They offer remote mount systems too. Several here have purchased HEs from them. And the best prices I've seen.:)
http://www.oceaneastmarine.com/