Flushing systems
 

I am ditching my closed cooling system for added room in the boat. So now the flushing is all that much more important. What I have now for flushing is a tee in the intake. I close the petcock valve for the intake and connect the hose to the fitting on the back of the boat and start it up. Seems easy enough but to get to the petcock valve I have to either take out the back seat or use a handle from a shovel or something like that. Does anyone know of a better mouse trap? The only other alternative that I see is to use one of those ones that you put under the boat. Not to bad. It will work however I would be really happy if I could just put a hose up to the back of the boat and start it up.

Jon

Jon, Check out the MST Guardian system at www.boatered.com. It seems to work well and everybody seems to like them.

Ted

jon you can put a seacock in the hose that goes to your Raw water pump. Put in te seacock and upstream from it (closer to the RWP) put in a T with a hose type valve on the "t" part. Then to flush it just connect a hose to teh hsoe style valve, shut the seacock and turn the hose water on. When you run teh engien let it idle slowly if you rev it up to high the hos emight not be able to supply enough water. That will work well if you ahvea through hull water pick up. I don;t us eteh pickup in my drive so i don;t really have to worry about no h20 in the drive. It came from the factory like that so i'm not worried about the drive, I think the previous owner put the flush valve setup in though.

Puder that is what I have now and the problem is that it is hard to get to the valve.

Jon, just use one of those "Fake-a-Lake" units. No, this is not a joke, it looks like a plumber's plunger with a water hose fitting in it on an adjustable length handle. Just hook up hose, put under through hull, extend handle to ground, turn water on and flush.
Greg

Greg that is what I was going to do for last resort. ALready have the fittings in the back of the boat seems a shame not to use them :rolleyes: :rolleyes: Wish they made some sort of valve that would just open from the one side when the hose preasure was on it and closed it off the the intake and vice versa. Should be a easy valve. Anyone? Bueller anyone?

[ 11-13-2001: Message edited by: Audiofn ]

why do you have to close the petcocks???
Do you leave the boat in the water???
If so, then I see why.
If you trailer and then flush, just hook up hte hose and run.
I have a T fitting in the inlet hose just before the raw water pump. I cap this T when not in use. I have a hose adapter in place to hook up the garden hose. When I first turn the water on it will fall out the drive, almost like a back flush. But when I start the motor, it pulls it all to the RWP.
When running nothing goes to hte drive.
This will only work for trailered boats.
There is a vavle that you can get. I have seen it a few places. Overtons is the last place I seen it. Around 55 bucks each. Same principle as what my T set up is. However, it has a spring loaded valve in it so that when the hose is hooked up it shuts off incoming water from the intake-or the drive.
If I see it again I will pass on the info.

Mercury makes a set up and it is used by Formula as their optional fresh water flush. The parts used are listed as stock on a 350 Mag MPI Horizon.
It is expensive but you can get the parts from a local Mercruiser dealer. Look them up on the Bam website: http://www.mercruiserparts.com/Show_pictures3.asp?dnbr=804703%2099&ivar=images/CRUISER/804703.99/14.png&inbr=4835&bnbr=150&bdesc=CLOSED+COOLING+SYS TEM
The parts I think you need are listed below and it works like air hose attachments except with water. Do not use too much hose pressure though and make sure bracket will fit the bolt pattern on your exhaust or you will have to make your own.

861242 Bracket-Fluch Quick Connect 350 Horizon $3.80
23-57369 Spacer 350 Horizon $6.32
22-859670A1 Y-Fitting - $41.65
32-4285069 Hose Flush - 23.45
28-861406 Scoket Quick Connect Flush 43.13
22-861405 Plug Quick Connect Flush 36.82
861427 Cap Quick Connect 3.07

Mnfastboat I do trailer. My system is set up exactly like you said. I have tried to run it the way you said, and it works the way you said. My only concern was that when I am running with the through hulls open I will be sucking a lot of air. Is this not that case or is it not enough to worry about then running at idle. If I am just being overly concerned you guys let me know. :D :D

EdB. I like that set up very simple. I guess you do not worry about the water pump but leaving a little salt water in there probably will not hurt anything. :D :D Thanks

Jon

I agree with Mnfastboat. My sonic has the fresh water flush. All it is, is a T between the raw water pump and the transom plate. The flush inlets are on the swim platform and are capped. I have no petcock. Obviously, for this to work right the hose connection needs to be capped when boat is running in the water otherwise the pump is drawing air.

I like the Guardian system though. No need to run the engine and if you have to, you can still flush the engines whil the boat is in the water.

Has anyone out here run that Guardian system on a High Perf motor ?

I have the Guardian on a 7.4 L MPI. It's not that I don't trust it, but I now flush with the Guardian and run the engine with the muffs. I had contacted the manufacture (because I didn't think it was working) but he asured me it was by my description of what it was doing (very slight vibration, hardly noticeable). If you go for it, definately go for the HP model (more flushing capacity).

[ 11-17-2001: Message edited by: bimini run ]

Thanks for the comments, where did you get yours at ?

Jon,

As some have already said, go with the MST Guardian. Very easy to install, even easier to us. The best money I have spent.

Mark

It seems all of these "easy" systems only flush the engine. Does water get back to the drive to flush it out too? Or does this not matter? - Ray

JOn, sorry for the delayed response. Worked all weekend :(

How I explained it is what Ihave seen and learned from being done on over a dozen different boats. At Idle everything is getting more then enough water. I have idled this way for over 30 minutes and the temp is under normal control. I like this alot better then the muffs. When you are inside the boat you cannot see if hte muffs come loose until it is to LATE :( I have seen that happen. If you need to run higher then 2,000 rpm then I might be running a higher pressure on the hose.

RayPanic, what I do to make sure the drive gets flushed using the above mention setup on mine is to turn on the hose first. Without the engine running the water takes the less resitance path, right out the drive. I have had this happen EVER time. By hte time you turn on the hose, get up into the boat and so on, several minutes or more have passed. More then enough time to flush the drive. When you start the engine the water will be pulled into the raw water pump by its suction. This will leave only a trace or less going to hte drive. When I am winterizing I already have the jug hooked up and sitting on hte edge of the open engine bay. After doing what you need, warm up to open stat, start a little fogging, I open up the bottle to the antifreeze once the water is shut off. Once the freeze is running through the tips, I start heavily fogging the throttle body. Then starve it out on the lasthalf gallon. Shut down the motor, At this time the water is still off and was just using straight freeze. With the bottle being up on the side of the engine bay, the gravity will allow the remainder half gallon to gallon of freeze to drain down and follow the once agian easy path and drain into the outdrive to protect what left over water is in the drive.

Sorry this was long, but descriptive. :)

Mnfastboat: You did not strike me as that anal!!! Flushing after a fresh water run? I am running in salt but I have never flushed after fresh water. Why would you bother?

Sorry Jon, I must have missed typed or you read wrong.
I do not flush after running. Unless I know I was too close to some sand or mud :(

I was referring this entire post on winterization practices. :)

Audio,

In the thread http://www.offshoreonly.com/forum/sh...light=guardian you mentioned you simply wished there was a mechanism you could install that would allow you to hook up a hose and simply turn on the engines. It exists, and I've been using it for 4 summers now.

I bought a pair in 1998. It appears the product is now OEM'd to Perko, who just started selling it through BoatUS and other outlets. When I bought it, you could only find it through special orders or at distribution levels. It uses a spring loaded valve which shuts down the outdrive path when you turn on a hose.

You put the valve inline between the raw water pump, and the outdrive. Attach a permanent hose to run to your outside fittings. Turn on the hose about 1/4 turn, start your engines, then turn on hose full blast. The pressure from the hose shuts a spring loaded valve to the drives, so no air or suction comes/goes to the drives.

Here is a link to the new Perko model Mine is a Sherwood and uses stainless steel springs, assuming the Perko does as well. Get the diameter of your hose, it's either 5/8", 1" or 1 1/4", and try it out. For $67 each, it's worth trying. Paying too much if you find them for more, so save the money and put it in your gas tank. Bought mine from NorShipCo who is now part of Western Branch Diesel in Portsmouth, Virginia. 757.673.7200

Kelly,

I had an earlier model of the "same thing" in my old Donzi. They would ocasionally stick in the "flush" position as they can load up with "gunk" around the piston so the spring won't treutn it. Not a big problem to disassemble and clean them, but you do need to remember to check for water flow out the transom every time you start the boat.

-Greg