Purchased new from Merc the entire sea water pump assemblies for my 496ho's and will be changing them tonight.

Anything I need to know before installing the assemblies or are they all ready to be installed from Merc.

Once installed, do I need to do anything special to get the pumps primed? I will not hose start, I will be heading to the local lake to set into the water to start and want to make sure that I do not ruin the new pumps.

Thanks!

I like to pack them with grease so you dont have a dry start

A quick shot of spray silicon lubricant into the pump body will be fine for the first few rotations of the dry impellor. Turn the impellor via the pulley and lube the entire housing and all of the veins. I don't like to use an oil based lubricant like WD-40 as oil does break down rubber. You can use dish soap too if you like. Both of these make getting the impellor into the housing easier.

If I may, were both of your pump housings damaged or scored? They are made from brass and are pretty strong as opposed to the HP pumps made of plastic. I know you dropped a LOT of shiney pennies on two housings.

I liked the dish soap easy to see everything working, via the bubbles. Mine was out for a while and I swapped the hoses. If your impellers were shredded I was told to back flush the oil cooler.

New <used> boat to me and the seller and I agreed that new pumps would be purchased by the seller, installed by me the buyer. I wanted them to be new as part of the sale. I will keep the old and replace the impellers and use those as spares if needed.