Launchpad McQ's Catalina 30 Atomic 4 Saga

[GregH]

The 5200 worked ok on the starboard?

[Launchpad McQ]

It did Greg....so far. I was skeptical that it would actually hold given Starboard's inherent non-stickiness. I applied the 5200 very generously on the back as well as the visible bead you can see in the picture along the edge. The 5200 seems to have bridged the little gap created by the fiberglass moulding's texturing. The two pieces that provide the backing for the electric pump and heat exchanger are new with the FWC install. However the piece in the back with the heavy bronze Groco raw water strainer mounted to it is not. I would feel confident recommending the technique since that heavy strainer hasn't budged in years now. The respective parts are attached to the Starboard using stainless steel lag screws.

[sastanley]

LP McQ. That looks great. The "Thatch mod" looks like it was meant to be! What is the PVC pipe assembly adjacent to the HX?!?

One thing I did was totally bypassed the "bypass", and run all my coolant straight into the sideplate, and capped off the t-stat inlet. I did bump my sideplate up to a 1/2" NPT if I recall & 3/4" inlet hose from the FWC pump. I initially did this because I was running an undersized HX with no thermostat and still pushing 180-185°F, and also, I so no reason to run the bypass any longer with closed loop circulation. Since upgrading the HX, I had to put a t-stat back in just to get the engine to 165°F.

[GregH]

Just noticed and not sure if I missed reading about this.... no alternator ?

PS. I am SOOOOOOO envious of all the space you have around the engine!

[sastanley]

Just noticed and not sure if I missed reading about this.... no alternator ?

PS. I am SOOOOOOO envious of all the space you have around the engine!

Greg, it is all the rage...."Staging for pictures"

[joe_db]

2 warnings:
One - the electric pump you are using is the one Indigo quit selling due to problems with it I think.
Two - it is about 100 times harder than you think to get all the air out of the fresh water circuit with an electric pump. You will want a switch to run it with the rest of the engine turned off and you may want an air bleed or two.

[sastanley]

Joe, I am running an electric Johnson CM-30. Not sure if that is the same in Indigo's package anymore or not. That thing moves lots of water (antifreeze), but I have the radiator cap on my HX at the highest point to help with air purging. I have several hundred hours on mine and it is great. I have it turn on with the ignition switch, so (without running it long enough to fry the coil) I can use it for bleeding, etc.
Edit - Joe I agree that if you want to be worried about it, have a separate switch to run the FWC pump outside of the rest of the engine/ignition circuit!! I happen to not need one right now, but I do think about it, if bleeding was a problem for me. I have a C-30 like LP McQ, and my HX is forward of the manifold like his, and thus slightly higher than the manifold.

[joe_db]

Joe, I am running an electric Johnson CM-30. Not sure if that is the same in Indigo's package anymore or not. That thing moves lots of water (antifreeze), but I happen to have the radiator cap on my HX at the highest point to help with air purging. I have several hundred hours on mine and it is great. I have it turn on with the ignition switch, so (without running it long enough to fry the coil) I can use it for bleeding, etc.
Edit - Joe I agree that if you want to be worried about it, have a separate switch to run the FWC pump outside of the rest of the engine/ignition circuit!! I happen to not need one right now, but I do think about it, if bleeding was a problem for me. I have a C-30 like LP McQ, and my HX is forward of the manifold like his, and thus slightly higher than the manifold.

My setup has a low point between the engine and where the heat exchanger went, so it essentially had TWO high points. I about went nuts with it until I realized I needed to run the pump while bleeding air at the engine and then it was easy-peasy.
If I set it up again I might make a video of the correct flow rate. Having never seen the electric pump in action, I didn't realize at first I was looking at a lot less flow than I should have been. What I should have done was recreate the bleed system from my old mid-engined car from the get-go. It had bleed valves in a couple of places with long clear plastic hose connected to them. If you needed to bleed the car, you unrolled the hoses and held them up while cracking the bleeder valves. This allowed bubbles to percolate out while not spewing antifreeze all over the place. I ended up sticking a bleeder at the thermostat housing exit and between cracking that with a temporary hose held up and having the heat exchanger open, the pump would eventually clear all the air out.

[ndutton]

Me too

https://www.moyermarineforum.com/forums/showpost.php?p=104014&postcount=8

For Jonathan:
Heater hose comes in black and red which I took advantage of when plumbing my FWC system. Antifreeze hoses = black, raw water = red. Easy to follow at a glance.

[Launchpad McQ]

As always, nothing escapes this group's keen eyes. I was reluctant to update the thread with my last post because the picture I used was out-of-date when I posted but I wasn't near the boat to snap a new one. Also, another reason for my trademarked weeks-long delays between posts is that I only have the time to type these up when I'm at work on a long layover. I'm always surprised how much time it takes to resize pictures, crop, type the narrative, etc. Alas, my wife is very supportive of the boat but not very supportive of me spending my precious little time home with the family behind a keyboard talking about the boat. So now this week, coming to you live from a rainy 17 hour layover at the Aloft Hotel in Portland Oregon, let me catch everyone up:

sastanley

What is the PVC pipe assembly adjacent to the HX?!?

That's a filter assembly that Tom (Indigo) ships with the electric FWC kit. It contains a magnet and "scrubby pad" that catches all the little bits of remaining block crud during the first few hours of FWC operation. In my picture it's installed in the wrong location. I had misplaced the installation instructions and assumed it needed to be installed there to protect the pump. The proper location for it is in line just prior to the heat exchanger inlet to keep the bits from clogging up the brand new heat exchanger...and then getting to the FWC pump.

GregH

Just noticed and not sure if I missed reading about this.... no alternator ?

It's just off for the time being while I "dial in" everything else. I'm just using a jumper from the battery to the coil for the test runs.

joe_db

2 warnings:
One - the electric pump you are using is the one Indigo quit selling due to problems with it I think.

You're right joe. Indigo has stopped selling kits with the BLDC pump that I have and reverted to using the Johnson pumps. I've been in frequent contact with Indigo since I bought the FWC kit and they've been very forthright and supportive. Like many of my boat projects, I bought the parts and months went by until I had the time to actually install them. In the meantime, Indigo had discovered that some of the BLDC pumps experienced reliability problems that were difficult to pinpoint to any specific batch of pumps. I spoke with Tom on the phone for almost an hour about the specifics of the BLDC failures. He offered to send me a substitute Johnson pump free-of-charge but given that my BLDC appears to be unaffected by the symptoms of the "bad batch," I thought it unnecessary to condemn a seemingly good pump for now. Between my cockpit temperature gauge and Cole Hersee overtemp alarm, I'm confident if the BLDC pump quits/fails I would be able to catch it before things go sideways.

Two - it is about 100 times harder than you think to get all the air out of the fresh water circuit with an electric pump. You will want a switch to run it with the rest of the engine turned off and you may want an air bleed or two.

So far I don't seem to have the same challenge with air purging but to be fair, I haven't run the system too long. There's an air vent on the electric pump so that might help and the HX is mounted in a relatively high position. But most importantly the "don't-leave-the-ignition-on-without-the-engine-running" warning is much appreciated and well taken.

ndutton

Heater hose comes in black and red which I took advantage of when plumbing my FWC system. Antifreeze hoses = black, raw water = red. Easy to follow at a glance.

I must've seen a picture (probably of yours) along the way and had actually already done this right after I took that picture. I know I definitely didn't come up with that idea on my own. I kind of went a little Led Tasso opposite (if anyone hasn't yet watched "Ted Lasso" on TV its worth a week of binge watching) from yours with the black hose being the raw water. In my mind, the bay water is black-ish so I did raw water black and coolant red.

Here's the up-to-date picture. I'll explain the disconnected coolant hose and paper towel under the manifold exhaust flange next week. Guess who's going to be pressure testing their manifold when they get back to the boat......



Merry Christmas everyone!

[sastanley]

Thatch mod. Good work. Merry Christmas.

[Launchpad McQ]

A few weeks ago I was doing an operational engine run to get the FWC kit dialed in, adjust throttle linkages etc. I shut the engine down and stopped to have a bite to eat for lunch. When I came back to the engine, I noticed a drip of water coming from the bottom exhaust flange stud threads. I let the engine cool, disconnected the exhaust from the manifold, and several cups worth of water came pouring out of the manifold. I tried to taste it but couldn't tell if it was fresh or salt water. So far, I've only used 100% fresh water in the cooling system so I didn't have the benefit of any glycol colorant to assist in the diagnosis. I don't know if there was any white smoke coming from the exhaust while I was running the engine because I was down the cabin making adjustments. I pulled off the reversing gear cover to find the telltale "milky oil" evidence of water intrusion into the engine...



I fashioned up this pressure test gauge and pumped it up to 15psi. The pressure dropped at a rate of about 1 psi per 10 minutes:



If anyone sees a flaw with this pressure test setup I'm all ears but at this point I suspect a cracked manifold. I'm doubly suspicious because this manifold came from my ill-fated spare engine purchase (see post #86) that arrived with other freeze-related damage. It looks like I'll be buying a new manifold. "Hello, Ken.....yep it's Jonathan....yep again."

P.S. I just realized my gross left thumbnail finally made a cameo on this forum. That's what happens when your hand gets slammed in the door of a 1988 Volvo 240DL station wagon at soccer practice as a 6 year old. Bye bye nail bed! Those Swedes sure knew how to make stout door latches. Remember those things?

[ndutton]

Did you pressure test the block independent of the manifold? It's easy enough to do and will provide further critical information. If the manifold is the sole culprit, for water to get into the oil it has to have migrated through one or more of the valves then either through the valve guide or the cylinder, maybe both.

Launch, welcome to the rabbit hole.

[lat 64]

Volvo outdrives (the competition)

I brought my newborn baby home in a '78 240. That old car was kind rusty back then in 1994, but a more stalwart friend was never had. I called it the Beige Bullet.

BTW, what you have a photo of is a 740. Not as good a car, in my expert opinion

[W2ET]

Good morning, Russ. How's the weather up in Homer these days?

Bill