[C38] Water Heater Plumbing

[Steve Smolinske]

D 

-----Original Message-----
From: listserve-bounces at catalina38.org
[mailto:listserve-bounces at catalina38.org] On Behalf Of
david at dlrfilms.com
Sent: Thursday, August 20, 2009 7:13 AM
To: Catalina 38 Listserve
Subject: Re: [C38] Water Heater Plumbing


> After years of chronic engine heating problems, I asked this C-38 
> forum for suggestions.

I guess it's my turn.

We had now heating problems when we bought the boat, but last Summer
started to get overheat alarms.

Simply cracking open the system to check this and that seemed to clear
it, so I have (hopefully) deduced that it is an "air-lock" problem.

But the overheats have gotten more frequent and are less reliably
cleared by cracking open the system.

Our most recent fix it to take the hot water heater out of the loop,
which works, but I can still see the air-lock forming, but without the
hot water heater in the system there seems to be enough circulation
pressure to push past it.

Because if the deteriorating nature of the problem I am wondering if the
freshwater impellor might be damaged, but when I start the engine with
the cap off the coolant tank, I can see (what appears to be) vigorous
flow.

It also seems like maybe the cap, which is spring-loaded and leads off
to the overflow tank might not be working right. When the air-lock forms
it pushes the coolant back down the tube, but my intuition is that this
should function more like an air-release valve. But I'm not an engine
guy in any way, so not knowing what it's supposed to do, I don't know
whether or not it's working right.

I'm half hoping the whole thing will overheat and seize so I can put in
an electric drive.

Help?


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