Priming stock aerator ballast fill pumps

[homer12]

A little background. I'm running a stock ballast system in 04 SV211 with stick aerator pumps. Last time out I couldn't get the belly tank to fill and port tank seemed to take forever. With valves open, I ran up to speed (about 20mph) to try to get them primed after a while. The belly tank is the one that wouldn't fill at all really and I've verified the pump does run. Any tricks or suggestions for getting them to prime and of course fill?


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[homer12]

I'm not sure if this matters, but on my through hull inlet on the belly tank, it uses this flat screened piece. The rear tanks utilize what looks more like the "scoop" style of intake. Is the front intake the OEM?

[swatguy]

It's possible your pumps are starting to go bad. The aerator pumps can function when you hit the in and off switches , but once you introduce the water pressure it may not be able to produce enough umff to get the water flowing. Kind of starts off like you mention where fill rates start to reduce.


its about their lifetime at this point.

[homer12]

Thanks swatguy. Looks like I better look into replacement at the lake this weekend. Going to check out more thoroughly

[swatguy]

Also rhat center one is flat so it doesn't get bent while loading in the trailer or a boat lift. You don't have the scupper style there or it will bend.

[dfoster]

On my 04SV, I had to re-adjust the horrible remote valves. I found that they weren't really opening all the way. So, while the knob under the dash would move, the lever at the valve near the tank wasn't really opening fully.

It took some fidgeting, but got it set properly so that they fully open. But then they don't fully close... so I also need to close the brass ball valves to make sure I don't slowly fill them.

But they are on my list of things to upgrade on the boat. I would want to move to electronic valves, or full impeller pumps so that I don't have to switch valves around.

[SurfingCane]

homer12 -- just went through the same issue on my 04 210. I ended up replacing the stock aerator pumps with Attwood T1200 in the rear and Attwood T750 in the belly. But the T750 would work for you in the front and rear...or just replace the 2 pumps that are giving you problems with the T750. I went with T1200 in the rear because I have 1100lb bags in my lockers to fill.
http://www.planetnautique.com/vb5/fo...-pump-question

[homer12]

Thanks guys for the input! Yeah, it's probably time to replace now anyway. I thought 1200 pumps were the way to go but with an easy swap and stock tanks will keep it simple with the 750 pump


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[homer12]

So it's time to replace the fill pumps. Man they are really tucked back in there under and behind the engine. What the best plan of attacks and any pics? Do I have to remove the stick ballast hard tank to get back there?


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[MikeC]

Someone has done a writeup on here about replacing the pumps and the valves with electric valves, I think Mikeski did it.
The belly pump is in your ski locker. To get to the rear pumps it's best to remove the hard tanks if you have them (if you do this might be a good time to replace those with bags as well). Definitely don't replace them with aerator pumps, use ballast puppies or a similar pump.

If you want some bags I have 2 750# bags and connections that I used in my 211.

Here's a copy and paste of one of Mikeski's write ups, I hope he doesn't mind me doing that:
The ballast system on your boat should have come from the factory similar to mine. From lake to tank to drain port here are the components:
1. Two scoop pickups for rear tanks under the engine for rear ballast tanks. Front through hull under access plate inside ski locker.
2. Immediately downstream of the pickups are ball valves that should normally remain open (emergency shut off valves). The rears have stainless L extensions on them so you can turn them off from inside the engine compartment. The front one is under the access plate inside the ski locker.
3. Behind the emergency valves there were round red rotary valves called flow-rite valves.
4. After the flow-rites there are three rule aerator fill pumps that are plumbed directly into the tanks.
5. Attached to each tank is a different style aerator drain pump plumbed directly to the discharge port above the waterline.
6. There is also a vent/overflow plumbed through the side and of the boat. When the tanks are full water often pours out of both the overflow and the discharge port.

I think I got it right. The system probably evolved over a few years. They probably added the various components trying to make it work and ended up with a fairly complicated system prone to frequent failures.

The valves were the weakest link in the system followed closely by the fill pumps that didn't always prime. The scoops help prime the pumps but they also cause issues because they pressurize the full lines when the boat is at speed. If you are cruising over 30mph or pulling a slalom skier they can overpressure the flow rite valves filling your ballast tanks (no bueno for slalom skiing).

The factory had a silent recall on the flow-rite valves in 2006. They would replace them with a TH Marine ball valve. I had mine replaced in 2006 but they were so stiff after one winter my wife was not strong enough to turn the handle at the end of the cable. I ultimately broke the handle on one of the valves.

At this point I decided to re-engineer the entire system myself. The drains work fine from the factory. The aerator pumps also do better than impeller pumps on drains as they can be run dry for some me time without failing so I left the drain system intact. I pulled all of the fill side components between the emergency ball valves and tanks (had to pull the rear tanks to do this).

The new fill system is quite simple and effective.
1. From the emergency ball valves I ran a 3/4" hose up to an impeller pump mounted on the ski tow bat cross beam angle support.
2. From the impeller pump the hose goes to a 3/4 to 1" adapter that connects to a hose that previously attached to the old fill pump. The aerator pumps block the flow of water so all of the cable actuator valve hardware is eliminated. The aerator pumps draw a considerably higher electrical current so I installed a relay panel where the power from the factory fill switch trips the relay that supplies high current to the pump selected.

The solution is simple and effective. I think my system is actually more reliable than any other ballast system in existence for two reasons. One, impeller pumps burn up quickly when ran dry. My system has no mode where the impeller pumps run dry since they are not doing double duty as drain pumps. Second, impeller pumps don't always like to reverse. When you switch an impeller pump from fill to drain it has to overpower the rubber pump vanes to run in reverse. This stresses the pump, if you have the engine off and low voltage it may not have enough power to flip the vanes and can burn up the pump (like after sitting playing music then going to drain mode when voltages are low or just by hitting all three drain pumps at the same time overloading the electric circuit). I supply my pump relay panel with a heavy #6 wire 50 amp circuit. Each pump has an automatically resetting 20 amp circuit breaker instead of a simple fuse). These are the little things that make it drama free as it has been for the last 8 years.

Hit me directly at mikeskiw@gmail if you have any questions.

[homer12]

MikeC, thanks for the input and reply. I've looked at this and thought about it. However, I'm not ready to spring for ballast puppies and start redoing it all. I just want to keep the stock set up and replace those pumps. Does anyone know if it's absolutely necessary to remove the tanks and if so how do you get the drain pumps off the bottom when removing them?

[MikeC]

It might be possible to get to the pumps without removing the tanks, but unlikely, especially on the port side under the walk through. The time it takes to remove the tanks will pay for itself when you're crawling around trying to get to the pumps.
Remove the engine divider panel.
Remove the ballast tank cover by removing the four screws holding the piece that covers the ballast drain and vent. Then the two cover pieces just slide out.
Remove the four bolts holding the tank flange to the floor (inboard along the divider panel track.
Remove the fill and vent hoses
Pull the tank tank up to get to the drain pump, remove the drain hose.
Slide the tank out, unless you're changing the drain pump there's no reason to remove that pump from the tank.

Removing the tanks and putting in bags was the single best upgrade for maintenance that I did, it made engine access actually bearable. I put the bags in using the original pumps initially.
Good luck, let us know how it goes.

[homer12]

MikeC, thanks!!

[Brichter14]

Seems like it is time to replace your hard tanks with bags. You can keep the aerator pumps, I have them on my SAN and they work great. I did a write up a while back. I use 1200's to fill and 750s to drain.

[Brbarthel]

I am looking to replace the ballast pumps in a 2012 SAN 230. Where do I get the pumps and is it best to replace both the fill and empty pumps?