Changing the impeller
Rio Dulce, Guatemala
Preparing the boat means checking all the things, including the
impeller. The last time was a few years ago. As you see on the
(unsharp) picture a bit too late. Some of the fins of the impeller are
gone and found their way into the heat-exchanger.
Removing the rest was no problem. I discovered that I had no gasket
any more so I had to cut out one myself. A precision job to do, but if
you are patience you will succeed.
The temperature engine after running for 30 minutes is around 180
degrees farenheit. It is ok, but I should check the heat-exchanger.
There might be some small rubber pieces of the old impeller. Work for
another day, after studying the manual.
The engine-maintenance is not my favorite thing. I really do not feel
at easy doing that. I wouldn’t know what to do if—for example—I
would lose one of the copper screws for the impeller-house.
Still the engine—hardly used at sea by me—is valuable safety
gear. It would not have been possible to come up the Rio Dulce. So I
better take care of this instrument as good as I can do. For me it
means changing oil as often as I think is good. At least once in the
200 hours of running the engine, changing filters and take care that I
have clean fuel.
This is not completely true, now that I’m thinking of it. I did at
least some other jobs on the engine these last 7 years like:
- Lining out the engine block and shaft
- Replacing the cutless bearing
- Mounting a dripless seal
Very nice, there is absolutely no water coming in from the shaft.
Only once the setscrew got loose and there was water up to the
floorboards. Luckily we found the leak and solved the problem quickly.
- Changing the V-belt (several times)
- Rewiring the engine-electricity
- Changing the cooling-water
- Changing fuel-filters (every 150 hours or so)
- Replacing an injector (with help of a diesel-mechanic)
- Changing the zinc on the propellor (every year)
There is only one zinc needed with this Perkins 4.108. I was
looking for other zincs in the heat-exchanger until someone told me
that in my engine there were none, because of the construction with
rubber so that electrolysis doesn’t have a chance.
I really should not be scared of this engine any more, but I still respect the steel-construction, the high pressure inside and the clean environment it needs to work. I’m scared about finding replacements or parts for it and I know that I will miss the engine when it is not working.
noisier to use.
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