Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

I have a 96 Chaparral with a 4.3 Volvo Penta GL engine and Volvo SX outdrive.

My problem started last September. My friends and I took my boat out to the river and it ran hot and started smoking. We floated back into the boat ramp and loaded the boat up. The impeller was shot to pieces, so I quickly ordered a new one and put it in. Upon further inspection, I also noticed the two hoses that connect to the water manifold were a little scalded looking and one had a hole in it so I also replaced those. I went ahead and did an oil change and fuel filter change.

I finally got the boat ready to carry back to the river and test out today. I have a problem with the relay getting the fuel pump to start, but once we got that figured out the boat will crank right up and run fine.

HOWEVER, we are not pulling any water in that we can tell. We verified the impeller is installed correctly and removed the thermostat, which was also in really bad shape and could have caused a problem. After that, we hooked it up with a water adapter and cranked it, but still no water coming in. My dad is the one doing most of this, but we are out of ideas.

What is the next step of things to check? I am out of ideas and I do'nt want to keep cranking the boat without it pulling water in without having some new ideas.

Can someone help direct me to a service manual for my motor on how the water cooling system works.

Thanks!

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

For a pump to work whatever it is pumping in has to have somewhere to go or nothing will move. The old impeller pieces could be plugging the outlet hose or up the line somewhere so much that nothing will flow.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

did you get all of the old pieces from the fried impeller out?

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

synchronized posting is an art!

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

I got some of it out, but I can't say I got all of it. Where all could the broken pieces be? Down in the foot, outlet hose...

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

thermostat housing, exhaust manifold water inlet, power steering cooler/lines, anywhere really.....have to start "ahead" of the blockage and work your way back to the pump removing and blowing thru hoses and inspecting fittings and housings.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

The blockage is probably upstream of the raw water pump, but you can check out the inlet side pretty easy I think. You can remove the inlet hose to the raw water pump and pour water into it to see if it comes out the inlet grate on the lower unit and compare how fast it runs out in relation to how fast you are pouring in.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

How did you determine the pump is not putting out water?

Did you pull the hose where it hits the thermostat housing to see how much water comes out?

With the muffs on and the water turned on, you will get no water past the pump if the engine is not running. What I would do, is to turn on the muffs and pull the inlet hose off of the raw water pump to make sure water gets to the pump while the engine is not running. This way you will know there is no obstructions between the drive and the raw water pump.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

Well guys, problem is FIXED! I'm not sure how to put all of the events together, but we have it ready to go now. Here's my guess.

Last year when it ran hot we thought it was because the impeller was bad. After we pulled the thermostat out (it was stuck) I think maybe the thermostat originally got stuck and caused the impeller to go bad. Does that make sense because after I think about it the thermostat is after the impeller so water should have made the it to the impeller and it was ripped to shreds...

We did pull the lower unit off and was able to spray a hose through from one end to the other. In that process we did wash a small handful of the old impeller out so that could have caused some of our problem.

I'm thinking one of these 2 scenarios happend after typing this.

Someone put the 2 hoses that go to the impeller on backwards 6 months ago and that caused us not to pull any water in and the impeller to go bad then today we finally realized it.

OR

Something caused the impeller to go out 6 months ago (maybe the thermostat) and in the process of removing the thermostat and cleaning out the old impeller we fixed our problem, but put the two hoses on backwards so we were actually blowing air out the hole that should have been sucking the water in.

Can you guys tell me what the purpose of the thermostat is? We pulled it out and let it off, but my dad said we don't need it because it is mainly needed for boats where it is colder than here in Florida.

Sorry this is so long, but thanks guys.

My dad and I kept saying something didn't seem right because he was saying the impeller was spinning the opposite way of what makes sense for the way the hoses were hooked up and I said it was wrong because when we would pull a hose it would blow air out of a hose that should have been pulling water IN.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

1.) The thermostat is necessary no matter where you run.

2.) A bad thermostat will not affect the impeller at all. The raw water cooling circuit always has an outlet thru the exhaust, the thermostat controls the flow rate of that water thru the engine. The thermostat housing plumbing is designed to flow right by a closed thermostat.

3.) If the hoses were backwards on the impeller pump housing then the impeller would not last very long and would end up as you described. Somewhere thru all of this the hoses got connected properly.

4.) The impeller pieces in the inlet hose would certainly have affected the impeller's ability to pull water up thru the drive. I believe you had a combination of issues and that the hoses on backwards started it. And the hoses on backwards would explain something I was confused about, which is the pieces usually go up thru the engine's components. With the hoses on backwards maybe that is why the impeller pieces went "backwards" instead of all thru the engine's cooling system after the pump.

Re: Volvo Penta GL Not Pulling Water, Help!!

Keep in mind the the engine was also run with NO fresh cooled water during that whole time in the water last September that fried the impeller. Be on the lookout for other symptoms, in other words do not start a long trip with it until you have run it a few times to see if all is well with the head gaskets and the rubber exhaust connections, etc.