24 Gallon Coolant Swap in 28 Minutes

[racclarkson@gmail.com]

Just broke my own record doing a coolant drain and refill aboard Aslan. Some may recall I replaced the HE and oil cooler petcocks with ball valves some time back.



No surprise, draining was a snap with not a drop of the 24 gallons of port motor's old coolant missing the buckets.

What's different is that I decided to refill the system through the HE drain using a submersible pump. When I got within a few gallons, I put the pressure cap back on. Low and behold, the water made its way to the overflow bottle. I was able to slow the fill by working the ball vale. Start to finish drain and fill, 24 gallons, 28 minutes. Much of that was spent hauling buckets out of the ER. I'm thinking a few push-ups and I might get it down to a 24 X 24 flat. Maybe hauling 48 gallons of coolant to the boat was a good start--cardio for sure.

This fill was water only to flush out the system before recharging with PowerCool Pre-mix. I have just finished a month with Penray in-service cleaner in both systems. And to be sure, I didn't use the three other petcocks. I generally never use the one behind the starter anyway. Were the system is poor shape, I would use all the drains.

This was a real time saver.

 

[SEVEN]

Get out here for a visit and set me up. wow

 

[scottinsydney]

Hi Robert,

So you could drain the entire engine including manifolds via oil cooler and heat exchanger drains?

 

[racclarkson@gmail.com]

Hi Robert,So you could drain the entire engine including manifolds via oil cooler and heat exchanger drains?

Scott, you get most of it. What’s left will be picked up by the water flush. If the system has issues or sediment, then you’d want to at least crack the other petcocks and hit’em with some high pressure air and drain them. My systems are in good shape, so I’ll run them up to temp today and then drain and refill with coolant. It’s really nice to be able to handle the coolant without making a mess. I also screw on a cap just in case a valve were to be inadvertently opened.

 

[rustybucket]

That is spectacular!!

 

[dar636]

Get out here for a visit and set me up.  wow

No kidding, then swing thru Seattle and we can kit up a 871 package... I just went thru the HE's and intercoolers. It is amazing what came out of them, on a cool running set of 871's. Now that they are clean I need to get my plumbing set up for preventative maintenance.

Great info, thank you-

Not kidding about the Seattle visit.

 

[racclarkson@gmail.com]

No kidding, then swing thru Seattle and we can kit up a 871 package... I just went thru the HE's and intercoolers. It is amazing what came out of them, on a cool running set of 871's. Now that they are clean I need to get my plumbing set up for preventative maintenance.Great info, thank you-Not kidding about the Seattle visit. View attachment 32038View attachment 32039

Yhat’s ugly. I love Seattle.

 

[racclarkson@gmail.com]

Broke my draining record today. Opened both valves and worked two buckets at a time. Maybe that’s more of a middle aged thing. Anyway, I flushed starboard motor twice before charging with coolant. Now I’m worried. Had to take a leak—all that running water. What the hell, got a bucket right there. Holy kidney stone! My piss turned four gallons of PowerCool pre-mix yellow-very yellow! Wonder if I could descale on my own??