Official 320 Dancer Thread

On a more serious side, is there a place where we could upload manuals for everyone's access? I have a hard to find manual for the smart craft sc5000 and several other manuals including the Mercruiser Engine Manuals for the 320 that I got from a mercury mechanic. I found out how much I have been getting ripped off for my annuals compared to what the Engine manual calls for. Anyway just thinking it would be kind of useful to have a place to put manuals in case someone needed one. I have all mine in PDF files so I would be happy to share them.
 
StevenA said:
Ok, here it goes I am really tired of the shower head for a faucet in the head, I took the shower curtain out on day one, never will use the shower. I would love to know more about and see a pic if possible of your replacement faucet you put in the head. Anything you have would be appreciated. Thanks, Steve.
Click to expand...

I replaced the faucet with this one - I didn't like the nickel finish in the bathroom and hated the round knobs - http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/SHUR...5200035QQptZBoatQ5fPartsQ5fAccessoriesQ5fGear

The new pull out hose is a tad shorter - but it works for us and is much better quality than the junk faucet Sea Ray used in 07. Now the wife wants the galley faucet replaced. Our faucet was starting to leak under the cabinet anyway, so that is why I replaced it.

How do you like the carpet on the steps? We love it.
 
skolbe said:
I replaced the faucet with this one - I didn't like the nickel finish in the bathroom and hated the round knobs - http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/SHUR...5200035QQptZBoatQ5fPartsQ5fAccessoriesQ5fGear

The new pull out hose is a tad shorter - but it works for us and is much better quality than the junk faucet Sea Ray used in 07. Now the wife wants the galley faucet replaced. Our faucet was starting to leak under the cabinet anyway, so that is why I replaced it.

How do you like the carpet on the steps? We love it.
Click to expand...

I love it, my wife loves it and our 4 year old lab mix loves it. Just did that project last fall, will be nice to keep us from falling on our arses when feet are a bit wet. The snap in carpet for the bathroom is my wife's favorite. The floor was hard to keep clean looking. I custom ordered from the templates they had on file the step carpet and bathroom carpet in the same style as our cockpit carpet. Since outdoor carpet can just pull out and wash on the dockside if necessary.

On the link you sent me, do I understand you in that this is the same one you bought? Does it overhand as bad as the factory one. The factory one on our 320 and prev. 280 always was a mess to try to use and not get water everywhere. Thanks again for the link. Steve
 
We find it easier to control and it doesn't spray all over (as bad) like the old faucet. If you don't want the pull out feature, just install a nice bathroom faucet. It takes 30 minutes, the shurflo one I bought connected right to the old fittings. Save your old one for resale time.
 
skolbe, is that one you bought able to be held up by the fitting in the head and used as a shower?
 
Raw Water Pump Impeller Install

I thought about posting this in the maintenace section but it might be more pertinent on the 320 site. Excuse me if I butted in.

Let me start out by saying I’ve been doing a lot of work on my boats for years and this is the first time I’ve done the newer style water pump impeller replacement on the fuel injected engines. I’ve done a bunch of the old style pumps on the old carburetor equipped motors before. By no means am I saying this is the only way to do the job; in other words I’m not a mechanic or an authority. The reason I’m putting this out on the site is that I had asked about some quick tips for doing this on the site and never got a complete answer on start to finish. I know, maybe I didn’t search the site long enough for this information. With that being said enjoy my painful tale about spending the weekend in the bilge of my 2006 Sea Ray 320 with 6.2L v-drives.

Access is the first thing to address to do this job. I’ve done them before (the old style pumps) by laying on the motor reaching down but the wonderful fuel coolers block your access from the top. I decided to remove the port muffler (drain it first since I ran antifreeze through my motors when winterizing), both hoses from the risers and the large hose going to the thru hull exhaust from the muffler. A helpful tool to use on the hose clamps is a 5/16” socket to stay on the clamps when you turn them. I also removed the inboard exhaust hose on the starboard motor from the riser to the muffler. It took about 45 minutes to remove all of these items. This positively was the right thing to do for the required access. The reason I did the port side removal was to also gain access to the starboard water pump that is close to the port side engine.

I started with the port WP and decided to remove the pump with the bracket since a few people had said it would be tight but you could do it even if you had to grind a little on the pump bracket and housing. Long story short is don’t do it this way; you’ll see why as the saga continues. First step is to remove the serpentine belt. That requires a 16 MM wrench to loosen the nut on the belt tensioner. I then took the two blue drain plugs out of the pump body to reduce any potential vacuum when removing the hoses. I loosened both hose clamps and pulled the hoses off. You might need to use a flat screw driver to get on the edge of the hoses to free them up. I then took the lower bolt out of the WP bracket with a 14MM socket. Next I removed the nut from the stud of the top of the WP bracket with the same 14 MM deep socket. As I pulled the WP forward it would not clear the harmonic balancer and fuel cooler unit. There is a small piece of casting on the back side of the WP bracket that hits the harmonic balancer. I got a die grinder and removed some metal off of the WP and bracket. It still would not come out. I thought about removing the fuel cooler but this is a waste of time for a couple of reasons. It is mounted on two metal brackets. The front bracket would come off easy; there are two 10MM bolts on the front holding the fuel cooler on and one 14 MM bolt at the engine for this bracket. The rear bracket is next to impossible to access. I decided to remove the front two 10MM bolts at the front bracket and push on the fuel cooler. Under much strain and pain it moved enough to let the WP and bracket come out. Believe me this is not the way to do it. I got it back to the bench and removed all of the 10MM bolts and removed and replaced the impeller and o-ring. The Merc part number is 47-862232A 2 for this kit that includes the impeller and o-ring. My impeller was cracked so the job was needed. I was able to remove the impeller with needle nose pliers; I know they make a tool to do this but I’ve never needed it. I also choose to use petroleum jelly to lube and protect the impeller on the initial start up. This also helps it to slide in the housing. You can also use dish detergent but I don’t plan on starting the motors for another month and I’m not sure the detergent would be a good idea sitting for this period of time. I reassembled the pump, touched up the black paint, and re-installed the two blue drain plugs with the o-rings on them. I re-installed the pump on the motor. You can also put a little dish detergent on the hoses to help them slide back on the WP. You will also notice the hoses are different diameters so you won’t mess that up. I put the serpentine belt back on and adjusted the belt tension. The way to tighten the tensioner is to first put a box end 16 MM wrench on the nut and then use an 8 MM socket on the shaft of the tensioner. I think it is a clockwise turn with the 8 MM socket to tighten the belt and then snug it tight with the 16 MM nut.

Now on to some more pain with the starboard WP. This is where the learning curve pays off. This time I decided to remove the three 10 MM bolts that hold the WP to the bracket. I first removed the 14 MM WP bracket bolt and then the nut on the stud. This allows the WP to pivot on the stud to get some access to the two 10 MM bolts on the backside of the bracket that secure the WP. The top 10 MM WP bracket bolt is easy to access. After these bolts are removed, let the WP lay on the hull so that you can get access to remove the two hoses. Use the same process on the bench for the impeller install. Now for the re-install of the WP to the bracket on the engine. I tried it two ways and one way worked. I first tried to put the hoses on the WP and install it to the WP bracket. No go on this effort since you are fighting the hoses and the weight. I took the hoses back off and put the WP on the bracket and then installed the hoses. See the serpentine belt install as listed above.

As if this wasn’t enough pain for the weekend, I went on to replace the impeller on the Kohler 5E generator. This was an easy job as long as you leave one of the four 11 MM bolts on the cover assembly (4 total). My exhaust muffler was in the way and required one of the bolts to stay in the pump anyway. This is a good thing since the WP housing could slide off of the shaft. I installed the new impeller and o-ring with some petroleum jelly. My impeller was missing one blade so I took the raw water hose off of the heat exchanger and found the missing blade. The Kohler part number is 359978 for the impeller and o-ring.

Required tools: 5/16”, 8 MM, 10 MM, 11 MM (for generator), 14 MM, 16MM – sockets and wrenches. flat and phillips tipped screw drivers, and lots of band aids. One last item not to forget- a large hammer is required for the completion of this job. Use the hammer to knock yourself unconscious to avoid the pain signals you are getting from every joint and muscle in your body.

Please guys, “no that’s not the right way to do it stuff”. This is a sincere effort on my part in trying to help anybody that has been thinking about doing this job on their own and un-familiar with what it would take from start to finish. I know everybody has a different skill level and this posting identifies what it would take to do the job. Yep, I’m sure there are many ways to do it, but this way worked for me and you can do it yourself. I was also trying to help you with the tools required to avoid what I had to do by bringing multiple metric and standard wrenches and sockets on board. I looked like a Snap on tool dealer going to the boat.

I’m sure the top question remaining is how long should it take to do this if you didn’t have to trial and error what you needed to do on this job. There are way too many variables to address the real time to complete the job due to many things. Some of the things to factor in : how long can you stand the pain without a break, how many beverage breaks, how many medical breaks for band aids, etc…….

Here would be my guess for the time involved: About 45 minutes to get the area open for access, a little less than an hour to remove the pump, about 30 minutes to rebuild the pump on the bench, and a little less than an hour to install the pump back on the motor. Figure the same amount of time to do the second motor less the time to get the area ready for access. Then you need about another 45 minutes to put the port muffler and all of the exhaust hoses you removed back on. I really think these time estimates as listed are somewhat on the conservative side and realistic.

I hope you enjoyed the write up and it will help at least one person.

Al
 
Great post Al, and thank you. I will be printing it out for my future reference.

I do believe this one should be placed in the “Technical” posters section as well.
 
Just come do it for me, I'll take pictures, hand you beer and bandages. Hell I'll even bring my girl shown below as a cheering section and comfort station!
 
Thanks Al - I am debating to pay for the impellers to be replaced or do it myself. This is very much appreciated.
 
Have any of you 320 Sundancer owners had problems with keeping your boat on plane. If I don't keep my rpm's up above 3800 or so, my boat falls off plane. One guy told me to put larger trim tabs on the boat to correct the problem. Can this be done by just replacing the tabs themselves or will I have to go with larger hydraulics too?

Bob


I originally posted this elsewhere but was advised I may have better luck posting in the 320 Sundancer thread. Have any of you 320 owners had a similar problem and put bigger trim tabs on?
 
Mine stays on plane @ 3500 RPM's or better. But 3600 rpm's is the best spot. I never run mine at 3800.
 
Same here, I can stay on plane at 3300RPM-3400RPM with full tabs. It's important for your boat to be able to stay on plane at lower speed to provide smoother cruising during chops. Last year I had to travel for couple of hours in the ocean with head wind and 2-3' constant chops. I slowed down to 18kts (21MPH)keeping her at 3350-3400RPMs. Anything over that speed felt bumpy, but the fact that she was able to cruise at 18kts gave us a smooth ride. When in calm water she should be able to stay on plane at 3300rpms.
 
with my 6.2's and full tabs, she'll stay on plane down to about 3100 rpms. You need to feather the throttle a little bit but she'll stay there with enough practice. I typically run mine at 3500 - 3600 rpms for best efficiency with a little bit of trim tab and will get about 23 knots. Every once in a while, i open her up to above 4000 rpms for a short stint to make sure there are no issues. Fully loaded with fuel, water, and the dinghy on the swim platform, i'll still get .8 to .9 when cruising.
 
Bob, now that you know most of us don't have problems below 3500, I would say that MAYBE you should check the bottom of your boat. If the bottom is fouled, it will take a lot more power to stay on plane. When you are at 3800 RPM, what speed are you running? Take into account wind and current of course but if you speed is way down then I would say your bottom is fouled and needs to be cleaned.

Post some number, rpm, speed, fuel burn and we can help determine (with any luck anyway) why you are having problems below 3800rpm's.
 
Bob M said:
Have any of you 320 Sundancer owners had problems with keeping your boat on plane. If I don't keep my rpm's up above 3800 or so, my boat falls off plane. One guy told me to put larger trim tabs on the boat to correct the problem. Can this be done by just replacing the tabs themselves or will I have to go with larger hydraulics too?

Bob


I originally posted this elsewhere but was advised I may have better luck posting in the 320 Sundancer thread. Have any of you 320 owners had a similar problem and put bigger trim tabs on?
Click to expand...

I read this on several posts and always wanted to stay on plan at a lower speed so i found a pair of used trim tabs on ebay and simply cut off a 5" strip by the same width. I used the thru bolts that hold the ram on the tab and viola I extended the tabs by 2" i do notice a difference, I now use alot less tab with better results. The tab ram is more than powerfull enough to handle the added lenght. I called bennett to confirm and they use the same ram for much biggers tabs
 
AAK said:
Raw Water Pump Impeller Install

I thought about posting this in the maintenace section but it might be more pertinent on the 320 site. Excuse me if I butted in.

Let me start out by saying I’ve been doing a lot of work on my boats for years and this is the first time I’ve done the newer style water pump impeller replacement on the fuel injected engines. I’ve done a bunch of the old style pumps on the old carburetor equipped motors before. By no means am I saying this is the only way to do the job; in other words I’m not a mechanic or an authority. The reason I’m putting this out on the site is that I had asked about some quick tips for doing this on the site and never got a complete answer on start to finish. I know, maybe I didn’t search the site long enough for this information. With that being said enjoy my painful tale about spending the weekend in the bilge of my 2006 Sea Ray 320 with 6.2L v-drives.

Access is the first thing to address to do this job. I’ve done them before (the old style pumps) by laying on the motor reaching down but the wonderful fuel coolers block your access from the top. I decided to remove the port muffler (drain it first since I ran antifreeze through my motors when winterizing), both hoses from the risers and the large hose going to the thru hull exhaust from the muffler. A helpful tool to use on the hose clamps is a 5/16” socket to stay on the clamps when you turn them. I also removed the inboard exhaust hose on the starboard motor from the riser to the muffler. It took about 45 minutes to remove all of these items. This positively was the right thing to do for the required access. The reason I did the port side removal was to also gain access to the starboard water pump that is close to the port side engine.

I started with the port WP and decided to remove the pump with the bracket since a few people had said it would be tight but you could do it even if you had to grind a little on the pump bracket and housing. Long story short is don’t do it this way; you’ll see why as the saga continues. First step is to remove the serpentine belt. That requires a 16 MM wrench to loosen the nut on the belt tensioner. I then took the two blue drain plugs out of the pump body to reduce any potential vacuum when removing the hoses. I loosened both hose clamps and pulled the hoses off. You might need to use a flat screw driver to get on the edge of the hoses to free them up. I then took the lower bolt out of the WP bracket with a 14MM socket. Next I removed the nut from the stud of the top of the WP bracket with the same 14 MM deep socket. As I pulled the WP forward it would not clear the harmonic balancer and fuel cooler unit. There is a small piece of casting on the back side of the WP bracket that hits the harmonic balancer. I got a die grinder and removed some metal off of the WP and bracket. It still would not come out. I thought about removing the fuel cooler but this is a waste of time for a couple of reasons. It is mounted on two metal brackets. The front bracket would come off easy; there are two 10MM bolts on the front holding the fuel cooler on and one 14 MM bolt at the engine for this bracket. The rear bracket is next to impossible to access. I decided to remove the front two 10MM bolts at the front bracket and push on the fuel cooler. Under much strain and pain it moved enough to let the WP and bracket come out. Believe me this is not the way to do it. I got it back to the bench and removed all of the 10MM bolts and removed and replaced the impeller and o-ring. The Merc part number is 47-862232A 2 for this kit that includes the impeller and o-ring. My impeller was cracked so the job was needed. I was able to remove the impeller with needle nose pliers; I know they make a tool to do this but I’ve never needed it. I also choose to use petroleum jelly to lube and protect the impeller on the initial start up. This also helps it to slide in the housing. You can also use dish detergent but I don’t plan on starting the motors for another month and I’m not sure the detergent would be a good idea sitting for this period of time. I reassembled the pump, touched up the black paint, and re-installed the two blue drain plugs with the o-rings on them. I re-installed the pump on the motor. You can also put a little dish detergent on the hoses to help them slide back on the WP. You will also notice the hoses are different diameters so you won’t mess that up. I put the serpentine belt back on and adjusted the belt tension. The way to tighten the tensioner is to first put a box end 16 MM wrench on the nut and then use an 8 MM socket on the shaft of the tensioner. I think it is a clockwise turn with the 8 MM socket to tighten the belt and then snug it tight with the 16 MM nut.

Now on to some more pain with the starboard WP. This is where the learning curve pays off. This time I decided to remove the three 10 MM bolts that hold the WP to the bracket. I first removed the 14 MM WP bracket bolt and then the nut on the stud. This allows the WP to pivot on the stud to get some access to the two 10 MM bolts on the backside of the bracket that secure the WP. The top 10 MM WP bracket bolt is easy to access. After these bolts are removed, let the WP lay on the hull so that you can get access to remove the two hoses. Use the same process on the bench for the impeller install. Now for the re-install of the WP to the bracket on the engine. I tried it two ways and one way worked. I first tried to put the hoses on the WP and install it to the WP bracket. No go on this effort since you are fighting the hoses and the weight. I took the hoses back off and put the WP on the bracket and then installed the hoses. See the serpentine belt install as listed above.

As if this wasn’t enough pain for the weekend, I went on to replace the impeller on the Kohler 5E generator. This was an easy job as long as you leave one of the four 11 MM bolts on the cover assembly (4 total). My exhaust muffler was in the way and required one of the bolts to stay in the pump anyway. This is a good thing since the WP housing could slide off of the shaft. I installed the new impeller and o-ring with some petroleum jelly. My impeller was missing one blade so I took the raw water hose off of the heat exchanger and found the missing blade. The Kohler part number is 359978 for the impeller and o-ring.

Required tools: 5/16”, 8 MM, 10 MM, 11 MM (for generator), 14 MM, 16MM – sockets and wrenches. flat and phillips tipped screw drivers, and lots of band aids. One last item not to forget- a large hammer is required for the completion of this job. Use the hammer to knock yourself unconscious to avoid the pain signals you are getting from every joint and muscle in your body.

Please guys, “no that’s not the right way to do it stuff”. This is a sincere effort on my part in trying to help anybody that has been thinking about doing this job on their own and un-familiar with what it would take from start to finish. I know everybody has a different skill level and this posting identifies what it would take to do the job. Yep, I’m sure there are many ways to do it, but this way worked for me and you can do it yourself. I was also trying to help you with the tools required to avoid what I had to do by bringing multiple metric and standard wrenches and sockets on board. I looked like a Snap on tool dealer going to the boat.

I’m sure the top question remaining is how long should it take to do this if you didn’t have to trial and error what you needed to do on this job. There are way too many variables to address the real time to complete the job due to many things. Some of the things to factor in : how long can you stand the pain without a break, how many beverage breaks, how many medical breaks for band aids, etc…….

Here would be my guess for the time involved: About 45 minutes to get the area open for access, a little less than an hour to remove the pump, about 30 minutes to rebuild the pump on the bench, and a little less than an hour to install the pump back on the motor. Figure the same amount of time to do the second motor less the time to get the area ready for access. Then you need about another 45 minutes to put the port muffler and all of the exhaust hoses you removed back on. I really think these time estimates as listed are somewhat on the conservative side and realistic.

I hope you enjoyed the write up and it will help at least one person.

Al
Click to expand...
How often do the impellers need to be replaced? This will be my first year with the 320 DA and I can't find when the previous owner changed the impellers last. I was quoted $500.00 to have the dealer replace both, so after the bloody knuckles and bandaids it might be worth it:huh:

Jeff
 
About to pull the trigger on a 2005 320, but wife is in love with the newer models rear bench seat. We park in coves, and have the kids swim off the back of the boat, and having this back bench would be a nice adder.

Has anyone added a bench like this? Is it even possible?

Thanks!
 
I was told by my surveyor, that my 350 mags like to run at 3800 but all you guys are saying somewhere around 3500 , should i bring it down a little and use a little tabs? am i not supposed to use the tabs after i plan out? i use full tabs to plan and leave them full just back it down to 3800 does this sound wrong? am i burning too much fuel? (under good conditions of course) thanks,
 
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