Winterizing/Flushing setup

osd9

osd9

New Member
Oct 3, 2006
4,874
MidAtlantic
Boat Info
2003 410DA
Engines
Caterpillar 3126-TA w/ ZF 80-IV
I just finished making up my flushing and winterizing setup for my CAT Diesels and I thought I would share it here.

The CATs have 2" water supply lines and the previous owner (Sea Gull) gave me a good head start by installing a brass "T" in line with the supply hose. Off the "T" is a reducing bushing from 2" to 1.25" . Off that bushing is a 1.25" brass close nipple to a brass 1.25" ball valve and then to another brass 1.25" close nipple. Off that nipple is a plastic 1.25" elbow and 4" plastic extension. I went with plastic elbow and extension off of the last nipple at the advise of others, especially Frank W. in order to keep the wieght and "moment" to a minimum that was hanging on the first nipple off of the "T".

In this configuration, the setup works as a "crash Valve" or "Dewatering valve". If you spring a leak, you open the crash valve, close the seacock, and use the engines to suck out the water from bilge, hopefully giving you enough time to get back to safe harbor....you know....a "water let'r out'r"

Here is what that setup looks like.

http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o235/osd9/PB170667.jpg

In these next few pictures, I removed the elbow and 4" estension and put a plastic 1.25" union in there place. I also added my bucket setup so that I can either flush the mains with fresh water or run antifreeze through the mains for winterization.

http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o235/osd9/PB170668.jpg

http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o235/osd9/PB170669.jpg

http://i121.photobucket.com/albums/o235/osd9/PB170670.jpg


The bucket is simply a rubber maid bucket with an 1.5" through hull to a 1.5" union to a 1.5" nipple to an 1.5" ball valve which is then reduced to a 1.25" hose adapter. The hose is 1.2" I.D. pond hose. A little ghetto, but it works....
 
Fancy, our cat mechanics simply pour 5-6 gals of pink into the the engine strainer after closing the secock and draining out the salt water. They claim even if it sucked some air during the process it wouldnt hurt. The second guy turns off engine at the final gal being poured.

The crash water removal is a great idea!
 
Last edited:
Hope that valve never sees emergency use Dominic. Nice installation, thanks for the post and photos!
Warren
 
Dominic,
Very nice setup. I have a quick question. When you do your winterizing precedure, before you start adding antifreeze how do you ensure that you have thermostat open to have a full cicle? Do you run engines with fresh water to warm them up or is there other trick, beside taking the thermostas off?

Thanks,
Alex.
 
Alex, our engines are FWC, so the thrmostat is in the antifreeze portion of the motor. So we dont need to address it. We are winterizing the raw jacket water portion of the motor.
 
Dancin Dave said:
Alex, our engines are FWC, so the thrmostat is in the antifreeze portion of the motor. So we dont need to address it. We are winterizing the raw jacket water portion of the motor.
Click to expand...


Since I have row water cooled would you say I need to warm up the engine to make sure that the thermostat is open? Do you think it's better to feed the garden hose with fresh water in to the strainer to have engines flushed at the same time?

Thanks,
Alex.
 
Hi Alex, sorry I dont have any experience with your type of set up , better consult with the experts.

Good luck!
 
Alex.

The way I do it is to hook things up, close the seacock and open the flush/crash valve. I then fill the bucket with water and put the garden hose, with a shut off valve on the end of the garden hose, into the bucket. I open the valve on the bucket and start the engine. I then throttle the garden hose to keep the bucket filled with water and let the engine run to flush everthing with fresh water. As stated above, I am only doing the raw water circuit, as these are closed cooling systems. When I "feel" that I have flushed the system well enough, I shut the garden hose and let the engine suck the bucket empty and shut the engine down. I then fill the bucket with 8 or so gallons of antifreeze and restart the engine until it sucks the bucket empty and shut down the eninge and start counting the days until March 1st.

In your case, with a raw water cooled engine, I would definitely let the engines come up to temp and get the thermo to open and cycle a few times. That way you can ensure that AF is throughout the entire circuit.
 
Dominic,

Thanks a lot for clarification.

Alex.
 
osd9 said:
In this configuration, the setup works as a "crash Valve" or "Dewatering valve". If you spring a leak, you open the crash valve, close the seacock, and use the engines to suck out the water from bilge, hopefully giving you enough time to get back to safe harbor....you know....a "water let'r out'r"....
Click to expand...

When I ran through the post quikly I missed this important part. Now this is some deap thinking and creative engineering. Using your engines as a super fast bilge pump, A+++ :thumbsup:
Try presenting this safety feature to your insurance and hopefully they'll give you additional discount.

I'll give it a shot to replicate similar setup for my boat.

Thanks,
Alex.
 
Alex...I have to give credit where credit is due...I engineered the entire Idea of a crash valve all by myself...:grin:...seriously though, the previous owner, although he is right this very minute trashing my boat ownership abilities in another thread , installed the original crash valves. I simply made some modifications so that I could utilize the "itzy-bitzy" plastic additions for flushing and winterizing...
 
Dominic,

Nice engineering work. I found these:
Diesel_2.jpg


HERE: http://www.yachtsofstuff.com/userPostings.asp?xID=yachtsofstuff&cexs=mtg
1" $89.99, 2" $225.99.
 
Harold:
I've seen those before and the concept is fine, however, I can tell you from experience, on my current and previous boats that I've installed valves on, one of the biggest issues and challenges to overcome is....space.

In my 410DA, I have both mains, with massive 2" setups, and the genie, all stuffed into a very small area. By adding the crash/flush valve setup, once you overcome the space issue, you then have be concerned with ALL the valves being able to swing in ALL the possible configurations. I'm sure it sounds easy, but I can assure you that the challenge is real.
 
Dominic,

I believe you! I just like to post items like that for informational purposes; In case someone else is looking for alternate solutions. As a matter of fact, I like the tub idea so much that I am putting a parts list together to make one for next year. It seems like a much easier way to fill and flush antifreeze.

Thanks again for your post.
 
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