Battle plan for flushing heat exchangers .

[aerobat]

Hello gents !

I think i will go forward and flush my heat exchangers hoping to bring a bit down my temps ( kad44 ) .

Ideally i would like to do it while in winter storage and i think i have a plan how to setup the piping on the turbo and impeller pump hoses , dillute the decalcer and circulate it via a bilge pump .

The basic situation : boat is on dry , fully winterized with heat exchangers full of antifreeze .

Beyond obvious caution on ambient temps when replace my antifreeze with the decalcer i,m asking myself how i remove the decalcer after i circulated it . Unfortunetaly i struggle to put my boat on muffs and fire it up to flush with fresh water.

Any creative ideas ? I do not think its an idea to leave the decalcer for a period of time in the heat exchangers .

Just drain the raw water side ?

Is it generally a way better idea to do it on the water since i canninstantly fire up the engines and even warm them up before flushing ?

Btw : i plan this as decalcer :


Antikalk LIQUI MOLY 25047 Marine Antikalk anti calcare Kanister 5 Liter | eBay.de

Thanks for any hints !

 

[oldgit]

Youtube has several videos on this if you need a hint or two.

 

[Alicatt]

It is on my list of tasks when the boat comes out the water, the starboard engine raw water turbo intercooler seems to have a restricted flow, as long as I keep the revs low it runs within the normal temp range, but push the revs up and the flow does not increase, then the silicone hoses collapse from the suction.
I did reverse flush the raw water circuit with red Lyme but still not enough flow, so the intercooler has to come off. I did try and put an inspection camera into the intercooler but there are too many bends

 

[PCUK]

Can’t you remove the tube stacks and rod them through? That's the normal method I use.

 

[jon and michie]

as @oldgit says look at youtube some good videos

 

[aerobat]

Thanks ! I watched the videos and they arw great how to setup the circulation .

But i,m asking myself how to flush the descaler mix out of the system when on land . I think only way is firing up on muffs

 

[Dino]

I flushed my engines a few years ago with Wessex Proflush. I used a large plastic storage box fitted with a small bilge pump. I connected the feed pipe to the pipe on the raw water strainer and I removed the pipe that injects water into the water cooled exhaust and that returned the water to the storage box. I circulated the water for a few hours. Then I discarded the water from the storage box and replaced it with fresh water. A couple of minutes running it flushed it. I did that twice

 

[oldgit]

Just out of interest, the folks who have had most success with cleaning heat exchangers by flushing the raw water system are very patient folks.
In one case on a Princess 360 the flushing of each engine took 3 hours in one direction and then reversed for another 3 hours.
The results were impressive.

 

[aerobat]

I flushed my engines a few years ago with Wessex Proflush. I used a large plastic storage box fitted with a small bilge pump. I connected the feed pipe to the pipe on the raw water strainer and I removed the pipe that injects water into the water cooled exhaust and that returned the water to the storage box. I circulated the water for a few hours. Then I discarded the water from the storage box and replaced it with fresh water. A couple of minutes running it flushed it. I did that twice

Great idea ! Flushing with fresh water to getvthe decacler out of the system when boat in on land sound reasonable !

Did you started the circulation it with the raw watwr circuit drained or full ? Currebtly i have antifreeze in the raw water curcuit

 

[Dino]

You’ll need to drain the raw water system. My boat was in the water when I flushed it. I turned off the raw water inlet valve, removed the pipe off the valve and connected it to the flushing pump using a one way valve that caters for various sizes of hose. See photo below. Once I removed the hose from the inlet valve, most of the water in the engine drained into the bilge. You will need some sort of container to catch the antifreeze.

 

[Sianna]

try this one out, I did this to my KAD43.