D4-260 charge air cooler

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spray

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I have a raw water leak into the bilge, I think it’s coming from the charge air cooler. Just quickly looking at spare prices e.g. o rings at £42.24 each and an insert £2599.20 I dread to think what a VP dealer would charge so I have decided to do the service myself, any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
 
O rings are all available online from specialist outlets. Just dismantle and measure one and your sorted. When I removed the charge air cooler and heat exchanger to descale I sourced all of these ancillary parts online. Remember VP don’t make o rings, they buy them in from the same specialist suppliers. I’d be surprised if the charge air cooler is leaking but again there are specialist repairers out there not necessarily in the marine industry.
 
Thanks for your information, was it a fairly easy job to remove? I have read elsewhere that these charge air cleaners are prone to leaking especially at moderate rpm which I think is happening with mine. A descaling might work if the boat was out of the water.
 
Whatever you do don’t cut corners with a sea water charge air cooler, if it fails you can easily write off the engine, that will cost a significant amount more than a few O rings, I agree VP don’t make the O rings but they decide on the specification and make sure it’s pressure tested.
 
Use genuine o rings as said if it leaks you will allow entry of sea water into the engine .

Strip the unit to check for corrosion where the end caps locate to the main housing , it’s likely that the mating surface is corroded away and you will need a new aluminium housing, the housing corrodes more in real terms than the tube stack , check the tube stack under pressure when rebuilt for leaks .
 
Not VP but CAT, but I've only just taken my 'Aftercoolers' (same ideas as your VP charge air coolers) off my CAT engines and dismantled. Both cores were pretty filthy and a chunk of the alloy housing on one cooler, where the end cap seal locates, had corroded with a small section eaten away. Don't ask how much CAT want for replacement housings!!! Anyway, a skilled engineer alloy welded and re-machined the housing, and a company that deals with aftercoolers/heat exchangers/car intercoolers etc. repaired, cleaned, rebuilt the coolers with new O-rings, painted and pressure tested them. All fine now. It wasn't cheap but they said they are now perfect. And vastly cheaper than replacement CAT parts..

In my opinion its worth chatting to good engineering companies if there is any damage etc, before shelling out on OEM replacement parts.
 
Thank you all for your replies.
Having had a good look at my engine, I think the leak had come from the recently replaced anodes , mainly the rear one. Perhaps the anode wasn’t tight at all. I will tighten it all up and take her out for a sea trial.
 
spray said:
Thank you all for your replies.
Having had a good look at my engine, I think the leak had come from the recently replaced anodes , mainly the rear one. Perhaps the anode wasn’t tight at all. I will tighten it all up and take her out for a sea trial.
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Simple solutions are good solutions. :cool: Hope this sorts the issue.
 
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