Running an inboard diesel ashore without cooling water?

[DaveS]

That's more or less what I do. By the time I have motored from my mooring to the lifting place in the adjacent marina the engine is nicely warmed up. When she's in position I stop the engine, whip off the sea water inlet hose from the cooling pump (1GM10), substitute a short length of hose into a bucket of fresh water and antifreeze, 50-50, then restart the engine and run until the water coming out the exhaust is bright blue. It sounds involved, but in practice it's about 5 minutes work and, it seems to me, an awful lot easier than faffing about with hoses on land, trying to get an idling engine to warm up.

The Volvo operating manual recommends removing the thermostat and putting back the cover with the thermostat seal in place before running the engine to draw in the antifreeze mix. That way there's no need to warm it up: just a minute of fresh water flush then half a bucket of antifreeze mix. I fitted a tee piece, two valves and a couple of metres of hose tail into the CW suction side to simplify this. In theory, the latter could also act as an emergency bilge pump, but I'm hoping to never put this to the test!