Volvo 2030 bilge filler

[typhoonNige]

Has anyone else suffered from the following?
I found 50 litres or more of seawater in the bilges after a short trip from mooring to marina. After pumping and sponging it out I searched for leaks, with and without the engine running and found nothing. It was only when the engine was run at fairly high revs that the problem was apparent - seawater hosing out of the heat exchanger overflow pipe at an alarming rate. The cause was a partially blocked water inlet at the exhaust elbow. This caused enough back pressure to allow seawater to flow directly into the coolant side of the heat exchanger via the rubber end cap.

After several flushes with fresh water and a new exhaust elbow, the system was refilled with fresh coolant and all appears to be fine.

The reduction in seawater flow from the exhaust outlet was not enough to be noticed or to trigger the exhaust temperature alarm so on a longer trip the boat could have suffered more than damp bilges. Another reason to carry a spare exhaust elbow on a long passage, and to regularly check the bilges!

 

[Ruffles]

Mine has done this twice in 11 years. Solution was to replace the exhaust manifold. Are you sure it was blocked and not restricted by corrosion? It wasn't obvious when I blew into the inlet so I took it to RK marine and compared with a new one.

 

[Allergy]

Volvo 2030 problem?

Hi Typhoon

I had the same problem with my 2020 & sail drive, especially with the partially blocked intercooler & exhaust elbow.
I think I have sorted it by having a vetus raw water strainer between the sail drive & the raw water pump and an annual descale of the exhaust elbow.
I have a tell-tail water stream which taps off the hose to the elbow. Since keeping the elbow clean, i.e. descaled, the tell-tail is just a steady dribble instead of jet of water.
Incidentally, it is a right job to get the intercooler tube equally spaced between each rubber endcap. Just 13mm longer would make all the difference in the endcaps gripping the tube.
Hope this helps
Alan

 

[Cantata]

I had the same result (on a 2020) from simply a loose hose-clip on the inlet end of the heat exchanger.
Be warned that draining the block doesn't necessarily drain all the coolant from the system. If you have a loop to a hot tank, for instance, it won't drain that, as I found the other day when I set about ensuring the whole system was flushed through and not just the block. The muck that came out of other parts of the system, when I had flushed the block several times before, was unbelievable.

 

[john_morris_uk]

I have had the same problem - and I started a thread on it about a year and a half ago. I ended up taking my Exhaust injection elbow off and cleaning it in acid. It decoked it thoroughly and solved the problem perfectly. I tried brick cleaner, patio cleaner and caustic soda (ok I know the caustic is alkaline smarty pants!) They all seemed to work a bit and eventually it came clean.

 

[Skylark]

Gosh! That's 4 of you in less than 24 hours. To help the rest of the 2030 owners, what sort of hours and duty cycle have the engines seen?

Mine is now at about 800 hours in 10 years. I haven't yet experienced this issue, thankfully.

 

[Stork_III]

Gosh! That's 4 of you in less than 24 hours. To help the rest of the 2030 owners, what sort of hours and duty cycle have the engines seen?

Mine is now at about 800 hours in 10 years. I haven't yet experienced this issue, thankfully.

Exhaust elbow blockage problems are not confined to MD2030. I had the same on my MD2020, with low power/black smoke/soot appearing between one weekend and the next. elbow almost totally blocked, 8mm dia aperture left. Problem seems to be a result of low speed running leading to over-cooling and carbon deposition at the elbow bend. 800 hrs in 10 years, I would take off elbow and check for build up.

 

[Heckler]

Gosh! That's 4 of you in less than 24 hours. To help the rest of the 2030 owners, what sort of hours and duty cycle have the engines seen?

Mine is now at about 800 hours in 10 years. I haven't yet experienced this issue, thankfully.

David
On Sonsy Lass, it had done about 1200 hours when it became noticeable, mine was rotten as a pear after I cleaned it, had to fit a new one, not cheap!
Stu

 

[typhoonNige]

Nice to know I'm not alone in this. drained and flushed the coolant circuit by disconnecting the feed to my calorifier and blowing through by mouth (easier now I am a non-smoker!). I refilled with fresh water and ran the engine briefly before repeating the process twice.
After the 3rd go I had clear, fresh tasting water coming through.

The elbow was choked to about a quarter of its normal diameter and the corrosion of the other end of the elbow was bad enough for me not to bother trying to save it. An expensive item to replace at about £145 but I feel a lot more secure than I would with one of dubious strength.

The engine performance has noticeably improved too!

 

[john_morris_uk]

Nice to know I'm not alone in this. drained and flushed the coolant circuit by disconnecting the feed to my calorifier and blowing through by mouth (easier now I am a non-smoker!). I refilled with fresh water and ran the engine briefly before repeating the process twice.
After the 3rd go I had clear, fresh tasting water coming through.

The elbow was choked to about a quarter of its normal diameter and the corrosion of the other end of the elbow was bad enough for me not to bother trying to save it. An expensive item to replace at about £145 but I feel a lot more secure than I would with one of dubious strength.

The engine performance has noticeably improved too!

Only £145 - mine is a high rise one and is multiples of that price!

 

[duncan99210]

At round about 2000 hours on our 2030, we had an impellor disintergrate. Chasing through the cooling system, including stripping the heat exchange got most of the bits but in the end I removed the exhaust elbow. The diameter of the exhaust had been reduced to about 1/3 of the space and the raw water flow through it was also much restricted. Cleaned it by use of a screwdriver blade, dentists pick and much elbow grease. Restored a full flow of raw water through the system and reduced fuel consumption. Now something I'd check on every other year - it takes about 1/2 an hour to get the elbow off and enable you to check the state of the flexible exhust pipe at the same time.

Talking to other folks, this is a common theme; all exhuast elbows get somewhat clogged with what is effectively limescale over time, more so if you often run the engine at low revs without much load, as is the case when charging the batteries. It probably more likely to happen then bore glazing but less trouble to remedy!