Water pump gear problems on TAMD 63P

baylabayla3288

baylabayla3288

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After a very nice season, with perfect weather and more than 1500 event free nautical miles, I decided to do the annual service to my TAMD 63 engines before lifting the boat. This time I decided to inspect the raw water pump gears. I had these replaced 3 years back due to gear surface deterioration. To my surprice the process has started again! As can be seen from the picture the surface on part of the gears is affected. Any knowledge out there on why this might hapend again? I know that the 63Ps had this problem with the original gears from at least ym 1998 but this should not happen to 3 year old original parts.
 
My 63P water pump leaked so decided to buy a service kit from Volspec. When Pump was removed the gear was showing severe deterioration along 2/3 of the tooth. Checked main drive cog and this looked in new condition. Had to buy a replacement gear for around £220 as had no intention of fitting pump with old gear. I spoke a friend who is a marine service engineer and Volspec about this and it seemed the problem was pretty unique, however I was advised to check the other engine for same problem. Removed the pump and the gear was showing similar damage so had to replace with another one. What was interesting was when ordering the service kit I was asked which water pump I had as the pump was replaced by Volvo, the new one having I believe a 3 bearing shaft rather than 2.
When examining the pump the shaft is not well supported and I believe can flex under load causing mis alignment and high local stresses on the teeth with resulting damage. The replacement pump shaft is better supported and must maintain better alignment so probrably eliminates this issue. If this happens again on mine I will look to fit the latter pump if feasible. Anyway your not alone with this issue and the consequences of tooth failure doent bear thinking about. Cant believe Vovo did not do a recall on these parts, but then it is a boat.
 
Early engine(old style heat exchanger car) had two piece bearing. Later engine ( plastic cap) had longer one piece bearing and second generation timing gears.
 
Thanks VP. It looks that the rest of the timing gears on my engines are fine so this could be related to the water pump design. Also the damages support this in my case as the pitting is occuring partly on the front and partly on the back of the teeths indicating an alignment problem.
 
HI VP, I guess your comment of revised pump and timing riles out the possiblity of substituting a later pump for the original 2 bearing pump. With your experience, it sounds as though this problem starts to occurr from day 1 of installation and gets worse with bearing wear. Roughly, what is the life of the pulley in hours when sustaining this problem.
Must admit when buying boat with these engines and researching potential problems, this one did not come up and I had believed the 63P to be a strong robust engine.
 
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