Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

[Bondo]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

Ayuh,.... Somewhere on the Intake manifold, Before the T-stat should be a 1/2" pipe plug,....

That's the hot water feed....

Somewhere on the Circulatin' water pump(bolted to the front of the block) is another 1/2" pipe plug,...

That's the return...

Ayuh,... My quote from the end of agallant80's thread,....

While puttin' a Tee in the block drain will work, it's only 1/4" pipe, where as the provided port just aft of the t-stat housin' on the intake manifold is 1/2" pipe, same as the return,...

'n some t-stat housin's have a spare port, or you can Tee off the temp switch/ sender, which is also 1/2",...

 

[alldodge]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

Do it the way the book says and you should be OK.

Formula does it different and the block plug is smaller, guess it may heat the water up slower do to less volume. Never had any issue with not having hot water or over heating but Merc should know best.

 

[smokeonthewater]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

block drain would be way too small... I thought he said MANIFOLD drain.... that on the newer stuff is the big blue plastic plug

either way ya gotta be on both sides of the t-stat so hot water will flow through the coil

 

[alldodge]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

block drain would be way too small... I thought he said MANIFOLD drain.... that on the newer stuff is the big blue plastic plug

either way ya gotta be on both sides of the t-stat so hot water will flow through the coil

Guess the one in stalled by Formula I have must have never worked since 1994, and the hot showers I was having must have only been in my mind :facepalm:

 

[smokeonthewater]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

Guess the one in stalled by Formula I have must have never worked since 1994, and the hot showers I was having must have only been in my mind :facepalm:

easy killer.... wasn't attacking you.... there are lots of things in this world that work ok but COULD work better

20 years ago I put a lawn mower battery in my suburban because it was what I had and I didn't have the cash for a new proper battery... it worked and I left it in there for over a year... pretty sure tho that we could agree that it was too small.

Sorry if you thought my post was an insult

 

[wrench 3]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

The system on your 350 magnum should be about the same as my 454 magnum. If you don't have an engine alarm, you should have a spare port on the lower of the thermostat housings. If this one is occupied, you can tee into the temp sender on the manifold as I did. The link to the diagram in agallant80's post #20 should give you a good idea were to find the port in the water pump. With no heater hooked up it should be unused and plugged.
It would seem that it wasn't that unusual not to hook up the heat exchangers. My boat is a Tempest 260.

 

[sfitr]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

My engine is raw water cooled and I use my boat in salt water, will this harm my water heater?

 

[Ned L]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

It will shorten the life of the heater some. It may not make enough of a differnce for you to ever have an issue (I would run the question past the manufacturer). Keep in mind that with your raw water cooled engine the water will not be as how as with a 'fresh water' cooled engine. Your engine should have a 160? thermostat (and not the 190? + of a fresh water cooled engine).

 

[agallant80]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

Salt water will destroy anything given the time. With that said the water heater will more than likely die on its own before the salt messes with it.

 

[smokeonthewater]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

my closed cooling systems have 160 deg stats

 

[rivermouse]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

Why not add a heater core with circulating hot water from the engine to heat it and have it located inside of the fresh water tank . It would be simple, cheap and effective

 

[wrench 3]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

My engine is raw water cooled and I use my boat in salt water, will this harm my water heater?

If your operating a raw water cooling in salt water, it should be fitted with a fresh water flushing system to be used after each use. This will also flush the heat exchanger in the water heater and minimize the corrosion. If not fitted, you should get one or you may loose the engine.
According to the manufacturer your heater has an aluminum heat exchanger. There are heaters available with stainless steal exchangers if necessary.

 

[smokeonthewater]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

hmmm if you have an aluminum heat exchanger I highly suggest NOT using raw salt water in it... I suspect that you'll have have salt in your coffee in short order

 

[bruceb58]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

There are heaters available with stainless steal exchangers if necessary.

You would think a stainless steel heat exchanger wouldn't work too well. Pretty bad heat transfer through stainless.

 

[sfitr]

Re: Connecting water heater to engine ? Advice needed !

It will shorten the life of the heater some. It may not make enough of a differnce for you to ever have an issue (I would run the question past the manufacturer). Keep in mind that with your raw water cooled engine the water will not be as how as with a 'fresh water' cooled engine. Your engine should have a 160? thermostat (and not the 190? + of a fresh water cooled engine).

Yesterday I got a reply from Whale / Seaward . This was the answer regarding circulating salt water in the heat exchanger

"It should be fine to run salt water through your heat exchanger, it will defiantly shorten the life of the water heater because salt water is vary corrosive but it should not shorten it drastically

Thanks

Steve"