We're getting our last minute items checked off the list before heading out to the Gulf Islands this Saturday and I realized I hadn't finished reconnecting my manual bilge pump to the new plumbing...and I was almost done. I thought it would be a good time to take it home and open it up before reconnecting. I found what everyone else has found, crumbling aluminum and failing rubber valves despite a rather new looking exterior. There's plenty of negative reviews of this thing and some are helpful enough to point you in the direction of the plastic Titan pump, but the Titan uses a different bolt pattern and I don't have enough time to fill the old holes and drill new ones before our trip. Against my better judgement, I ordered a replacement Gusher 10 Mk3. My only saving grace was the 5 year warranty that, again according to reviews, Whale is actually good at honoring.
When the new unit arrived, I needed to rotate the pump body relative to the bracket so the inlet was facing forward when the unit was mounted. While I was at it and had tools in hand, I decided to take a look at the inside and found this:
If you look close at the bottom of the pump body, the "epoxy coating" that's supposed to protect against the corrosion is so thin, you can see the cast aluminum. Same thing inside the inlet and outlet ports. It's even worse under the valves.
I hate companies that take advantage of customers. The reviews of this pump go back as far as you want to look. Many explaining that it only lasted a few years before corroding enough to not seal properly, but Whale doesn't seem to want to do anything about it and continues to sell these claiming they are "Robust design stands up to the toughest marine conditions". It's even more frustrating knowing this is a crucial component most users won't touch until it's absolutely needed. They make the problem almost worse by selling a potential replacement pump that doesn't use the same mounting holes.
Reassembly of the pump after flipping the pump body and installation offered more frustration. There's an inconsistent attempt to isolate the stainless hardware from the aluminum with nylon bushings at some points, but direct contact at the other end of the bolt, the yellow coating was too thick in the holes for the hardware to pass through requiring drilling them out to fit, and all the bolts are metric (Ok, now I'm just complaining, but you get the picture of how last night went)
I remember talking with the owner of Port Townsend foundry when I was picking up my new strut last year. He had a plug of a whale pump body sitting on a shelf. When I asked about it, he said that he had a pretty well-off customer who was tired of dealing with these pumps so he hired the foundry to make replacement bodies out of bronze. I asked him how much that was setting the customer back and he gave me the standard boat answer; "if you have to ask....".
When the new unit arrived, I needed to rotate the pump body relative to the bracket so the inlet was facing forward when the unit was mounted. While I was at it and had tools in hand, I decided to take a look at the inside and found this:
If you look close at the bottom of the pump body, the "epoxy coating" that's supposed to protect against the corrosion is so thin, you can see the cast aluminum. Same thing inside the inlet and outlet ports. It's even worse under the valves.
I hate companies that take advantage of customers. The reviews of this pump go back as far as you want to look. Many explaining that it only lasted a few years before corroding enough to not seal properly, but Whale doesn't seem to want to do anything about it and continues to sell these claiming they are "Robust design stands up to the toughest marine conditions". It's even more frustrating knowing this is a crucial component most users won't touch until it's absolutely needed. They make the problem almost worse by selling a potential replacement pump that doesn't use the same mounting holes.
Reassembly of the pump after flipping the pump body and installation offered more frustration. There's an inconsistent attempt to isolate the stainless hardware from the aluminum with nylon bushings at some points, but direct contact at the other end of the bolt, the yellow coating was too thick in the holes for the hardware to pass through requiring drilling them out to fit, and all the bolts are metric (Ok, now I'm just complaining, but you get the picture of how last night went)
I remember talking with the owner of Port Townsend foundry when I was picking up my new strut last year. He had a plug of a whale pump body sitting on a shelf. When I asked about it, he said that he had a pretty well-off customer who was tired of dealing with these pumps so he hired the foundry to make replacement bodies out of bronze. I asked him how much that was setting the customer back and he gave me the standard boat answer; "if you have to ask....".
