Whale Gusher

I used my whale gusher for the first time in years. It would not prime after 25 pumps. The nozzle was under 3 inches of water. I realize the pump is 22 years old. The hose and connections appear fine. Is there a rebuild kit or something I can do to this thing?

Defender ( www.defender.com ) has everything you need for these (assuming it's a model 10 MK II or III). They sell complete kits in either nitrile (diesel resistant) or neoprene. Also, the plate that holds the exit valve may very well have corroded away on you (mine did), and these are also available. Given the price of these pumps , they are worth rebuilding. Just do a search on "gusher" from their home page, and I think you'll find everything you need on the first page returned from the search. Of note, I had to get one of these in service ASAP, and took the exit plate assembly out of a MKII that I already had on hand and it fit my MKIII pump without issue - I don't know why they say MKIII only on their plate kit, but I'd guess it would work on a MKII given my experience, but no promises

It doesn't take much to foul the valve flap in the pump. I rebuilt one and it worked fine for a few pump outs (bilge) then would not prime. I tried sticking my finger into outlet side of the pump thinking something might be stuck under the valve flap, did I mention this was a whale gusher for the bilge!? It still would not prime. When I took it apart again I did indeed find a 2" by 1/4" splinter under the flap, I think my finger was too large to get to the obstruction. I removed the splinter and reassembled and it has worked fine since. I also added a screen on the bilge side of the inlet hose.

The first time I used mine it took about 125 pumps to get it going. Have someone put their hand over the opening as you pump to see if they feel air. With mine you could feel air coming out but no water. After a good long while it picked up and started moving water. After that, no problem.
Best Regards,
Frank
E28 Valinor

I had a problem with mine this summer, took it apart, and a rubber band?? was in between the flapper and seal, sucking air past it. Removed the rubber band, put it all back together, and worked fine since. You just may find something, and it doesn't take much, in the way of an obstruction as your only problem. Otherwise, the rebuild kit may be the next route for you. It's worth taking it apart.

"Gusher" Don't Gush?

gulfcoaster said:

I used my whale gusher for the first time in years. It would not prime after 25 pumps. The nozzle was under 3 inches of water. I realize the pump is 22 years old. The hose and connections appear fine. Is there a rebuild kit or something I can do to this thing?

Click to expand...

After so many years, you might want to pull a new bilge hose thru from the pickup to the pump. Those old white spiral vinyl hoses do have a measurable life span. If there is a small crack or puncture anywhere in the line, you will never get a vacuum going. I just replaced all the hoses on the discharge side to the transom. They appeared solid, but once you get beyond a couple decades...

We will do the inside vacuum-side hoses next.
"All good clean fun."


As others have noted, in this and prior Gusher-related threads, these are high-end high-$$ pumps and are usually rebuildable.

Best,
LB

ps: Can you post up a picture of the pump?

bayhoss said:

The first time I used mine it took about 125 pumps to get it going. Have someone put their hand over the opening as you pump to see if they feel air. With mine you could feel air coming out but no water. After a good long while it picked up and started moving water. After that, no problem.
Best Regards,
Frank
E28 Valinor

Click to expand...

That's the way mine was before I rebuilt it. The Independence 31 has a very deep sump. I would estimate from the bottom of the sump to my pump must be at least a 7 foot rise. After rebuilding the pump, I've got prime and and am discharging water in about 2-3 strokes. I could tell my pump was failing as the number of strokes and rate of speed needed to pump to get it primed kept getting worse.

I've also been through junk caught in the flapper valves, and it is a good point that this is the first thing to check.

Before you buy a repair kit, take yours apart. If yours is like mine, you'll find that much of the hardware is frozen. After 22 years, a new pump might be a better way to go.

Whale Gusher pump rebuild

I just pulled mine out and did a full rebuild last week.
My pump is 20 years old and I think the PO did a rebuild at some point. The Whale rebuild kit was I think around $41.00 and it has everything you need unless the main T bolt is broken. Getting the complete pump out of the boat's location is sometimes the biggest effort. You either need 2 people or gorilla arms to reach everything.

But pull it out first and it should be obvious whether it's something stuck inside the pump or the flappers and/or diaphram are gone.

SS screws

I think it's a design issue when they use ss screws with painted aluminum to hold the internal flapper on. Over time, the small amount of corrosion set up by the SS and aluminum reaction is enough to bubble the paint and push the flapper off the seat, it doesn't take much to loose the suction. Nylon screws would work much better.

Thanks for all the feedback.

I'll head down next week and start to troubleshoot the problem..

Annual bilge pump test

This is a nice reminder of why it's a good idea to add an annual test of your manual bilge pump to your to do-list. I never used mine in anger (thankfully) but every spring as part of commissioning I would shut off the electric bilge pump and fill the bilge with fresh water, just to see whether the Whale pump would still work. I wondered whether I needed to then winterize it, but it seemed to dry out over the summer so that I didn't need to worry.

I kept a rebuild kit aboard as part of my spares, though of course that would not really be of any use in an emergency, would it?

Steve said:

I think it's a design issue when they use ss screws with painted aluminum to hold the internal flapper on. Over time, the small amount of corrosion set up by the SS and aluminum reaction is enough to bubble the paint and push the flapper off the seat, it doesn't take much to loose the suction. Nylon screws would work much better.

Click to expand...

Amen to that. I replaced my whale pump only 2 years ago, and in that time the aluminum housing had corroded enough to where it would not prime.
Took it apart, ground out the bubbled metal, repainted, and installed
new rubber. Kinda disappointing, only getting a couple years of
service before needing a rebuild.

Hi Martin and Steve,

I agree that the SS screw into the aluminum was a real bone head design. On both of these pumps that I have, I realized on disassembly that some residual water seemed to sit on the bottom part of the exit valve plate assembly leading to all sorts of corrosion, as noted. Luckily, the piece destroyed being the exit valve plate itself. On my rebuild, I've tried something but can't say yet on how long it will last. I had on hand Primocon (have had very good luck doing Primocon topcoated with hard epoxy bottom paint on prop and shaft with basically no fouling and minimal paint loss on the blade tips)

http://www.yachtpaint.com/usa//prod...ocon.asp?ComponentID=9841&SourcePageID=6941#1

so the inside of the pump body gets repainted with Primocon, and for the age old stainless in aluminum issues, I got out the tef-gel:

http://www.tefgel.com/contain.php?param=tefgel_infor

Hopefully, this will all last, but too soon to tell. It is a bit much to have to do this extra stuff on a pump that costs close to $300 bucks new, but that's why I decided to try the extra protection on rebuild.