I'm taking over a bunch of maintenance on my inlaw's 1998 270 DA. One of the project's I'm tackling for the spring is replacement of their hot water heater. I thought I'd share some pics of the project along the way.
To start, I noticed during winterization that there was a ton of corrosion in the corner of the heater. I wasn't sure if the tank itself was leaking, but it looked bad. Also, their water system has a horrendous smell that I'm trying to rectify and I figured getting rid of the ancient tank would be a start.
The tank was original, and looked like it was melting away. As it turns out, it was installed directly on the shelf there, and water from years of cleaning had gotten under there and taken it's toll.
Here's a pic of the back side of the tank. You can see the corrosion there too, plus all the dirt and grime of 24 years of operation. I wanted to clean that up too.
Now it was time to try to remove the tank. I opened the front to clip the 120VAC wires easily, removed the 15 MM pex hoses from the elbows, and got the overflow hose cut off. Easy so far. It was fastened by 2 screws each in 2 attachment feet. The front ones came our surprisingly easy. The back ones - were hidden and really hard to get at. So I tried to just pull it out. No dice.
But what happened is the case of the heater basically crumbled. The aluminum bottom was totally gone, and the back panel had gaping corrosion holed in it. As the cover came off sopping wet and stinking fiberglass insulation fell off. You can see it falling in the bilge below. This boat suffered a near sinking last year, and I'm sure that was mostly responsible for the wet insulation.
Once the cover was out of the way along with wads of the insulation, and the main tank was visible. Turns out it's round under that square case. The mounting bracket is actually attached to the tank itself, not the thin frame. Eventually I moved enough of the wiring and hoses to engage the screws with help of a long extension on a cordless driver. After that the tank came out easily.
Here's a pic of it on my workbench with most of the fittings removed.
Once out, I was left with a puddle of goo and insulation. I'm in the process of cleaning that up along with the rest of the bilge, but a need a hose and warmer weather to do it.
In the mean time, I've got all the fittings attached to the new Kuuma 5 gallon tank. The dimensions are almost the same in every respect. The Kuuma tank comes with no fittings, so I was able to clean up are reuse all the old fittings. One difference is the pressure relief value needs a 3/4" threaded to 1/2" barb fitting vs. a 1/2" threaded to 1/2" barb. A trip to Ace took care of that.
Note the areas circled in red. These are nipples for engine heat exchanger heating. This boat is raw water cooled so doesn't have a heat exchanger function. The nipples on the old tank were severely corroded and the loop had gunk it it, so I just clipped them short and pinched them closed.
I also fabricated some spacer blocks to keep the tank a bit elevated. I used some spare 1/2 Starboard I had laying around. I made spaces for under each mounting bracket, plus under the center for support. The center ones will he held in place with a stainless screw, and the bracket ones just with the mounting screws.
That's it for now until I can hose things down.
I'm also working on replacing the batteries, the dead battery charger, and all the dash panels with a Flounder Pounder dash panel kit.
To start, I noticed during winterization that there was a ton of corrosion in the corner of the heater. I wasn't sure if the tank itself was leaking, but it looked bad. Also, their water system has a horrendous smell that I'm trying to rectify and I figured getting rid of the ancient tank would be a start.
The tank was original, and looked like it was melting away. As it turns out, it was installed directly on the shelf there, and water from years of cleaning had gotten under there and taken it's toll.
Here's a pic of the back side of the tank. You can see the corrosion there too, plus all the dirt and grime of 24 years of operation. I wanted to clean that up too.
Now it was time to try to remove the tank. I opened the front to clip the 120VAC wires easily, removed the 15 MM pex hoses from the elbows, and got the overflow hose cut off. Easy so far. It was fastened by 2 screws each in 2 attachment feet. The front ones came our surprisingly easy. The back ones - were hidden and really hard to get at. So I tried to just pull it out. No dice.
But what happened is the case of the heater basically crumbled. The aluminum bottom was totally gone, and the back panel had gaping corrosion holed in it. As the cover came off sopping wet and stinking fiberglass insulation fell off. You can see it falling in the bilge below. This boat suffered a near sinking last year, and I'm sure that was mostly responsible for the wet insulation.
Once the cover was out of the way along with wads of the insulation, and the main tank was visible. Turns out it's round under that square case. The mounting bracket is actually attached to the tank itself, not the thin frame. Eventually I moved enough of the wiring and hoses to engage the screws with help of a long extension on a cordless driver. After that the tank came out easily.
Here's a pic of it on my workbench with most of the fittings removed.
Once out, I was left with a puddle of goo and insulation. I'm in the process of cleaning that up along with the rest of the bilge, but a need a hose and warmer weather to do it.
In the mean time, I've got all the fittings attached to the new Kuuma 5 gallon tank. The dimensions are almost the same in every respect. The Kuuma tank comes with no fittings, so I was able to clean up are reuse all the old fittings. One difference is the pressure relief value needs a 3/4" threaded to 1/2" barb fitting vs. a 1/2" threaded to 1/2" barb. A trip to Ace took care of that.
Note the areas circled in red. These are nipples for engine heat exchanger heating. This boat is raw water cooled so doesn't have a heat exchanger function. The nipples on the old tank were severely corroded and the loop had gunk it it, so I just clipped them short and pinched them closed.
I also fabricated some spacer blocks to keep the tank a bit elevated. I used some spare 1/2 Starboard I had laying around. I made spaces for under each mounting bracket, plus under the center for support. The center ones will he held in place with a stainless screw, and the bracket ones just with the mounting screws.
That's it for now until I can hose things down.
I'm also working on replacing the batteries, the dead battery charger, and all the dash panels with a Flounder Pounder dash panel kit.