Over the weekend I installed two Jabsco Ballast Puppies in an 08 Malibu 23. I have tied into the main fresh water intake in the past using simer pumps. I have done probably 4-5 boats like this and never had any issues. I did the same thing and this time when I put the boat in the water it started to overheat. The temp got to about 207 and I shut it down. I let it cool off for a bit then closed the valve that shut the ballast off from the Tee in the line. After this I tried it again and the boat dropped back down to normal operating temp and ran fine. As soon as I open the valve the temp would start to climb. The only thing I can think of is that when the valve is open and the sacs aren't full it's pulling air through the pumps and the boat impeller is drawing air instead of water. This really bothers me cause I've done it so many times before with no issues. Does anyone else have any experience similar to this with the Jabscos? My only thought is that the impellers in the Jabsco pumps don't seal quite as tight as the simers do and allow a vacuum past the impeller. I ended up redoing the intake for the ballast system and tied into one of the existing drain holes in the boat. The hole was a little smaller and I was worried about it cutting the flow rate of the pumps but the fill and drain speed was really similar to when it was teed into the main fresh water intake. Both ways took appox 7-8 minutes to fill both 750lb sacs in next to the engine. Long story short it works great now, but I wanted to see if other have had similar problems with these pumps.
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