FormulaM2Formula

I'm putting new drives on my 382 and they will have IMCO lowers. I am concerned about excessive water pressure, so I have two options.

1: Add a strainer with a pressure relief valve and add a water dump out the back.
2: Just add a pressure relief valve and add a water dump out the back.

I'm thinking I would rather go the strainer route which could save me some time if I ever get around to adding closed cooling, and it might save me some money later down the road anyway.

Does anyone have sea strainers for their engines on the 382? I'd like to get your suggestions (and photos if you have them) of where to mount the strainers. Also, any recommendations on where to put the water dumps would be appreciated. I'm sure I want them out the back, but debating about where on the back to put them.

Thanks,
Garrett

FormulaM2Formula

Anyone? Buehler?

RedDog382

Garrett,

Did you ever figure out a good place to mount sea strainers? I'm thinking about adding them to mine while I have the engines out.

FormulaM2Formula

Hi Chris,

Sorry for the long pause. I haven't been online much. Been planning the big upgrades.

Yes I did. Here's a pic. Not a very good one. I'll take some more this weekend while I'm working on it. I like the way it turned out. I'd almost be tempted to pull the flip up steps out completely and move the strainers forward and use the strainers from stainless marine if I was going to do it over.

The strainers I have clog up too easily because the don't have enough surface area. I plan to put some stainless screen wire in them this year to prevent them clogging. I had this happen on the sacremento delta after about 12 boats followed a guy into a shallow area and sucked up a bunch of plant life. Geez, was that a nightmare. I also didn't put a shutoff valve on the intake side of the strainer. I may add that this year too. The problem is that if the strainers are below the water line. Take off the lid, and the boat starts filling up with water. And, I've discovered, that the bilge pumps can't hardly keep up, especially if you take both lids off at the same time.

Garrett

RedDog382

Garrett,

Thanks for the input. Want to add these if I can find a good location to rig them. OSO Steve recommended the Stainless Marine also ... think I will go with them.

Are you feeding water from the drives or did you go to a hull pick-up?

FormulaM2Formula

I kept the feed from the drives. I think there might be some advantages to adding hull pickups, but I didn't really explore it. I've also heard that it is a good idea to keep water going through the drives to help with cooling even if moving to hull pick ups. I guess that the drive water would just go straight to dumps in this case. I put dual dumps on each side and put a pressure relief on the strainer. My opinion is that the pressure relief should go on the clean water side of the strainer to prevent starvation from dumping water as pressure builds on the dirty side as the filter starts to clog.

The water intake goes through the strainer and then to the raw water pump.

The reason I chose to not use the stainless marine strainers are that they are quite a bit taller than the one I used. I can't remember now all the trade offs, but I know I couldn't mount them where I have the current ones mounted, and I *think* that I would have had to remove the flip up steps to have enough clearance for the stainless marine ones.

I have also *heard* that some of the bronze strainers are better strainers. Several of these strainer companies have been around for a long long time building strainers for off shore boats/yachts. I didn't find this out until after I already had mine in, but I think I'd check this out more if I was doing it over.

Here's a external pic of the dual water dumps. I only use one dump tube on each side with a pressure relief valve on the strainer. But, I thought, hell, if I'm drilling holes in a perfectly good boat, why not drill a couple more. I figured it would be good to have just in case I get more exotic on the power some day. Believe me, I sweated drilling those holes. Not to mention I drilled them in August last year in Phoenix. I did it at night. I drank a beer after it was over to relax.

I like the way I have mine mounted. It is solid. I used 3/4" x 1.5" aluminum bar mounted in to the aluminum that the steps are on. I used all stainless cap screws and nylock nuts w/ flat washers. If I hadn't been in such a hurry, I would have powder coated the aluminum white first, but there always time for future projects.

The new drives are on the boat in this pic. They hadn't even been in the water yet.

G.

RedDog382

Garrett,

How did the shorter drives work out and what are the DPM stickers on your drive? I assume someone that beefed up the drives for you ...?

Can you explain the need for pressure relief valve/water dump to me?

Thanks,

Chris

t500hps

I just found this thread and am real interested in this too!!!

RedDog382

Russ,

See my thread in G.D. section also. Good information coming back.

Chris

FormulaM2Formula

Hi Chris,

I didn't have a chance to take more pics. I'm taking days off work to finish the boat.

DPM is ****'s Performance Marine. **** Tryce (aka Mr. Gadget on OSO) built the drives for me. They XR uppers with some build modifications that are supposed to increase lifetime of upper gears. The IMCO lowers contain all standard Mercruiser parts to make it easier to get parts if they break.

Since my drives were too low (stellings boxes were added after the original build and drives were not raised), the shorties worked out great. I was expecting to lose some speed with the XR drives vs. XZ, but I didn't. My only thought is that the 2" shorties eliminated some drag that existed from the drives being too low before.

The IMCO lowers supposedly will generate a lot more water pressure than the Mercury lowers. A lot of people run pressure reliefs to compensate.

I have seen 74.8 GPS on salt water with the new setup. I think the drive oil gets hot on long runs and reduces internal friction because it won't do that right off the dock.

Garrett