Figured out why the head was clogged SEE last post

J

jwrape

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I have a 74' Trojan F-44 motor Yacht with a Vacuum type head.
My head is the type that you push the silver button on the back of the unit, wait for the red light to turn to green and then press the pedal to flush. The Pump has been rebuilt but now I have a MAJOR clog that I cannot get unclogged.
The toilet never has flushed well but I have been plunging for hours and can't get it to move. Is there a secret?

My front head has a new pump and will suck you head off. It sucks like a air plane toilet. I am thinking I might have to finally replace the rear pump although it should be working good since it was rebuilt only 4 years ago and wasn't used for 3 years since.
Thanks for your advice.
 
"not used for 3 years"

could be part of your problem if the rubber parts took a set.

plunging helps but not always. first thing to check is if you can see something at the bottom of the head, in the venturi, under the ball valve. if you do pull it out with stiff wire.

Next are the duckbills on the pump inlet (and outlet). they're easy to pull, just undo the hose (watch for spill is the pump had been installed lower than the vac tank) and then unscrew the fitting.

have a set of spares, they're cheap, and when you clear the old one, if they look bad, replace them.

the venturi and the duck bills are really the only possible clogging spots on a VF although dont' discount calcium build up in the hoses if they're original to the boat.
 
Ah, see my lovely wife put the tank treatment in the bowl after we tried to pump out and I have a bowl full of Blue water, I see now i'm gonna have to vacuum the water out and try to unclog it.

But if I read your message correctly, since it sat for 3 years, it might need a new rebuild? You can hear the motor running but it takes forever to build up vacuum
 
The duckbill vacumn unit is easy to take apart and that is where the clog normally is.
I took mine apart and was suprised at 2 things, 1, how much is stunk and 2, how easy it was to dissasemble, clean and put back together. I would try that, since it can't hurt anything byt your nose!
 
So the duckbill vacuum unit, is is located in the Belge near the holding tank or in the bottom of the head? Honestly, i have only had this boat for a season and haven't worked on everything yet. If I am correct, i think the vacuum pump is in the belge but I'm not familiar with what the duckbill is actually.
 
Every boat is different. Look for your holding tank it should be right near that.
It will have wires coming out of it for the vacumn pump and the top will be held down with like 8 screws.
If you flush toilet and vacum pump turns on, then that will help you find it.
If it don't turn on, then it could be the pump that is bad or a breaker is popped.
 
The pump comes on when the button is pushed to start making vacuum, but it doesn't seem to be making enough vacuum lately and now that it's clogged all it does is bubble.
 
on an older boat, you probably have a vacuum tank (cylinder) and a separate vacuum pump. Find the pump... from the head, the hose goes to the vac tank, then to the pump and from then to the holding tank. the pump should be closer to the head than to the holding tank if the installer followed Sealand guidelines.

there is really not much to rebuild on the pump... just unclamp the hoses, and unscrew the fittings to get to the duckbills. clear whatever is clogging, and reassemble. if the DBs are hardened up, replace them.

real simple.
 
Ok, sounds easy, where can i find the rebuild kits? Online somewhere or West marine or what?
 
Well I finally figured out what happened. Every time I would "try" to flush the head the pump motors would turn off and it sounded like one would spin longer than thte other on the de-acceleration. So I turned it on and went into the belge. I found the vacuum pump and saw that the motor pulley set screw had comelose and the belt slung off. I put it back on and then it flushed better butnot completely. Still have to work on it because now it's still mostly clogged, it barely goes past the water door. Doesn't seem to go all the way into the tank.
 
BoatFix carries the duckbill valves. Do a search on SeaLand, then scroll around until you find them.
 
"pump motors would turn off and it sounded like one would spin longer than thte other on the de-acceleration"

the pump motors? more than one??? belt driven? all the VF pumps i've seen dont' have belts, unless the early ones did. the motor shaft is connected to the bellow with a set screw. Incidently, one of mine got loose a few days ago, there is a hole in the shaft that's hard to see in which the set screw goes.

are you sure you're not confusing the Vac pump with a belt driven water pump?
 
No, i know it's a Vacuum pump cause when it works properly it sucks like a airplane toilet and the front head has a new pump already in it and it will suck you head off. It actually has directions on the wall that say to push button when you come in, do you business and wait for the green light and then flush. It builds vacuum and then sucks everything down into the holding tank. I wish I had a picture but I don't right now. I will get one though.
 
I found a picture finally of what my pumps look like.
I have two of these that come on when I push the button.
They are Jabsco pumps
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They are mounted side by side.
I spoke to my Dad and he thinks there is some trash caught in the rear head Jabsco and it needs to be taken apart and cleaned.

All along I thought the front head had a new pump on it but come to find out it was just rebuilt and not replaced.
the rear one was rebuilt aswell but just doesn't have the same kind of vacuum and the front head.
 
Here's a better picture of one
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The weird thing I am thinking is that I have two of these running when I turn the rear head on. I'm wondering if maybe somewhere along the way my two pumps got wired together so thatboth come on when just one ot he toilets buttons are pushed. Because I know when I push the button for the rear head, both of them come on. I really need to do some more investigating intothe way this system works.
 
Well I finally removed the pumps and disected them to find the issue.
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And here is the torn diaphram that is causing the problem.
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jwrape, someone, at some point in the past, was quite resourceful.

Those Jabsco pumps are actually water pumps. Although when running dry, they do have the ability to generate a vacuum. Hooking the two together enabled them to replace the original (single) vacuum pump that came with the VacuFlush head - and surprisingly enough, they created enough vacuum to cause the toilets to flush!

Very interesting installation. A fine example of good ol' American ingenuity...! In the 35+ years that I've been in this business, I've seen quite a few workarounds. And some of them were absolutely amazing!
 
WOW! really??? I thought I had read they were water pumps but didn't realize that they were original.
The front head with the good pumps has the same setup and flushes perfectly and hasgreat suction.

That's kinda cool that these are a piece of american enginuity at it's finest. LOL! No wonder I had a hard time finding any pictures of anything like it.
 
So what type of pump, do you think, might have come originally in the 74' F44 Trojan Motor Yacht? Someone had to think that this was a better way to go rather than replacing a single pump on BOTH front and rear heads.

I did find it odd that it had two pumps but I have learned not to be surprised with the mechanics of this boat since it is 34 years old and has had over 4 owners since new and probably many more mechanics on board. I am almost sure that the previous owners were not mechanically inclined before my Dad's ownership and now mine. There were some shady electrical wiring and plumbing done when my Dad got it.

I remember my father having a REALLY hard time with both the heads when he first got it. After a season of fighting with it and constantly plundging the heads, he finally, one winter, removed the heads, and the plumbing all except the holding tanks and re-did all the piping with jaccuzi piping and rebuilt the pumps etc... He said when he replace the piping he found where it went from a 1 1/2" pipe all the way down to a pipe the size of your thumb.

He said how in the world is the stuff that you flush supposed to go through a pipe that small. LOL! After all that replacement, it has done very well until recently with the diaphram issue.
I remember asking him why trojan would have built it that way and he said it was definately someone's rigging that got it to that point. Maybe they made it where is would work but never work to accept a #2 down the pipes. :-)

Weird... i am glad to be getting to the point where things are not breaking as much and a lot of things are upgraded with new. This winter I just have to get the generator working correctly and then move on to re-varneshing all the wood on the outside. It is starting to show age and it about time to start sanding and varnishing. I don't look forward to it but it's so worth it after it's done.
 
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