Head Identity

R

River Runner

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Member
Joined
Mar 7, 2017
RO Number
33941
Messages
72
OK. This is going to sound like a total noob question. I have entered this century and went from a porta potty on my last boat and a manual handle operated head on the previous boat.

So my question is... is there a site where I can identify the type of head I have? The head uses 2 buttons. The bottom button operates the macerator. It is a push button. The top switch is a push pull arrangement and is currently pushed in. It does not do anything. It is currently winterized but in the water so I'm not sure what is missing or possibly disconnected. The boat has no water in the holding tank. Does it use pressurized fresh water or river water to flush? My old manual head used river water.

I wish I could post pictures on here but have not figured out how yet.
Thanks
 
quote:
Originally posted by Robyns Nest

Take a picture and post would be your best bet.

Click to expand...


I have pictures but can't get them to post. I hit the insert image button nd all that comes up is "[/img} [/img]" and no way to copy my picture to there. I am on many other forums and all ask me for what file I want to copy once I hit that button and I select the file. How do you do it here?

Thanks

I will try this again...
 
Right click picture from other forum and select "copy image location". Then paste that link here between
leaving out the quotation marks.
 
OK, follow your water intake hose and see where it goes. The other end is either connected to your water tank or to a thru hull allowing sea water in.
 
I found out after looking at more pictures of heads online than I care to that what I have is a JABSCO Model 37010 series. What are the main issues with this unit? What spares should I have onboard? I also chased down wires from the switch last night to see that the switch that did nothing apparently turns on the sump evacuation pump for the shower. Good thing I'm not living on it yet... that would have been a bit difficult to take a shower! OK. So now I have to follow the supply line. There should be a ball valve on the incoming line if it uses river water to flush correct? On all of my previous boats, any through hulls get a shutoff. If winterized then they likely shut this off and blew it down to prevent the lines from freezing.
 
No issues per se with Jabsco, but they are cheap. Buy a rebuild kit. If the head looks like it hasn't been touched in years it's probably due for a rebuild. If everything seems to be in good shape you can keep the kit aboard for when it's time to use it. The most common problem areas for a head are the impeller and the joker (aka duckbill) valve. Your kit will have both.

If your head is a raw water flush model, the thru-hull intake 'must' have a working seacock. That isn't the same as saying that a previous owner didn't do something stupid, but it should be there.
 
OK. So I got the head functioning over the weekend. What I found are as follows...

Waste line to the through hull completely blocked. Cleared obstruction and it works fine now clearing the bowl... maybe too well. The bowl does not hold any water and the water coming into the bowl is just a slow trickle.

Since I have never seen this head operating as new, I am assuming that the bowl should hold some amount of water and not doing so means I have a bad joker valve or debris in the valve? I located the correct through hull for the head and opened it. Since the water coming into the bowl is less than I would expect I am going to assume that the intake impellor is faulty? Should the head flow as much in as out? My check for next weekend is to hook up my small compressor to the supply hose to the head and blow back down the line and out the through hull to verify that I have no blockage from debris and good flow. Otherwise I think it may be time for a replacement pump assembly.

Thoughts?

Thank you!
 
That head has a single pump motor which drives two impellers, separated by a plate, gaskets and o-rings. So while you might have an obstruction in the intake, it may also be a problem with the pump causing the intake side to lose suction.

What you have to think about is how much you want to invest in an old head that is very noisy (if you sleep on the boat, forget anyone staying asleep when it gets flushed) and isn't particularly efficient when it works well. For example you have no control over flushing - you push the button, you are pumping water through the system. This can be a problem if you get a clog, as pushing the button to get it to clear fills your holding tank. (Sounds like you don't have a holding tank, but if you live in Ohio as your signature indicates, I think you have to have one.) And then you are more likely to get a clog, because that head has no sort of vacuum action to cause the waste to evacuate quickly.

I'm sure you are not looking to spend a bunch of money on a boat you just bought, but the flip side is that I once spent a lot of wasted (and unpleasant) effort on that model head. Rebuilt the pump, then the pump motor burned out. Bought a new motor assembly, then decided to pull the plug when the better models like the Marine Elegance came on the market for a good price.

Think about where you want to go with this before you throw good money after bad.
 
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