Jabsco Freshwater Pump Falls Asleep

[CommodoreDoug]

Greetings all on this drizzly morning in Admiralty inlet. I have a new chapter to add to the never-ending saga of the always cycling variable speed freshwater pump.

My Jabsco pump-installed about 18 months ago-has stopped cycling and now seems to enter sleep mode. It first happened three days ago and I figured the tank was low or empty but turned the circuit off and back on nonetheless and it roared to life.

Now every time I need to use the gallley or head faucets I have to turn off the water pressure switch and turn it back on.

It can't be the breaker as the pump is obviously getting power and if it were a giant air bubble the pump wouldn't prime at all, so I am at a complete loss.

I have owned five sailboats over the last 36 years, every one with a freshwater pump and I have never experienced this problem.

No doubt the answer is simple and obvious and I'll feel like an idiot when one or more of the great minds who frequent this forum povide the solution, but I am eager to be humbled so fire away.

Thanks and warmest greetings from S/V Egret,

Doug

[Stu Jackson]

Doug, those pumps were installed on new C355s, the successor to our C34s. Their skippers reported a tremendous numbers of failures.



You may want to consider two things:


1. Buy a Shruflo or Johnson pump, better stuff


2. Get a "normal" pressure pump instead of the variable models.


You could install an accumulator if the noise bothers you. It doesn't bother me on our 32 year old Shurflo, I know it's working.