confused on coolent reservoir

[anaisdog]

my 1986 c34 hull 99 did not come with a coolent reservoir and after my impeller blew itself apart, my mechanic said i needed one.  dutifully paid for him to hang one off the door, in the head.  he said to keep it filled so I did. it somehow managed to empty itself, over the winter, while the boat was 10 feet in the air. new mechanic says it's not ingress, it's for egress - it is set up as an overflow for when the engine is running and if i fill it, it will be too much and overflow, hence the antifreeze all over the floor.  any idea how i tell who is right? 

[KWKloeber]

becki .  you should know by now... <wink> 
a pic of the overflow and a pic of where it's hose is connected to the engine.  Or a plane ticket to look at it.

kk

[anaisdog]

when i get to my boat, i will.  and no one comes to detroit.

[sailaway]

I own a 1986 hull 95 boat. It does not have a extra coolent  reservoir   anti freeze  is in the reservoir  you do not fill it to the top leave 2 inches of air space . The seawater impeller brings in seawater to cool the heat exchanger if you  don't have lake water you will ruin the impeller. The anti freeze impeller is different impeller. I don't think you need an extra coolent reservoir Charlie

[Craig Illman]

I added a coolant reservoir ala Ron Hill's Rubbermaid bottle on my 1990 C30. Two advantages. First, you keep air out of the system, reducing the risk of foaming and boil-over as well as reducing corrosion from reducing available oxygen. Second, you'll more quickly notice if you're losing coolant from a pin hole leak in the heat exchanger.

They've been in autos for many years... I'm sure Detroit wouldn't have incurred the expense if there wasn't significant benefit.

my three cents (inflation)

Craig

[Ron Hill]

becki :  Here's how a "coolant recovery " system works:

When the internal coolant heats it expands and the excess flows into the reservoir bottle.  As the engine cools the coolant contracts and coolant is sucked back from the bottle into the engine reservoir.

All autos and some boat engines came with a coolant recovery systems.  Catalina started to install them with the MKII M35BC engine. 

A thought