winterizing Faryman A30

[Seaweed2]

I was winterizing the Faryman A30 M diesel on my CD28 and ran about 5 gallons of RV antifreeze through the inlet hose. It took 2 or 3 minutes at the most. I felt good about it but then saw in the manual that it has a thermostat. Is it possible that the t-stat didn't open and there is unprotected water still jacketing the cylinder? It spit out a good deal of pink antifreeze from the exhaust during the 2 minutes. I can't afford to compromise this engine. Any thoughts? The folks at N.A. Faryman in Orlando seem to think I will be ok. I really want to trust them but I just need a little confirmation from someone who experiences colder temps in the winter.

[Frenchy]

Honestly, it would have been better to remove the thermostat. But I think that if you ran the engine for 15-20 minutes
on fresh water before you put the inlet hose into the RV antifreeze jugs, you will be okay, since the thermostat should
have been warm enough to open. If the total run time was only a few minutes, I'd suggest removing the thermostat and
re-winterizing. This is assuming you're in a place where temperatures drop below freezing and your engine is raw
water cooled. -- Jean

[Steve Laume]

Is this a raw water cooled engine or do you have a heat exchanger

If it is raw water cooled, then the thermostat comes into play. If you have a heat exchanger then you are good because that would only effect the internal cooling loop that is protected by permanent anti freeze.

Five gallons is a lot of antifreeze. I use less than a gallon for the raw loop on Raven, Steve.

[Seaweed2]

Thanks for the quick replies. We are having flurries today! It is a single cylinder with only raw water cooling. The thermostat housing is so small that I didn't think there was even one on the engine, but there is and it cannot be much bigger in diameter than a quarter. I am told there is a pinhole in it with a cotter pin through it to keep it open, so that would let some antifreeze pass but not much. I did not run the engine prior to hooking up the antifreeze and that is why I am having these concerns. Sounds like I should go back and do it again, this time making sure the engine is warmed. I was afraid of that and probably knew it deep down. A classic example of, "a job worth doing is worth doing well". Thanks for the feedback.

[Nebe]

You should also consider getting your engine nice and warm so you can pump out your engine oil and replace with new oil.

[Seaweed2]

So I went back to the boat and decided to pull the housing where the thermostat was just to make certain that the antifreeze was in the water jacket.

Thermostat housing

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After pulling the t-stat housing it took a while to chisel the old gasket out before I could remove the thermostat.

Housing off with t-stat intact

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Finally got it out and it looks like it was frozen open!

Thermostat out of housing shows open at ambient temp of 38 degrees F!

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The cylinder sleeve was full of antifreeze. I will replace the t-stat and the gasket. It is the smallest thermostat I have ever seen. Cute little thing. I also noticed that the petcock on the lower side of the engine, just above the water pump, would drain the water down in the cylinder if I opened it. Still not certain it would completely drain the sleeve, so I will do the complete job again next year but if it drains antifreeze then I will know it reached the sleeve. Thanks for the comments!

[Frenchy]

Good job! - and now you can rest easy. Yes, that is the tiniest thermostat I've ever seen too. It's probably been stuck
in that open position for a while. One tip- It's not a bad idea to test the new thermostat before installing. Heat it up in
a pan of water and see if it opens before the water boils. I wasted time and effort once before discovering the new
thermostat I installed was defective. - Jean

[Seaweed2]

We are expecting some temps down into the single digits in the next few days but I'm not worried! Thanks for the tip on testing the new one before installation. I guess we usually assume that because it is new it will function properly. A simple enough test to ward off a pile of headaches.