I have been having some troubles with my manual bilge pump for a while now and have just about decided that it is due for replacement but before spending more B.O.A.T dollars thought I would see if the collective knowledge of the forum could offer any possible solutions.

The current pump is an old Whale Gusher 10 MK 2. Some time ago it became very unreliable in being able to suck the water up from the bilge (about a 2m rise from bottom of bilge to pump). For a while I could get it to work by pumping furiously for a while until it began to draw then even that stopped being successful.

It is old so forked out for a service kit with new diaphragm and internal valves. When fitted the pump worked quite well for a very brief time but has now once again returned to not being able to suck the water out of the bilge. I have had it apart a number of times to see if I can find an obvious solution but it seems to me to be a very simple (but effective) design there does not appear to be that much that could be causing the problem.

what I have observed is that when I take the suction pipe out of the bilge and fill it with water (prime it) it will suck that water out of the pipe. But if i quickly immerse the end of the pipe into the bilge water and pump it still fails to suck up the bilge water.

is there something obvious I am missing here of do I just need a new pump?

if it is the latter. Better give me your recommendations on what manual bilge pump you would recommend.

thanks.

Thanks Crusoe. Think I will start with replacing the inlet hose as it is very old and hard/brittle and add a new strainer with a one way valve. I would do this anyway if I replaced the pump so it doesn't matter. I'll see how that goes and if it is no better look at replacing the pump.