Your Guide To the Cleaning Marine Heat Exchanger

Marine heat exchangers are the cooling systems for nautical vehicles. It is the marine version of the cooling system that you get in a car. In this case, the sea water passes through the heat exchanger and absorbs the heat from the engine coolant. It is then finally discharged overboard.

Marine heat exchangers do not have moving parts and so there is very little that can go wrong. Problems arise only when the heat exchangers get blocked with debris. Furthermore, the heat exchangers can develop leaks externally as well as internally. To get rid of the debris that has accumulated in the inlet chamber of the heat exchanger, you need to engage yourself in cleaning marine heat exchanger.

Get started in cleaning marine heat exchanger

Doing away with the debris should be a simple operation, as the good marine heat exchangers are equipped with a de-mountable end cover at the inlet. You can also seek the installation of a good capacity raw water strainer within the raw water inlet hose. Another good option while cleaning marine heat exchanger is to mount a proper hull strainer that will not let the debris enter the system.

If required you can take the marine heat exchanger to a radiator shop for a thorough cleaning. The radiator shop should have have some experience handling cleaning marine heat exchangers. Cleaning a marine heat exchanger is actually a two step process. Firstly, you need to clean the unit with a strong alkaline solution for removing organic dirt, like oil and secondly, the unit must be cleaned in an acid solution.

Sometimes if you need a comparatively less amount of cleaning for the heat exchanger, all you need to do is leave the heat exchanger in the system. You can clean the jacket waterside in the same manner as an automobile cooling system is cleaned; for this, you can use any of the radiator cleaning solutions that are available in the market. The process of cleaning marine heat exchanger can also be done by making use of a small diameter long handle brush that cleans the small tubes on the raw waterside.

When cleaning marine heat exchanger, do a post-cleaning inspection, which helps you to know whether there are any missed leaks.