Volvo Penta Fuel Pumps

[DanM]

I have 2004 8.1 GiI Volvo Penta engines and recently had issues with fuel starvation at higher RPM's on one motor. A dock mate with the same VP's had this problem on both motors this year. After research and inspection of my friends pumps, the issue is that the internal areas of the pumps are painted. As they age the paint starts to bubble, peel, and clog ports. Never in my decades of messing with motors have I seen this. I contacted VP but as usual they will not speak directly to you. A Google search has shown this is becoming a common problem with these VP pumps. Do other manufactures paint the insides?

At about $1200 per pump (plus labor if you hire a mechanic) this misstep has created a new business for at least one entrepreneur. He takes your pump(s), tears them down, removes internal/external paint via chemical or abrasives, repaints them (yep, you guessed it, outside only), checks the high and low pressure pumps, reassembles them with new o-rings/gaskets, tests them again, and ships them back. He charges $300 each if you don't need HP or LP pumps, $430 if you do. I plan on using his service this winter.

This was part rant and part for information if you're finding issues with VP fuel starvation that filter replacement doesn't resolve. I'm not throwing shade on Volvo Penta as overall I am happy with their engines, just not this particular issue.

[Viper]

Failures resulting from painting fuel related components internally isn't a Volvo specific problem, Merc had issues with their Gen III Cool Fuel units because of it too. Don't know who's brainchild that was but it's never a good idea.

[tomschauer]

But they look good on the assembly line!

[bud37]

Really makes you wonder about who signs off on this kind of nonsense, don't it.....had to be a drawing with the specs on it that crossed someones desk.....sheesh......

[jcoll]

I've seen this issue in some dock mate's boats and I wondered if the ethanol in the fuel had anything to do with the problem.

[mjk1040]

U can almost bet ethanol had everything to do with it, not to mention any additives too!

[Viper]

I think it's just a reaction with gasoline period. Ethanol was already out when these things were designed so I suspect that was considered. I've worked on boats with the issue that never saw E fuel which is common here. I think they just underestimated the effect gasoline would have on the coating. They probably fell for a coatings sales pitch and ran with it.

[jcoll]

Those coatings guys are pretty hard core I had one try to sell me on coating the shop floor. 70 years of grease and oil soaked into poor concrete and he assured me it would stick I had my doubts and didn't do it. I would hope Volvo would try to reduce the costs. They're getting a bad reputation on this one.

[bud37]

First, thanks to DanM for posting this....I am quite sure that this has and will be creating a lot of difficult to diagnose symptoms for many and after reading about this I for one have put this away for future reference.Seems to me that perhaps they were trying to use a less expensive alloy and then coating/ painting it.........types of alcohol and aluminium don't get along corrosion wise so if these parts are an aluminium alloy even removing the coating may and I say may, show an issue down the road. It would be interesting to find out what the upgraded parts are now made of alloy wise.Perhaps it is the same part, just not coated ???? True that this is an industry wide problem so far..... ...

[DanM]

Update: Fuel pumps are on my work bench and the port shows significant flaking paint. All I had to do was touch it and it dislodged. Definitely would have become a fuel starvation issue next season. Starboard pump's paint was starting to bubble under the fuel filter. I have not yet gotten into the inner chamber.

I spoke with a reputable VP certified repair center and they're beginning to see cases of this but it's not just VP's. It's is also happening with Merc's. Wonder if the pumps are made by the same manufacturer. Glad I discovered this before something unhappy and/or dangerous happened. I'll be sending them off for rework in the coming days.