My March Pump Sucks!

What is the deal with my March Pump. I have no issue priming it until I try to prime it with boiling wort. I've tried every thing I can think of, but it just will not stay primed when I'm trying to run boiling wort through it for the last 15 minutes of the boil. As soon as it stops boiling, there is no problem. I open the valve plug in the pump, and I'm good to go. What am I doing wrong?

Reverse your electrical connections, because it is supposed to blow! BWAAAHAAA!

Seriously, Mine does the same thing until I "really" get it primed. It will get enough liquid easily to spit and sputter and trick you into think it is pumping, then it stops. Lately, I have started pumping plain water before I start the boil while my last sparge is draining, then leaving the water in the pump. 15 min before the end of the boil, I turn on the pump and it discharges the small quantity of water harmlessly into the boil while pulling in fresh wort, never losing prime.
This has worked well for me so far...

I don't follow why you need to pump wort while it is boiling?

GilaMinumBeer said:

I don't follow why you need to pump wort while it is boiling?

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The idea is to pump the last 15 minutes just be sure everything is "sterilized" inside BEFORE introducing the cooling wort that could be infected by any nasties hiding inside. Same idea as introducing your immersion chiller to the boil the last 15 minutes of boil.

bull8042 said:

The idea is to pump the last 15 minutes just be sure everything is "sterilized" inside BEFORE introducing the cooling wort that could be infected by any nasties hiding inside. Same idea as introducing your immersion chiller to the boil the last 15 minutes of boil.

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Yah! What he said.

bull8042 said:

Reverse your electrical connections, because it is supposed to blow! BWAAAHAAA!

Seriously, Mine does the same thing until I "really" get it primed. It will get enough liquid easily to spit and sputter and trick you into think it is pumping, then it stops. Lately, I have started pumping plain water before I start the boil while my last sparge is draining, then leaving the water in the pump. 15 min before the end of the boil, I turn on the pump and it discharges the small quantity of water harmlessly into the boil while pulling in fresh wort, never losing prime.
This has worked well for me so far...

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I'll give this a try. I'm willing to try anything at this point.

bull8042 said:

The idea is to pump the last 15 minutes just be sure everything is "sterilized" inside BEFORE introducing the cooling wort that could be infected by any nasties hiding inside. Same idea as introducing your immersion chiller to the boil the last 15 minutes of boil.

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I've just started using a plate chiller, and once I get my pump rigged (hopefully tomorrow) I'd planned to sanitize this way. 15 minutes seems excessive though, providing the chiller and pump are clean I'd think it wouldn't take more than a minute or two.

But like I said, I'm just starting out in the pump/plate chiller world...this is a very timely thread for me!

I'm not sure how long is the optimal amount of time, I usually start with 15 minutes to go, because it takes me that long to get the boilng wort to flow. I wonder if the fact, there is only about 1/8 of inch between the bottom of my kettle and my dip tube, might make it harder for me to prime with boiling wort.

There will certainly be some steam bubbles that get sucked into the line but if you start will a full prime (no air in the pump or tubing), it shouldn't be a problem. 15 minutes is a bit more than necessary. About 10 minutes to go I run some wort through the pump and chiller until the output temp hits 200+ then I shut the pump off and let it sit in there. The wort doesn't have to be moving to heat sanitize.

I stand corrected as one whom I consider more knowledgeable than I has spoken..... and his post count is bigger too!

TBLbrewer said:

I'll give this a try. I'm willing to try anything at this point.

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Obviously, IGNORE the part about the electrical connections. I was being facetious......

Bobby_M said:

if you start will a full prime (no air in the pump or tubing), it shouldn't be a problem.

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This is my problem. When the wort is boiling, it pours down the tube to the pump, and then up into the pump. The problem is that there is about 6 inches of air at the top of the tube where it comes out of the kettle. This doesn't happen if I'm not boiling.

Maybe if you sent a picture it would clear this up?

I've supposed that during the boil the entire siphon tube eventually fills with steam bubbles so when you open the valve, all of that air is now in your tubing between the kettle and pump. If you have a QD on your hose where it hits your kettle, just disconnect it, open your valve and drain a bit of wort into a small container, close the valve, reconnect the QD.

I'm still putting some thought into installing a tiny needle valve into the top of my QD to purge that air.

I've come to the realization that for what we <think> a $130 pump should do, the march pump sucks.

But tell me, how many other food grade, high temp (affordable) pumps are out there? AND, if there were a pump with more pressure that could self prime, etc., wouldn't it come with a new set of problems?

Bobby_M said:

I'm still putting some thought into installing a tiny needle valve into the top of my QD to purge that air.

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I don't have quick disconnects yet, but I had the same thought of trying to intergrate a schrader valve to relieve that air from the line.

I like the idea of running off some wort before I hook up my hose. It makes since... Unfortunately I probably won't be able to test it out until January. December is not a good brew month for me.

ScubaSteve said:

I've come to the realization that for what we <think> a $130 pump should do, the march pump sucks.

But tell me, how many other food grade, high temp (affordable) pumps are out there? AND, if there were a pump with more pressure that could self prime, etc., wouldn't it come with a new set of problems?

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I agree, I'm just new at using mine. It works great as long as the liquid is not boiling. In fact I couldn't be happier with it other wise. I can cool my 5 gallons of wort using my plate chiller and the March Pump in about 5 minutes. This is a heck of a lot faster then when I used to do partial boil extract batches, and had to wait 20 minutes for the kettle to cool in an ice bath.

I think Bobby M hit the nail on the head though. The ball valve on my kettle is closed the entire time I am filling the kettle. So now that I think about it, the dip tube is full of air the whole boil. So opening the valve on a system with the hose already hooked up is introducing the air into the lines.

GilaMinumBeer said:

I don't follow why you need to pump wort while it is boiling?

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I'm with GMB on this....If you pump wort in to a plate chiller or a CF chiller the only part that needs to be sanitized is the chiller not the pump. Its not possible to pump boiling wort with your march pump so why try??

Actually, it's probably not possible to pump boiling wort, period, unless you have the pump right at the bk output. The liquid drops temp and is "near boiling"...probably 205-210F. I've found with my pump that if it's primed and pumping at all, it will also recirc wort on the BK while it is boiling.

I had problems with pumping boiling wort as well. I now wait until the end of my boil and pump thru my chiller for 5 minutes before turning on the water. I think the main problem is that the pump creates a vacuum which actually lowers the boiling point of water. This results in a phase change - liquid to gas - and the pump gets locked (steam lock instead of air lock).

stevehaun said:

I now wait until the end of my boil and pump thru my chiller for 5 minutes before turning on the water. I think the main problem is that the pump creates a vacuum which actually lowers the boiling point of water. This results in a phase change - liquid to gas - and the pump gets locked (steam lock instead of air lock).

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That sounds like a very reasonable explanation of the phenomenon. It wouldn't take much of a vacuum for that to occur.

How long have you used this pumping routine, and do you use a CFC or a plate chiller? I'd think the residual heat in the post-flameout wort would be more than adequate to sanitize everything.

The instruction sheet that came with my Shirron advises against running hot wort through the chiller without water flowing as well. It's not clear to me why...if these things can stand up to oven baking, surely a little &#8776;200°F wort isn't going to bother it. Does anybody have any thoughts on that?

I am thinking about getting a pump, but was just planning on running StarSan through it to sanitize, is this not good enough? It seems like it would be a heck of a lot easier.

Sanitizing with StarSan would do the trick, and save a lot of misery.

Jonnio said:

I am thinking about getting a pump, but was just planning on running StarSan through it to sanitize, is this not good enough? It seems like it would be a heck of a lot easier.

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Are you guys not reading the post!!!! You don’t need to sanitize the pump only the chiller. If you run it correctly the pump takes 210 degree wort which is very hard to contaminate and pumps it to the chiller where it is cooled to 70ish degrees. The only parts that need to be sanitizes is after it has cooled.

King of Cascade said:

Are you guys not reading the post!!!! You don&#8217;t need to sanitize the pump only the chiller. If you run it correctly the pump takes 210 degree wort which is very hard to contaminate and pumps it to the chiller where it is cooled to 70ish degrees. The only parts that need to be sanitizes is after it has cooled.

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Exactly, that is why I want to run some near boiling wort through the chiller. I want to sanatize all the surfaces that touch the cooled wort. Since this includes the plates on the chiller that are further down stream from the input (Wort would be much lower in temp upon reaching these plates if I'm running water also), I was just going to use the availble heat from the wort to do the job.

As far as the phase shift goes... I'm using silicone hose that is incredibly flexible, I would have thought that a change in pressure one way or the other would have simply been absorbed by the flexibility of the hose.

Jim Karr said:

Sanitizing with StarSan would do the trick, and save a lot of misery.

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Sounds like additional misery to me, a step that is entirely unnecessary. Why bother, if I can sanitize the chiller by merely pumping hot wort through it...something that is already part of the process?

King of Cascade said:

Are you guys not reading the post!!!! You don’t need to sanitize the pump only the chiller. If you run it correctly the pump takes 210 degree wort which is very hard to contaminate and pumps it to the chiller where it is cooled to 70ish degrees. The only parts that need to be sanitizes is after it has cooled.

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Easy there killer - I was referring to sanitizing the setup, if you can pump something through your chiller and all the tubing after it without using the pump then more power to you. I will take the complete setup and sanitize it, whether the pump itself needs it or not.

Also, I am going to be doing a whirlpool IC, so it wouldn't hurt for the pump to be sanitized as well since after a short couple minutes of running the pump will be pumping wort that is cool enough to possibly get contaminated.

When the liquid is boiling you are essentially trying to pump a good bit of steam which is a gas. Imagine trying to pump air with your march pump. Does not work. Same thing with steam.

That's true....but it doesn't continue boiling for long. I've never had a problem recircing boiling wort....I simply dump the output very close to the surface of the boiling wort to limit HSA (if it exists).....FWIW, I use approx 4-5 ft of silicon tubing before and after the pump. I imagine I'm recircing "near boiling" wort....probably 205F which is an excellent sanitizer. Remember, Star-san does not STERILIZE, it SANITIZES. If you use star-san, you're probably achieving the same effect...but you're using a consumable item. If you recirc hot wort, with enough tubing to allow it to stop boiling, it wont affect your pump. And, it doesn't cost anything other than electricity.

Pumping hot wort through an external chiller is very easy and practical in comparison if you're the type of brewer that already plans on pumping through. It's as simple as starting the pump a few minutes before starting the coolant flow. We're saying "minutes" but really, as soon as the chiller hit 200F for a few seconds, it's good to go.

Bobby_M said:

Pumping hot wort through an external chiller is very easy and practical in comparison if you're the type of brewer that already plans on pumping through. It's as simple as starting the pump a few minutes before starting the coolant flow. We're saying "minutes" but really, as soon as the chiller hit 200F for a few seconds, it's good to go.

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Thanks Bobby - this addressed my concern. I thought about the same thing, but was afraid that if it really took a couple (up to 15) minutes of near boiling wort to sanitize something then turning off the boiler, but not turning on the cold water would probably not maintain that temp long enough. If it is only a matter of a minute though that should be fine.

Research shows that sterilization by boiling is achieved within 2 minutes. Anything past that, and you're wasting fuel and time. This applies to boiling water for consumption, too.

Bobby_M said:

There will certainly be some steam bubbles that get sucked into the line but if you start will a full prime (no air in the pump or tubing), it shouldn't be a problem. 15 minutes is a bit more than necessary. About 10 minutes to go I run some wort through the pump and chiller until the output temp hits 200+ then I shut the pump off and let it sit in there. The wort doesn't have to be moving to heat sanitize.

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+ 1 Thats how I do it.

I was going to go with...

It must be defective, you should send it to me.

*DOH*

See, this is why I love this forum, I've gotten several great ideas to make my pump work the way I think it should. If nothing else, I have the stubborn factor to fall back on . I'm so damb stubborn, I'll keep trying until it works.

I took my pumps apart this weekend, as I had to reorient the output for my new rig. Removing the head and getting a look inside at the impeller really sheds a lot of light on how it works, and where bubbles might be trapped. I highly recommend it, just be careful about stripping screws/heads.

Hrmmm... in regards to sanitizing your plate chiller/pump after the boil kettle, running boiling wort works fine. I have a brutus system, and when I run Hot wort throught the plate chiller, I make sure I turn down the ball valve on the far end of the recirculation pump. This way I don't get steam bubbles in the pump. If you are worried about sanitation, you should really examine your equipment and disassemble your march pump before your next brew... It doesn't take too long. And you'll see it DOES build up some serious beer stone and soil. Worse, the inside of your ball valve does too. Dissassemble that after you brew, and I guarantee you will want to after every brew once you've seen what deposits in there. But even after seeing all that, I think that running boiling wort through for 5-15 minutes is just fine... Sometimes I remind myself that I've heard that Guiness adds a little bit of rot wort from their previous batch into every new batch by boiling it to kill all the nasties :_) or so I've heard.

I have a Saltwater aquarium and I use pumps extensivly to filter this and filter that. One thing i have learned with my pumps is that you have to watch your head space. (the distance your are attempting to pump) it will decrease with distance; length and height. If you are attempting to push air through your setup with hot wort it will take more engergy from the pump. Hot water has a lower viscosity hence more engery from the pump. The smallest ammount of air/steam will decrease the pressure (engery) of the pump.

Have you primmed the complete setup with water before you start the pumping of wort?

As long as you rinse your pump out after usage(hot water) and run some sanitizer through before hand (pack it up the night before) you will not have any problems. Boiling wort causes pumps to cavatate, you can adjust the flow rate(slow it down). But generally breweries do not boil while pumping. In the brewry I work for we clean sanitize and hot rinse everything before wort hits it. No need for boiling(which makes 3 phase pumps howl at the moon)...

I brewed yesterday, and I am happy to report no pump issues. I took the advice of running some boiling wort through the ball valve prior to hooking up the hose and starting the pump. Worked like a charm. I ran it until the wort on the exit side read 210 degrees, and then shut it off.

I also took the advice of taking the pump head apart. It gave me piece of mind to see that it was clean, and I was able to air dry it that way to avoid mold growth.

Thank you for all the advice!