Head Not Sucking Sea Water

[mow2000]

I've got an almost new head (raritan compact ii). It doesn't pull in sea water but it pumps to the holding tank just fine. I pulled off the line from the through-hull, put it into a bottle of water and could not pump out the water (switch set to "wet bowl"). I then poured that water into the line and it ran into the bowl (line not clogged). Looking at the parts diagram (boy these things are complicated) i can't really identify what might be the problem. If I understand it's function, a busted check valve would probably suck water then spit it back out. I guess it could be the dry bowl/wet bowl switch which appears to move a "cam" that presses against the check valve. Any ideas?

[Ex-Calif]

I just had a similar issue on my 2 year old Jabsco.

I pulled the pump handle and cover off the flapper valve assembly and found very small stones in the inlet side. One of them had jammed the flapper valve open so no suction could be generated. 15 minute job.

[captain465]

I encountered a similar problem with a Raritan head on a friends boat. The in line check valve in the sea water supply line had allowed the check ball to move into the feed line. Removal of the check valve and retrieving the ball from the line, reassembling the check valve solved the problem. The other symptom was that when you pumped the handle, it seemed to "spring back", as if there was pressure building up in the pump.
Hope this is usefull to you.

Fred