Garmin Auto Pilot Pumps

[Toki]

...Was installed on a second “failed” pump, without changing the pump.

NOW you tell me after I plunked down $400 for a pump repair/exchange! Ah well, better than $1200 for a new pump. But it's good to know that when my new pump fails (and yes, it sounds like it's a "when" and not an "if"), a $195 check valve may fix the issue permanently.

 

[Cessna172]

I believe I may be next in line to suffer the pandemic pump failure...

Experiencing the uncommanded port steering and when the autopilot is set to heading hold the boat wallows back and forth like a beagle on a scent.

Is the first step to contact Garmin?

Gary

 

[Harry]

I believe I may be next in line to suffer the pandemic pump failure...

Experiencing the uncommanded port steering and when the autopilot is set to heading hold the boat wallows back and forth like a beagle on a scent.

Is the first step to contact Garmin?

Gary

Gary, It sounds like all you need to do is recalibrate your auto pilot. It's a process Garmin can walk you through.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

 

[Toki]

OK, so Garmin's AP pumps suck, but their customer support rocks! The very day they received my bad pump, a new one was sent out and my doorstep 2 days later. Yay!

 

[Godspeed]

I had/have a failed pump as well. It is today being replaced by Garmin at a Garmin authorized repair shop at NO CHARGE INCLUDING LABOR🙂. The Garmin tech worked with the shop and required that they completely purge the entire system twice before installing the new pump. The tech stated that they had found that returned pumps from FM boats had debris from the boat manufacturing process in the lines that were causing the pumps to fail after very small valves in the pumps clog with debris. He said this cleaning/purging process was being required on all new FM warranty repairs of Garmin pumps.

When I discussed this with the repair shop they said they were told that the steering hoses are installed during the build process at FM and that they are not always sealed during the build and fiberglass and other construction dust an get in the system. The pumps and valves are very sensitive to any foreign material.

I get the boat back this weekend and hopefully after the purges I will not have any other problems.

Also, given the low cost of the check valve I all but begged the tech to sell me one for the pump. He was emphatic that it would not be necessary after the purge and new pump install.

 

[Godspeed]

Also, I forgot to mention that Garmin has its techs monitoring Tugnuts for posts regarding their products to be proactive. That said, I do want to give high reviews for their customer service. I worked with Jason at Garmin and he was a real pro at helping me through the issue in very short order.
Brian

 

[BB marine]

The tech stated that they had found that returned pumps from FM boats had debris from the boat manufacturing process in the lines that were causing the pumps to fail after very small valves in the pumps clog with debris. He said this cleaning/purging process was being required on all new FM warranty repairs of Garmin pumps.

I was told this a couple years ago by a Garmin technical service rep on the phone. I had issues with the pump hammering, and shadow drive not functioning properly. The helm wheel at times would be Spongy and wandering. The rep told me that the pump install and shadow drive location was the issue.
Pump install should not have all hydraulic lines tied to the Valve shutoff manifold. Tee fittings should be used and there should only be three fittings attached to the manifold, I had 5. Shadow drive needs to be has close to the helm as possible to function properly. The shadow drive was installed far aft directly above the pump. I was also told that many pump assembly failures from Fluid Motion were do to debris or contamination getting into the pump assembly and causing the small check valves to fail.

The suggestion from the Garmin Rep was to plumb the pump properly, move the shadow drive away from the pump and fwd. Then flush the hydraulic system before final bleeding.

During bleeding sequences the pump was isolated from the system using the valve manifold. I used the old fashion way of bleeding the system using the helm. I pumped and wasted four quarts of oil during the purge flush and then finalized bleeding the air from the system. After following the advise of Garmin I have not had an issue. ( I'm knocking on wood as I type this) This took place in winter of 2016 after one season of owning the boat. Garmin unfortunately gave no assistance because it was an installation issue. The boat was still under a 1 year factory Fluid Motion warranty but thats another story that doesn't need to be talked about.

The Garmin customer service and product gets my vote as being excellent. The representatives will spend as much time as needed and never rush through troubleshooting or explanations of repair. I am sold on Garmin products and will continue to use their products on future boats.

 

[chronicity]

Yes, I'm on my first replacement pump and having steering issues (R27-OB). The problem is less severe this time and in also seems to only occur in rough water or other times when there is more steering input, with the wheel wanting to walk to the left. Because the issue is not always obvious, I haven't been able to really isolate it yet. The valves on the pump have been closed for the last several days on the water and I have not now noticed the problem again, but we've been in glassy water all of that time.

 

[Harry]

I'm having my third pump installed this morning by a Garmin tech. As mentioned above the techs are great and extremely conscientious. Failure of my second pump was not contaminated fluid but started leaking after a few weeks of being installed. Hoping for the best on number three.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

 

[acdfpic]

I just replaced my pump this last week. I left the manifold block in place and just changed the pump/motor. It wasn't a bad job compared to others on the tug. Only lost a tablespoon or so of hydraulic fluid.

I took it out for a test drive and it appears to be working well. I have to wait for calmer weather for the calibration.

 

[acdfpic]

Spoke too soon! Worked for about 3 hours and the heading hold has stopped working again.

 

[Toki]

OK boys and girls, here's your Garmin autopilot pump lesson for the day.

Ran down to the R27 to install the new pump. Immediately hit a wall trying to thread the fittings into the valve body. Very frustrating, I used the exact same fittings that came out of the bad pump, threads looked correct, but I just couldn't get them started in. I finally got one started, but there was so much resistance I didn't tighten for fear of stripping out that valve body. I went home as a failure, did some snooping on the interwebs, and according to a Garmin tech bulletin pumps manufactured before 2018 were 1/4-NPT threads, later pumps went to ORB-5 threads. So ... got some SeaStar fittings on order with the ORB threads.

Man, it's just never simple, is it?

 

[acdfpic]

Toki,

Did you check the box? My new Garmin pump came with the fittings. They were buried in with some other things. Also the new wires don't screw into the ECU and came with these weird little clamps to keep them attached to the ECU.

My own Garmin autopilot pump saga continues. It worked for a couple of hours and then started driving the boat off at a large angle when using heading hold. Further research showed that it was driving the rudder to full left and then the pump stall indicator would flash.

After about an hour on the phone with Garmin, the current thinking is that there must be air in the system even though I bled it after the change. Going to try redoing the lines to match the Garmin instructions as opposed to the RT installation and then purging the system.

I will report back when it's all fixed...I hope.

 

[Toki]

Yup, the new pump did come with the straight male-male fittings that go on the front of the valve block, they worked great. It's the two elbows that go on top of the valve block that were the problem, new pump didn't come with those and I couldn't use the elbows I took off the old pump.

I know that having all 5 lines go into the valve block is not per Garmin spec, and I considered replumbing with tees per Garmin spec, but I saw no convenient way to do that without re-doing several hoses. I figure this is the way Fluid Motion does it, so how bad can it be? It would be very cool if someone from FM or Garmin would chime in on this thread and comment on this.

 

[ixlr8]

Toki,

Did you check the box? My new Garmin pump came with the fittings. They were buried in with some other things. Also the new wires don't screw into the ECU and came with these weird little clamps to keep them attached to the ECU.

My own Garmin autopilot pump saga continues. It worked for a couple of hours and then started driving the boat off at a large angle when using heading hold. Further research showed that it was driving the rudder to full left and then the pump stall indicator would flash.

I will report back when it's all fixed...I hope.

I had a sea trial on a boat that did the same thing. They found that dealer didn't do the AP calibration properly. Once the calibration was redone... it worked correctly.

 

[NorCal]

I don't know what the problem is with the auto pilot pumps. I know that in the first year of ownership we had two pumps fail. After that we were able to get a smartpump. Have not had a single problem since then. This is on a R31.

There was talk at that time about bad valves, debris in system etc. I don't know why the original pumps fail, but for us the answer was the smartpump.

John

 

[acdfpic]

The pump saga continues. I tried recalibration today and the heading hold worked for a short while, but the pump started making a loud clicking noise and then did the full deflection.

The next step is to plumb the system the way Garmin says to do it and do a thorough bleeding. Stay tuned!

 

[asm777]

Hope everyone gets their issues resolved!

We had steering issues with four GHP10 pumps over a 3 year period and had a Smartpump installed last October. Garmin and Fluid Motion replaced pretty much everything except the hoses in the steering system in the process of trying to figure out what was causing our steering/pump issues.

We've been trouble free for the past 10 months and keeping fingers crossed that it stays that way!

 

[nzfisher]

What seems to be an endless saga of pump issues.-Mine, second pump, quit working recently. However, when hit a dead blow not terrifically hard, it seems to reactivate the pump. Any insight out there as to why this would work to reactivate pump? Also, has anyone taken one of these to a hydraulic repair house (small tractor repair comes to mind). Thanks

 

[it4llc]

Some time ago there was a thread describing GHP-10 autopilot failure due to leakage past the pump’s internal isolation valves. A solution suggested was to install a “Garmin Check Valve Kit.
Part # 010-11203-00.” The kit description from Garmin is: “add hydraulic isolation to your autopilot pump and steering systems with this check valve kit. This kit improves pump efficiency and rudder control while increasing the autopilot pump service life”.
As a matter of caution I installed this kit in my R27 (2012 model). Below is an image of a kit installation in, I think, a Cutwater 30.

Did the kit come with the fittings or did you need to purchase anything additional? The installation guide http://static.garmin.com/pumac/GHP10_Verado_Adapter_INST.pdf seems to say that additional isolation hoses are needed. Also, some suppliers of the kit just seem to sell the box, and not the fittings, so I'm trying to figure out what else I'd need to buy if I just got the check valve w/o any fittings. Thanks!