Warning: old school vs new school coolant systems, I made the wrong call

A few months back I had to pick between rebuilding my old coolant pump setup or splurging on one of those new high-pressure systems. I went with the old route cause my boss said it's tried and true, and I figured $150 for a replacement pump was better than $800 for a whole kit. Big mistake. The old pump clogs every other week with chips from the aluminum we run, and I'm spending half my Friday afternoons flushing lines with a garden hose. The new systems have those self-cleaning filters, and looking back, I should have just borrowed the money from the shop budget. Now I'm stuck with this thing till we hit our next quarter numbers. Has anyone else dealt with a pump that gums up constantly? I'm about ready to retrofit a damn screen in the tank.

1 comments

1 Comment

val_wilson28d agoMost Upvoted

Man I have to push back on this a little. I have been running old style centrifugal pumps on our Bridgeport for three years now and I might have to clean the filter once a month tops. What kind of aluminum chips are you running? If they are fine stringy swarf that is a chip management problem not a pump problem. You can get a magnetic separator for like 60 bucks that catches most of that stuff before it even hits the pump. I just dont see how spending 800 dollars is the only fix here. Maybe your boss had a point about tried and true but you might be jumping to conclusions about it being the end of the world.