Ding on intake grate

[jeremywatco]

Crawled under my new to me 2007 AR210 today. One of the intake grates has a sizeable ding (dent) on the lip of it. Would this have a negative performance impact? Should I address it or leave it?

 

[ToddW850]

I gotta believe this would cause some cavitation. Have you noticed any? Secondly, I'd double check the impeller, in case this was from something getting sucked up, and not hitting something.

 

[jeremywatco]

Impeller looks great. What would proper fix be? Bend it back and file it smooth or new grate

 

[ToddW850]

Well that's great the impellar is good. I'm torn between even messing with it, if it is not causing some cavitation. But if you have the ability to bend and smooth it out, that couldn't hurt.

 

[tdonoughue]

Or file it down; probably easier to do. Basically I would not want it sticking up into the water flow path, but I would worry less about the 'ding' itself.

 

[HawaiiBreeze]

File it down and radius it smooth and rounded, not razor sharp. As it is it will create a small pocket of air (which the intake grate does already) that will add to the cavitation.

 

[jeremywatco]

Does it matter that both of these grate "screens" dont have any silicone on them? The intake grate itself is all sealed up. But the mentioned dinged part on both engines has zero silicone on them.

 

[tdonoughue]

Mine did from the factory, so when I do mine I replace all that as well. I don't think it helps much with cavitation (it is behind the intake), but I suspect they do it to reduce drag. So, while you are down there, I would, but if you don't, I don't think it is tragic.

 

[scokill]

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you have nothing noticeable then you can only make it worse by trying a "fix"

 

[AZ_AR195]

everyone has an opinion, so here's mine -

will the ding have an effect on performance - technically yes ( Bernouillis principle ) but very minimal

will the effect be noticeable by the user - probably not

to fix or not to fix - i agree with Scokill - "If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you have nothing noticeable then you can only make it worse by trying a "fix"

potentially you could straighten it but it could micro-fracture eventually break off and cause damage to impeller etc.

just my 2cents.

 

[scokill]

everyone has an opinion, so here's mine -

will the ding have an effect on performance - technically yes ( Bernouillis principle ) but very minimal

will the effect be noticeable by the user - probably not

to fix or not to fix - i agree with Scokill - "If it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you have nothing noticeable then you can only make it worse by trying a "fix"

potentially you could straighten it but it could micro-fracture eventually break off and cause damage to impeller etc.

just my 2cents.

Having said what I said, I would probably try and fix it perfect by bending, grinding, filing, and filling with metal if necessary