Had a small 800 gph rule pump burn up yesterday. It was only 3 months old and used to pump the very bottom of the bilge. 3amp breaker didn’t pop… mate was outside the ER and smelled something. Took us a few minutes to ID the source as it was under the floorboards and smoke wasn’t very thick. Plus I wasn’t expecting a bilge pump to smoke so we checked all the other equipment first. As soon as I cut the power the smoke stopped. First time this happens to me… I ve had many pump failures but not smoking. opened up the pump this opening and interestingly it was the black negative wire terminal that melted.
In the last few years I've had small Rule pumps and the float switches not work straight from the box. The quality of old is just no longer there. They must be pumping (pun intended) them out by the million in China. I now refuse to fit them.
Wow a little scary. I've had a few of those pumps fail and I keep a spare "in stock". I had a Rule -Mate 2000 do that once brand new but the breaker did trip. Only guess is it ran dry for a long time. My big pain point is those float switches. I am switching to Ultra switches on bilge pumps. They don't fit in shower sumps unfortunately.
BTW that is the newer style pump (garbage) sometimes you can still purchase the older style that hold up a little better.
Had a Rule float switch melt a few years ago. The fuse finally popped but it smelled like the boat was on fire in the meantime.
I don’t know how long it was running. That’s what’s odd about this. The float switch was free. I m guessing the float switch didn’t stop the power whenever it ran last. I don’t have an indicator light or alarm on this one as it is just there to pump the bottom of the bilge which the primary 3700 can’t I usually replace the switches with ultra switches but we had a couple of rule switches left over.