Jabsco 817-0000 Bearing Seal | Self-Priming Pump Repair

If your Jabsco self-priming water pump has started weeping at the shaft, the bearing seal is usually the culprit. This is the Jabsco 817-0000 bearing seal, the exact service part that rides between the pump bearing and the impeller bore. It's a small piece, but it's the one that keeps raw water on the wet side of the pump and out of your bearing. When it dries out or wears, you get that telltale drip under the pump and, left alone, a bearing that fails not long after.

These pumps live a hard life. They spin every minute the engine runs, they pull salt water, and they sit in a warm engine room that bakes rubber and elastomer parts over time. Most seals we see come apart around the two-year mark, sometimes sooner on a boat that runs a lot of hours. The seal itself doesn't wear like a bearing does. It just gets stiff, loses its grip on the shaft, and starts to pass water. That's your cue to pull the pump and freshen it up.

How do you know it's the seal and not something bigger? Look for water tracking down from the pump shaft, a light salt crust building underneath, or a slow drip that shows up only when the engine's running and pressurizing the raw water side. A little weep is the early warning. Catch it there and you save the bearing and the shaft. Ignore it and salt water works into the bearing, the bearing seizes or gets sloppy, and now you're into a much bigger repair. So we tell people to treat a weeping seal as a this-weekend job, not a someday job.

Worth being clear about what you're buying. This is the bearing seal only. It's not a full service kit and it's not the impeller. If your pump is due for a complete rebuild, you'll also want the matching impeller and, ideally, the bearing. We'd rather you knew that up front than opened the box expecting a whole kit. For a lot of boats, though, a weeping shaft with a healthy impeller just needs the seal, and this is the part that fixes it.

Replacing it is straightforward if you've had a pump apart before. Pull the pump off the engine, take the end cover and impeller out, and pry the old bearing seal out of the body bore. The new seal goes in lip-first toward the impeller bore. Give it a light coat of water pump grease before you press it home so it seats clean and doesn't grab the shaft dry on first start. Take your time getting it square in the bore. A cocked seal leaks just as fast as a worn one.

A couple of things we've learned the hard way. When you button the pump back up, snug the end cover down evenly and don't lean on it. Over-tightening that cover can distort a fresh seal and undo the whole job. And while you're in there, spin the bearing by hand. If it feels rough or notchy, do the bearing at the same time. It's a lot easier than pulling the pump twice, and a tired bearing will chew up your new seal in short order.

This is a repair part for boaters who maintain their own raw water pumps, and for the yards and techs who service Jabsco self-priming pumps as a matter of routine. If you keep spares aboard, a bearing seal is a smart one to have in the box. They're cheap, they're small, and needing one on a weekend when the parts counter is closed is a bad way to spend a Saturday. Match the part number to your pump, keep a little marine grease handy, and you'll be back running in an afternoon.