# Had to rip apart my Kremlin 10:14 Pump



## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

A few months ago I left the air on in the spray room And not only did I leave the air on, I left the air on for my Kremlin pump.

For whatever reason it cycled a bit and got caught in between strokes and just started venting air. This must have happen for hours. My water trap was full of water, my oil trap was full of water, my Kremlin regulator had water in it and the air motor had water in it.

I was able to get the water out and it worked. But it no longer worked nice. It had random semi stalls. Where it would stall for a brief moment and then start back up. Enough to get a reduced pressure in the line and cause a spray hiccup. Nothing terrible, but very annoying.

So I went online to youtube and found the only video that showed how to work on the air motor. It was a manufacturers video. And it really wasn't much of a video, more like snap shots with voice. But I was able to at least have a glance at what things looked like inside. 

So I took all my lines off of the setup and took the two mounting bolts off and brought the pump to my bench. Removed three nuts and pulled a cotter pin and then the piston pin and separated the fluid pump from the air motor










Then I pulled 3 more nuts that removed the blue cap. Pulled the cap off and there was the heart of the beast. 










Pulled off the top aluminum ring which just sat there and then removed the brass nut and pulled out the piston. 










Everything was in pretty nice condition. Not much grease left on anything. One of the O rings was a bit dry and had some white cake on it that I cleaned off. I pulled all the O rings out, cleaned them and their seats, regreased everything and put it back together

This is the Kremlin with the air motor pulled apart.










I hooked the air motor up to my air line and put almost no pressure on the gauge and it jumped to life again.

So I put the fluid pump on and finished the assembly and hung it back in it's place. Hooked up my air and fluid lines and primed it with some thinner. When it was working nice I could have the pump cycle with only the air gauge bouncing off of the zero pin. Now the air gauge doesn't even move and it'll cycle thinner.

I haven't done a real run with primer or pigmented material yet. But it sounds great and it cycles nice. I'm happy I didn't have to get the O ring kit at $300. Just a bit of time and grease and it's a new pump.


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## DaVinciRemodel (Oct 7, 2009)

Wish I had one to work on.


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## Kent Whitten (Mar 24, 2006)

Amazing that small pile is 2 grand isn't it? 

Glad to hear it went well Leo. Why would o-rings cost so much? Is it like an automotive motor? Or are the o-rings just round rubber gaskets? I don't suppose you can find cheaper replacement o-rings.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

$1800 when I got it including the hoses and gun. All of the parts are machined and nice.

It's a Kremlin. If you think it should cost 40 cent it'll cost you $5 and you'll have to buy a bag of 10 of them.

I don't know why it's so expensive, because they can, I guess.

I'm betting most of them would be standard hardware store O rings. But the piston O ring looked like it was something oddball.


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## JHC (Jun 4, 2010)

Leo do you know how often the o rings have to be replaced? If the o ring kit is that expensive I wonder how much that piston would be?


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

I'm sure it's pricey.


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## Spencer (Jul 6, 2005)

I don't have one but thanks for posting anyway. Some other guy with one will have the same problem and do a search, find this, and get some insight.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

Fired it up yesterday and the damn thing is leaking. Around the O ring in the blue case. Guess I'm going to have to get the rebuild kit.


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## JHC (Jun 4, 2010)

That stinks.I have repacked one pump in my career as a painter, now I don't even bother because every time I try now its a huge ordeal. I have a great repair shop I trust and spend my time doing what I am good at.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

It's really easy. Now that I know what I'm doing I'll bet I could do it in 45 minutes after I empty all the thinner out of it.


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## DeanV (Feb 20, 2006)

Good to know. I have never taking a pump apart. So far, I have never had a pump rebuilt even. Just had to replace a prime valve so far. Not to say pumps have been problem free, just other problems. Mostly minor stuff.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

The pump itself is very simple. 2 ball valves and a teflon piston ring. An O ring to seal the top of the cylinder and and plastic ring to seal the ball valve. The air motor is more complex, but not by that much. Lots of precision milled parts in there.


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## hdavis (Feb 14, 2012)

Leo G said:


> $1800 when I got it including the hoses and gun. All of the parts are machined and nice.
> 
> It's a Kremlin. If you think it should cost 40 cent it'll cost you $5 and you'll have to buy a bag of 10 of them.
> 
> ...


two words - 3D printing


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

So, buy a $25,000 printer to get $300 worth of parts.

Priceless.......


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## hdavis (Feb 14, 2012)

More like $2500 - they're getting cheaper. Payback for printing general household stuff is something like a year.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

Leo G said:


> Fired it up yesterday and the damn thing is leaking. Around the O ring in the blue case. Guess I'm going to have to get the rebuild kit.


I put a hose clamp around the blue case and tightened it down. No more leak. Seems the screws in the plastic case aren't holding so well. Works like a charm again.


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## Xtrememtnbiker (Jun 9, 2013)

That only took you two years to fix...


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

It was never broke, just leaked. But it's annoying and does affect performance of the AAA pump. Just came to me one day, hose clamp. Didn't figure it'd work, but it worked great. 

Actually did this 3-4 months ago. Was searching around for videos about how to repair the pump and this thread came up in the search. Figured I'd updat it.


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## gates559 (Jan 15, 2009)

I had the exact same thing happen to one of mine. My rep pulled it apart for me and fixed it, he sold me just the parts to fix it. It was around 60 bucks.

I paid around 2800.00 cdn for my first one. Its an awesome gun that puts a beautiful finish on. Well worth it for anyone that wants to be competitive in the woodworking industry. 

Thanks for this post, Kind of makes me want to pull mine apart and clean and grease it. I haven't used it in ages.

The o rings in it are not anything you can get at a hardware store. They are all weird sizes and different material.


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## Leo G (May 12, 2005)

Of course they are.


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