There is nothing particular to the volvos that make them more water
ingestion prone than any others. Investigate how high your risers are above
the water line. Merc has adapter blocks that go between the riser and the
exhaust manifold to increase the height or the riser, volvo may have
something similar. It could be a leak or a head gasket too of course.
Neither volvo nor merc really have anything to do with the actual engine.
They buy them intact from gm, bolt on their accessories and spray paint
them. The 5.7 aka chevy 350 is a pretty solid engine and does not have a
history of head or head gasket problems.

wrote in message
oups.com...
I have water in a Volvo 5.7L Sm Block engine and trying to figure out
what the issue is.
Volvo replaced the engines last year for a similar problem, saying it
was a head gasket issue, but now Volvo says they were either installed
wrong or that we are excessively backing down. We have had the boat
for 3 years with out an issues so something doesn't sound right.
Anybody else having the same problems?