No automatic bilge pump - problem or not?

rwoofer

rwoofer

Well-Known Member
Joined
1 Apr 2003
Messages
3,355
Location
Surrey
Visit site
Having read a little about bilge pumps, it got me thinking about my own boat, a Moody 44 that has only one manual bilge pump.

From all the maintenance books etc I read it would appear that every boat has an automatic bilge pump and that it should be left on when the boat is unattended.

Am I taking a big risk by not having one??

I was thinking of having a second manual pump that can be operated from inside, but I may have to go for an automatic one if I'm taking a big risk.

Any opinions out there?

RB

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
I have not got one and don't want one. My boat is 66 years old, wooden, and on a distant swinging mooring. If she is making water, she needs "seeing to"!

I don't see the point of an automatic bilge pump on a boat with a self draining cockpit; if she's leaking, I want to know about it. And I really don't like the idea of leaving the battery in circuit with something in the bilge.

I do think the old rule about two manual bilge pumps, one in cabin one in cockpit, is sensible, though.

<hr width=100% size=1>Que scais-je?
 
no use saying she need's seeing to when she's sitting on the sea bed. An auto pump could one day save your investment... the day a skin fitting decides to fail with no one aboard, or the day someone forgets to close the sea cock on a poorly installed loo and the water back syphons in.

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
mine are sat in the keels, the switches will allow about 2 - 3 inches of water in before starting the pump, this will alert me on my next visit that she is taking water. The installations are fused and have a three way switch, manual-off-auto. Works very well so far, remember to fit one way valves or your batteries will be flat on return, for the water will run straight back and with switches the power should not come on for long.

On the other hand my port hull is doing something very odd indeed. Three weeks ago on our last visit she had about an inch of water in the keel, yesterday she was dry. Remembering she is in the water and how cold it has been, where did it go

duh duh da da , duh duh da da mystery lol

<hr width=100% size=1>Julian

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.topcatsail.co.uk/movies.html>Dolphin Movie From Top Cat</A>
 
Echo all Mirelle has said and add that if one is considering having an electric pump to prevent sinking at the mooring unattended that unless one has sufficient battery capacity (ie alot, unless permanently connected to shore power) to pump the volume of water out that will sink your boat then you are wasting your time. Furthermore, no electric pump of managable size will cope with any significant leak below the waterline when the boat is unattended.

If you only want it to control leaks not capable of threatening the boat between the times you visit it, then fix the leaks.

Hardly any yachts out here are fitted with electric bilge pumps.

John

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
I fitted mine the weekend I arrived at Porthmadog last year and saw Top Cat slowly rolling side to side. "That's odd" I thought, seems like she is very heavy in the water.

When we got on board there was at least 18" of water in the port hull. Fastest bilge pump in the world employed - man with bucket!

The week before we had picked up our pick up line in the port prop and it had disturbed the packing - then old - I was warned by someone in the yard to renew the packing before launching her as she had been laid up, so it was my fault.

The week before I had checked for damage at the shaft and tube but all seemed ok, I had not removed the rope as it was last thing Sunday evening when it happened, see my posting on harbour master on jet ski.

Had we had auto switches it would not have stopped the leak, but it would have stopped so much water filling the boat from quite a small drip as it happenend. When I removed the old packing I found it in one piece in a spiral, so the water had been running around it and dripping constantly for 5 days. Scary!

My advice - fit switches and electric pumps, flat battery or sunk boat, it is a tough one.

<hr width=100% size=1>Julian

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.topcatsail.co.uk/movies.html>Dolphin Movie From Top Cat</A>
 
My only warning is:

Take your battery capacity in Ah, halve it to get useful capacity and let that equal C. Take the current draw when your bilge pump is pumping and divide C by that to give the hours the pump will run for and let that equal H. If one has a fear of ones boat filling with water without being noticed, then make sure that you visit your boat more frequently than every H hours.

That assumes that you leave the boat with the battery fully charged.

We did the sums for our own boat when it was built and for a pump usefully sized for the vessel, 520Ah of batteries and the frequency that we expected to be able to visit the boat, it did not pan out. While I know many don't do so, we always inspect the bilges before we leave the boat and if there was any sign of dampness at all it would be investigated as to cause before leaving. Also, as another has said, we also like to leave the boat electrically dead (apart from the solar battery charge maintenance) and that obviously sways our thinking on the point.

John

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
A auto pump will not stop a major leak, but will help with minor problems becoming a mojor one.
We have for many years not recommended an off switch, someone will switch it off just before the leak starts.
The system we adopted in the finish was to run the float switch via a fuse direct of the batteries as a full time pump, and a second feed to the pump via a circuit breaker / switch as a manual overide, and backup feed.
Also think were you fit a pump or pumps, a well known large builder fitted two pumps, engine room and main cabin area. One day a new boat was noted slowly sinking by the bow, the forward shower drain was leaking, the more water that trickled in, the further the bows sunk, and the higher the two pumps moved out of the water. From then on they fitted three pumps, or one for and one aft.


Brian

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
Why not do as the RNLI do with all afloat Lifeboats, in the auto pump circuit an orange flashing light is installed and at a position on ariel mast etc. Should the pump activate the light flashes. Hopefully it will be spotted and boat can be checked sooner than later. I would rather have a flat battery than a sunk boat!!!

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
<<<I would rather have a flat battery than a sunk boat!!!>>>

I trust that you are not imagining that the water will stop coming in once the battery is flat. It is not a case of the risk of a flat battery versus a sunk boat. Unless one has sufficient battery capacity (unusual in a small boat) one will end up with a flat battery and a sunk boat. A common trap is that people believe that they can use a small bilge pump in a small boat in order to increase battery life - forgeting that the smaller the boat the quicker it will sink ie the same sized leak will sink a small boat faster than it will sink a big boat.

Over the last 5 years or so I have been the first to report 2 sinking boats (both around 40 ft) in our marina. In both cases they had automatic bilge pumps and in both cases the water was well over the cabin sole. They would have sunk despite their pumps and their owners' preference for flat batteries over a sunk boat.

John

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
A cautious disagreement

No battery powered bilge pump is going to do any good against the sort of inflow that a failed skin fitting can generate! But a few milliamps leaking from the pump circuit could rot out a skin fitting in a few weeks...then where are we?

The stern tube is perhaps the likeliest culprit for the sort of trickle that can really make a mess, yet is controllable by a bilge pump. But that is just the sort of slowly worsening leak that an automatic pump can disguise from the inattentive owner until it reaches crisis point - at which point the automatic pump won't deal with it!

Yes, I might one day leave the boat with a seacock open, although I have'nt yet, but I don't have a "poorly installed" loo (or engine, or selfdraining cockpit!)

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by Mirelle on 29/12/2003 01:04 (server time).</FONT></P>
 
Re: A cautious disagreement

I have an automatic bilge pump operated by a no-float electrode and the set up is fused and connected direct to the batteries. It has been installed for three years and so far no sign of stray currents doing damage. The pump proved useful once when I was on the boat by the pump noise waking me up and enabling me to see we had a serious stern gland leak. I do not think an automatic pump will stop a disaster on a boat which is left unattended for, say, more than three days. Where I moor (Hamble) we do tend to rely on friendly owners nearbye to keep an eye on each others boats and take action if necessary (call the harbour master). We also know some of the other owners 'phone numbers.

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
Re: A cautious disagreement

With a separate level switch there's no problem in connecting an hour meter to record the time the pump's been on : for those who'd like an auto-pump, but don't want to be inattentive.

Our little boat (not self draining cockpit) leaks rainwater in something awful, & an auto-pump is convenient so's upon arriving for a quick scoot round the harbour I don't spend ages with the manual one, or find the cabin floor covered.

On resisting the technology of auto-pumps & alarms, I have read many accounts of sinking that include something along the lines of .." the first indication we had that somehting serious was wrong was on going below/leaving the bunk/hand dangling in water while sleeping" etc etc. Maybe they all had badly maintained boats?, but in some cases an auto-pump/alarm might have given the head start needed to save the boat.

Of course, electrolysis might still destroy a skin-fitting....so perhaps not.

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
Not so bad idea ...

I have a simple Rule 300 with a flait switch and a solar panel connected to the battery.

The amount the pump runs is compensated adequately by the small trickle charge solar panel.

Why do I have it ..... the condensation etc. collects in the bilge and it saves me remembering to hand pump each time on board.

I honestly believe that a boat even samll ones should have two pumps as least. I have two manuals serving different areas and also the auto electric. My boat is only 25ft .....


<hr width=100% size=1>Nigel ...
Bilge Keelers get up further ! I came - cos they said was FREE Guinness !
/forums/images/icons/cool.gif
 
Did that once!

Put boat on posts, scrubbed bottom, greased seacocks.

Refloated, set off down the Wallet.

Somewhere off Walton Pier, went below to mark up position and stepped into water. Major panic. Heave to and hunt for leak. Found I had not hardened up the yoke nuts on the WC inlet seacock (OK, OK, lucky it was'nt the outlet!).

Now, with an automatic pump, the water level would not have risen above the sole. But I would still have needed to find the leak, perhaps with a flat battery?

<hr width=100% size=1>Que scais-je?
 
Re: Did that once!

I see what you mean....but would an auto pump + alarm have alerted you earlier?. Then start engine to power pump & locate leak at leisure.(relatively speaking)

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
Re: Did that once!

I would be the first to admit an auto pump would not save a vessel with a major leak that was unattended for a period of time....The point all you anti auto pumpers seem to miss is shold the pump activate either when at sea or on mooring/pontoon berth this may give sufficient warning and has done many times in the past to someone aboard or walking by/punting by that there is an imminent problem...after over 40 years at sea both for pleasure and commercial that to me makes good seamanship sense....something that seems occasionally to be in short supply in these coloumns. As I have said before though you pay your money and take your choice....never never stop learning though.

<hr width=100% size=1>
 
Re: A cautious disagreement

I think your post is an indication of the false trust that many have in the toy submersible bilge pumps people put on their boats and of their inappropriate use to hide leak problems.

If the water inflow is sufficient for one to wake up with your hand in the water there is no way the pumps being talked about here would have made much difference. They will not save the boat and, of course, the pump would only have run until the batteries were covered anyway.

A bilge alarm is appropriate for use when at sea or inhabited and seacocks are open and the boat is no longer in an inert state. Our own is set to go off when there is less than 1 litre of water in the bilge (the alarm is in a small sump which is the first place to collect water), but it has never gone off in anger.

If one needs an auto pump to control rain water entering the boat - heaven forbid, how can you then claim any knowledge of boat care whatsoever? No doubt if the roof of your house leaked you would consider it a fix for the problem to just put buckets under the leaks. As Mirelle, I think, said earlier, if one has water coming into the boat then fix the leak.

John



<hr width=100% size=1>
 
That\'s not the problem!

I do see your point, but there is another aspect to this, which weighs more with me.

My boat has, as usual, no electrolysis problems this year. No anode fitted, no dezincing of prop, no funny looking paint over fastenings, no problems. Not an accident - the electrical system was Rolls Royced with big cross section double rubber covered tinned cable to waterproof junction boxes and none of it goes anywhere near the bilge! And I religiously turn the battery isolation switch off when leaving the boat.

I really, really, don't want to introduce 12 volts into proximity with water, nor do I want to leave the batteries on line when away from the boat. Therefore, no automatic bilge pump. The bilges are dry apart from the sump, which gets a drip from the stern seal and needs one stroke to clear it once a week. I emphasise - this is a 66 year old wooden boat.

Yes, I could fit one, in the dry part of the bilge, just for peace of mind, but that still means a live 12v circuit for 8 months of the year. I just dont think it is worth it.

<hr width=100% size=1>Que scais-je?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top