Sealing cabin sole boards

[strato]

I have just sealed the undersides and varnished the topsides of all my cabin sole boards. When screwing back down should a place a rubber seal around the edges to stop water from the bilges sloshing up or is it best to leave air to circulate?

 

[Refueler]

Leave air to circulate IMHO ... nothing worse than mouldy seawater stink !

 

[anpgr]

Leave air to circulate IMHO ... nothing worse than mouldy seawater stink !

I would agree - but I guess it depends on how much of a problem sloshing water is for your bilge/cabin sole design. I have a deep bilge and haven't noticed any water coming out of bilge yet. On a different boat with shallow bilge I have had water coming through but I would try to fix the ingress cause rather than try to seal the cabin sole.

 

[Refueler]

I would agree - but I guess it depends on how much of a problem sloshing water is for your bilge/cabin sole design. I have a deep bilge and haven't noticed any water coming out of bilge yet. On a different boat with shallow bilge I have had water coming through but I would try to fix the ingress cause rather than try to seal the cabin sole.

I agree that ingress should be sorted if possible ..... but many boats like mine - you get collected condensation running down into bilge ... mishaps etc.

 

[strato]

Thanks, I have two accesable bilges that collect water, when sailing the water sloshes up & water then gets below all the other boards that are screwed down, it's these boards I'm thinking of sealing.

 

[Deleted member 36384]

Welcome to the forum strato. Don't seal. Sloshing water has considerable force behind it and the sealing method your suggesting is likely to be inconsistent and provide a low quality seal. The seal will likely fail resulting in what you are trying to stop. Far better to put the effort into diverting bilge water to a common area and pumping out with a small electric pump, if you cant stop water from entering the boat.

 

[strato]

Thanks all, it seems the seal wasn't a good idea.

 

[Refueler]

Welcome to the forum strato. Don't seal. Sloshing water has considerable force behind it and the sealing method your suggesting is likely to be inconsistent and provide a low quality seal. The seal will likely fail resulting in what you are trying to stop. Far better to put the effort into diverting bilge water to a common area and pumping out with a small electric pump, if you cant stop water from entering the boat.

Which is pretty well what I do ... main bilge area has an auto pump that discharges through the sink overboard.