Water inlet for aircon

[bigwow]

Having almost fitted an aircon unit on BigWow 2 years ago and up till now not having got round to cutting yet another hole below the waterline, for the inlet to the pump. Would teeing into the inlet to the forward head save me the problem of yet another hole. I appreciate now is not the weather for aircon but the unit is reversible, apparently, and works as a heater as well.

 

[Anonymous]

In principle, yes. It is quite common for boats to have one inlet skin fitting and a large manifold but it is essential that the skin fitting is big enough so that a pressure drop (partial vacuum) does not result in air being sucked into the system. In your case the question is whether the aircon pump is large enough to cause air/water being sucked back from the head. Try it, you can always change it if you have problems and the fewer skin fittings the better.

 

[jfkal]

I have exactly done that for my aircon some years ago. However I found that I needed to fit a "no return valve" on the side of the head.
Beauty of that setup is that if the aircon side becomes air-locked, a few strokes on the head pump with the seacock closed fixes that problem in no time.

I had doubt initially but it worked just fine.