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Bilge pump

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Colin Morley:
I like my BayRaider because of the ability to tow it easily and then put in the water ballast. However, It takes quite a long time to drain the water just with the self bailers open unless the boat is going a lot more than 5 knot. If I leave it on a mooring or pontoon with the water still in it is impossible to get it out without motoring around for a while. So it seems to me that it needs a bilge pump for those situations. This needs to be quite powerful if one is not going to pump for many minutes. I have had a number of ideas but would be most grateful if any of you have experience of fitting a bilge pump.

Best wishes,

Colin Morley  James Caird

Colin Morley:
Thank you Claus,

What I have found so far is very simple unless I have missed it. What I would like information on is:
1. Does any one have experience with electric bilge pumps?
2. If using hand pumps what capacity have people used and how long does it take to pump out 300 L by hand?
3. Where is the optimal place to mount it?

Many thanks for any advice

Colin
 
--- Quote from: Claus Riepe on 23 Apr 2011, 06:07 ---Colin,
you may not have found it yet, but there is suitable information on this forum already.

--- End quote ---

Peter Ivermee:
I use a Whale Gusher Urchin screwed to the outboard bulkhead.  I feed the inlet pipe in through the large round hatch in the deck.  With a long flexible pipe it can be used to pump unwanted water out of anywhere within reasonable reach (not that I've had that problem).The outlet goes through a copper L bend through the bulkhead and out into the outboard well.  It works well but it does take 5 minutes determined pumping.  I'm thinking of fitting an electric version.

Graham W:
Colin,

I also have a Whale Urchin screwed to the port side of the outboard bulkhead.  On my boat, this seems essential as the Andersen Super Mini self bailer mounted in the sump barely works at all, even at 6 knots (to be replaced this winter).  I have followed Claus's suggestion of drain plugs in the bottom of the ballast tank wall, draining in to the sump.  And I have also experimented with dropping an Attwood Waterbuster portable pump in to the top of the ballast tank but it is rather slow and I suspect would cost a fortune to run using D batteries.  The Whale GP1642 portable pump might be a better solution as it can run off the boat's rechargeable Yuasa battery (if you have one).

Colin Morley:
Thank you for these thoughts. As for the self bailers. I have three. The front two that are standard with the boat and one next to the water inlet. I have found these three will empty the ballast tank but I have to be travelling at least 5 knots and it probably took ten minutes. I think a hand pump fitted to the outboard bulkhead is probably the answer with a flexible hose which I can put down the main access hole and the other end going over into the outboard well. The Whale urchin gusher says it does 43 L/min. That means 7 minutes of pumping flat out. I would like a bigger and faster one than that. Does anybody have experience of one that would shift 100 L/min? As for an electric one it would have to have a 12 volt battery. I am not clever enough to calculate how much current it would draw and so how big the battery would need to be. Any thoughts?

Water ballast is terrific but draining it when on a mooring or sailing slowly can be difficult with the fitted self bailers.

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