First Major Mistake

We know a couple who say that when you are learning something new, you go until you make your first major mistake and then you stop and regroup.

Well boy howdy did we make a mistake.

The reinforced hose to my raw water galley pump has been too short since Matt cut it to add antifreeze to the pump two years ago. This results in getting one good pump of water and then the collapse of the hose.  We wanted to try to replace the hose, but this would require closing the through hull -- which had worked at one point.  I tried it, it wouldn't budge.  Matt tried it, it wouldn't budge but he said to me "We need to leave this alone, or we're going to break something."

Did we leave it alone? Nope.

We tried it with a cheater bar. DO NOT DO THIS.  Unless you are already sinking do not do this.

It opened up the seal of the caulk between the wood backing plate and the hull, which let in a nice sheet of steady water flow -- we calculated it to be about 1/2 gallon per hour.  Which is survivable I guess but we had a panic and, as the lift was not available to haul us out, we got out the emergency star-brite epoxy sticks, made snakes, wrapped them around the backing plate and the bottom of the through hull.  Water still sheeted in, pushing the epoxy out of the way.  We mushed it back into place a few times (I think it was old and it took a long time to kick), still panicking quite a bit.

The flow slowed to maybe 1/4 of a gallon an hour and we left - we had work commitments the next day - with the automatic bilge pump on and our fingers crossed.  This was nothing the autobilge pump couldn't handle, and frankly the bilge is so huge a full week of water flow would not have endangered us.

Unable to take the suspense any longer, we went back last night to find that the bilge was full of ice-melt from the cooler, and the leak had stopped.  We will be doing some serious through hull replacements when we get hauled in the fall.  They all are seized open.  It would be nice to set up a manifold to reduce the number of holes in the hull but the idea of trying to figure out the paths for the hoses seems impossible.

We are now loaded with all our dry goods and cocktail mixers (we like to do a signature cocktail for everyone) and all we need are our clothes and our cold food items.


Additionally as a side note on the dinghy chap installation -- they fit really nicely but do look amateurish up close.  I also somehow was at least five feet short of hook velcro and was not able to put it on one side.  They have stayed on admirably nevertheless.  I ordered more velcro but when it arrived found that I had ordered the loop side instead and so it is useless.  The new velcro will hopefully arrive shortly.

I also did a test fit of my waterproof hatch rain fly/fabric dorade and it fits perfectly. I do need some way to keep the baffle from sagging too much, but I will take care of that next week.