Thru hull counts

[chowdan]

My boat has 11 in total. My boat is a 1980 42ft custom sailor.

My seacocks are original grocco tapered cone(however not a traditional tapered cone as they have a rubberized sheath on them). They are in good condition, but I'd like to replace some in the next couple years. They all are glassed in so it will be a bit of work. The work that I did during my last haul out was pretty extensive and I lacked the time or finances to be able to do the seacocks(i only trust quality bronze).

Here my list. My head has been ripped out and replaced with a composting head. The head intake and my spare seacock will be converted for a water maker down the road.

Cockpit drains x2
Engine intake
Galley/aft cabin drain
Shower sump/head sink
Head intake
Head discharge
One extra
Depth/sonar/paddle
Spare plug in extra depth
Wet Exhaust has a valve as it's close to the waterline but it stuck in the open position.

[ddiesel]

Originally Posted by Copacabana

I hear you Billkny!... but I'm curious about how you've managed to get down to just 3 through hulls below the waterline.

I've been eliminating through hulls below the waterline whenever possible. I'm down to 5: galley sink drain, head sink drain, engine raw water intake and 2 cockpit scupper drains. One of the advantages of installing a composting head was that I could glass over another through hull. On my last haul out I glassed over the old transducer hole. I now rely on 2 fishfinders that shoot through the hull. Simplicity is my mantra

what fish finders do you use?

[billknny]

Originally Posted by ddiesel

what fish finders do you use?

I don't know what he uses, but the Aimar P79 transducer is the one most common for recreational boats. It is sold by several of the electronic manufacturers under their own label with their own connector on the end of the wire. They are all the same on the business end.

Airmar make a whole line of in-hull transducers of various sizes and powers. See the Gemeco catalog for the full line.

[Copacabana]

Originally Posted by ddiesel

what fish finders do you use?

I have a cheap and cheerful Garmin fishfinder (under USD 100) which has the transducer mounted inside the hull in a blob of silicone. The other depth comes from my Garmin GPS/fishfinder combo (same method for mounting the transducer). This way I have 2 sources of depth information, plus all the extra features a fishfinder offers (battery voltage, bottom contour and density etc.).

[GBR134]

Am I the only one who has no idea how many through hulls I have and have no worries about it. I know where the liferaft and other emergency kit was when I last saw it but it may have been tidied away somewhere else. Cavalier I know but I’ve got away with it for the last 35 years.

I’m also probably the only one sniggering and thinking that the skin fitting (through hull) paranoid brigade are more likely to feel at home with the 85+% of yacht owners who rarely leave the Marina rather than the 5-10% who go sailing!

Ok slightly smug and a little tongue in cheek but only a little. I think I’d best go put my tin hat on now to protect from incoming flak!

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Is a sea chest significantly better?

Let's say you have 6 thru hulls or a sea chest with one large inlet hose and 6 smaller hoses feeding individual systems (7 hose connections at the seachest) and those hoses are longer with more chance for chafe.

If you religiously, close the main seacock every time you leave the boat, maybe it's better but most people I know don't close all their seacocks on a daily basis. So looking at it from the outside (ie: design for the "typical" cruiser) a sea chest may be worse as you just increased the number of failure points while adding cost and complexity to the design and construction of the boat.

Like I wrote earlier, those with few have a false sense of security. Our 62 has a manifold which eliminates 10 through hulls, but the internal fittings can still fail, so no difference IMO.

[Copacabana]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Like I wrote earlier, those with few have a false sense of security. Our 62 has a manifold which eliminates 10 through hulls, but the internal fittings can still fail, so no difference IMO.

I don't worry too much about my hoses as I close all my seacocks. Also, I change my hoses frequently. I do see your point however...

In my case, the boat is very simple so there isn't much to go wrong or spring a leak.

[Cheechako]

any one poorly maintained thru hull can sink a boat. That's worse than 20 maintained ones. I have never heard of a boat sinking from a seacock issue. I'm sure it must have happened, but my guess is there are far more worse things out there. I hear of two or three propane boat fires each year just in WA state alone. If you fear seacocks, you better not have propane!
and a side note: I eliminated some thru hulls in one of my boats. It took a lot of work, but bottom line, when I was done it felt less safe than before I did it. Why? because I had rubber hose running throughout the boat under the floor or in other hidden areas, and bronze tees, and many many clamps etc... all below the waterline. The weight/stress of hoses and bronze tees hung on seacocks like a manifold was much higher than just a clamped hoe. Etc etc.

[TeddyDiver]

Originally Posted by Copacabana

I don't worry too much about my hoses as I close all my seacocks. Also, I change my hoses frequently. I do see your point however...

In my case, the boat is very simple so there isn't much to go wrong or spring a leak.

Good practice and easy to do with only few of them which is not the case with most production boats. Some are obviously missing the point most boats sunk have been in their berth no one on board. For me there's only stuffing box left to fail.

Teddy

[billknny]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

any one poorly maintained thru hull can sink a boat. That's worse than 20 maintained ones. I have never heard of a boat sinking from a seacock issue. I'm sure it must have happened, but my guess is there are far more worse things out there. I hear of two or three propane boat fires each year just in WA state alone. If you fear seacocks, you better not have propane!
and a side note: I eliminated some thru hulls in one of my boats. It took a lot of work, but bottom line, when I was done it felt less safe than before I did it. Why? because I had rubber hose running throughout the boat under the floor or in other hidden areas, and bronze tees, and many many clamps etc... all below the waterline. The weight/stress of hoses and bronze tees hung on seacocks like a manifold was much higher than just a clamped hoe. Etc etc.

You really miss the point... First, nobody said (or even implied) you can skip the maintenance if you have fewer seacocks, so that is just a silly strawman argument.

Here is the real issue: On a boat with 3 or 5 underwater seacocks it is EASY to stop a leak, even if the water is over the floorboards: Close all the valves and THEN sort it out.

On a boat with 20 seacocks, and water at the floorboards, you are almost surely SOL. You will NEVER get to them all, and I take the bet at least 4 of those 20 are damn hard to reach--even with an empty bilge.

Because we sail on the ocean and in remote areas far from help, we have the occasional safety drill. Terribly nerdy, I know, but still a good idea.

One of our regular drills is "WATER!" Everyone has a specific task, from closing the water tight doors, through manning the manual bilge pump, to closing all (three) of the seacocks. It takes two people 3 to 4 minutes to secure our boat to be sure it keeps floating even with a failed seawater hose.

THAT'S why a good, seaworthy boat has a very limited number of holes in the bottom. Not because of any fear of a seacock or thruhull fitting failing.

But that's OK. If you feel safer with a swiss cheese boat, I'll not try to talk you out of it.

[john61ct]

Yes if the boat is likely to be in a slip when it sinks,

as opposed to living aboard cruising,

different levels of caution are appropriate.

The ability to quickly close them all certainly makes sense for those inclined to be more cautious.

And yes how rigorously maintenance schedules are enforced is a separate factor from quantity.

[RaymondR]

Originally Posted by Yachtjuno

3 thru hulls and how many miles of pipe work? It’s always a trade off.

It's sort of hard to fit "miles of pipe work" into a 30' - 40' boat?

[Captmatt]

I thought the 18 excluding transducers was bad on my 2004 L47! To make things worse, at least 4 of the through hulls are virtually inaccessible at the bottom of the plumbing chase and in an emergency would be very difficult to close much less plug. Not sure what Leopard was thinking when they placed these.

[billknny]

Originally Posted by Captmatt

I thought the 18 excluding transducers was bad on my 2004 L47! To make things worse, at least 4 of the through hulls are virtually inaccessible at the bottom of the plumbing chase and in an emergency would be very difficult to close much less plug. Not sure what Leopard was thinking when they placed these.

That was kind of my point in the first place, most modern builders don't think about what is best, but just do what is expeditious to getting the product out the door.

[boatpoker]

Thought you guys might like to see a page from a survey I did on a 1988 Bayfield 36