Lagoons Have Cheap Brass Thruhulls

[malbert73]

Originally Posted by minaret

Very common. Even more common in production multihulls, where space is often at a premium and thru hulls are often in difficult locations. Anyone who has replaced a great deal of thru hulls will tell you that while 80% of them are indeed a breeze, the other 20% more than make up for it. I have in the past had to go to extreme measures to replace a thru hull, like cutting out a section of bulkhead and replacing it afterward. Powerboats are often the worst, with thruhulls under engines and in all sorts of other strange inaccessible places.

Amazing pics.
My 46 year old Allied built monohull has the original bronze throughhulls and there is barely any green on them. They look pristine. I removed one fitting to examine and rebed just for the heck of it and it looks perfect. They also have the cone type seacocks which are easy to service and don't leak, so tough to see spending the time and money to replace with more modern ball type. Rudderpost is also 1.5 inch solid bronze, in a solid bronze heel fitting. All look fine. Back then shortcuts werent considered, even in a "production" boat like an allied. I wonder what kind of bronze alloy they used back in 1966?

[Cheechako]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

Yeah, most all have some arrangement like that...

"I f i remember the groco have the ball separate from the body with a teflon spacer?"

I often wonder what happens to that plastic liner when the seacock has been closed a while and has a barnacle or two attached, then you rotate the sharp little bugger through the plastic!

[neilpride]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

"I f i remember the groco have the ball separate from the body with a teflon spacer?"

I often wonder what happens to that plastic liner when the seacock has been closed a while and has a barnacle or two attached, then you rotate the sharp little bugger through the plastic!

Good point, what i can see with groco is that the spacer is just a ring of a white material probably teflon or some kind of hard stuff in the intake and another in the discharge side , this rings if get damaged with the use of opening and closing the valve with sharpy bugs dont compromise the watertight of the valve mainly because the shaft of the lever have a teflon bushing to, i believe the reason for this white rings is to keep the stainless steel ball away from the bronze and to avoid some play in the ball .
Maybe im wrong

[Cheechako]

Originally Posted by neilpride

Good point, what i can see with groco is that the spacer is just a ring of a white material probably teflon or some kind of hard stuff in the intake and another in the discharge side , this rings if get damaged with the use of opening and closing the valve with sharpy bugs dont compromise the watertight of the valve mainly because the shaft of the lever have a teflon bushing to, i believe the reason for this white rings is to keep the stainless steel ball away from the bronze and to avoid some play in the ball .
Maybe im wrong

I think they are used universally in ball valves for lubrication so the valve doesnt stick/freeze up. Isolating the materials also occurrs I suppose. A good ball valve is a pretty nice device, but not as much a long term solution as a true seacock... IMHO.

[neilpride]

Agree, nothing beat a true seacock, can last a lifetime if properly serviced, still i dont understand why builders like Lagoon and others dont use a decent quality seacock in their boats, save cost??? how much ? 2000 , 3000, $ in a 500.000 catamaran? sounds ridiculous or this guys have a strong tie with some chinese manufacture!!!!

[atoll]

Originally Posted by neilpride

Agree, nothing beat a true seacock, can last a lifetime if properly serviced, still i dont understand why builders like Lagoon and others dont use a decent quality seacock in their boats, save cost??? how much ? 2000 , 3000, $ in a 500.000 catamaran? sounds ridiculous or this guys have a strong tie with some chinese manufacture!!!!

i think you will find a lot of struggling large marine companys are run by accountants these days,who only see margins,not the guys sitting in the life raft

[JayCall]

Through hulls are a particular pecadillo of mine. Minaret is right on access or total lack thereof. I almost got thrown off a boat at a boatshow several years ago because the rep at the show thought I had no business spending that much time in the engine room trying to find through hulls to check access. He thought I was crazy-and he did not even know how many or where they were on his own boat! A friend about a year ago took a captain position on a 175' yacht that had just undergone a $3M refit and had electric valves put on all the through hulls. He insisted that manual valves be added in front of the electric ones and the owner almost fired him! He told the guy-"What if one pops, shorts out the electric valve and you watch about $8M sink to the bottom of the Med? they added manual valves!

[perchance]

Originally Posted by neilpride

Agree, nothing beat a true seacock, can last a lifetime if properly serviced, still i dont understand why builders like Lagoon and others dont use a decent quality seacock in their boats, save cost??? how much ? 2000 , 3000, $ in a 500.000 catamaran? sounds ridiculous or this guys have a strong tie with some chinese manufacture!!!!

I think it could be a case of spending the bulk of the build money on "Pretty" and too little on the important stuff. But as they say" the market dictates".

[44'cruisingcat]

If I was buying a second-hand boat, I'd be having a survey done. The cost of replacing the through hulls would obviously be deducted from the purchase price.

[trimaranspirit]

Originally Posted by JayCall

Through hulls are a particular pecadillo of mine. Minaret is right on access or total lack thereof. I almost got thrown off a boat at a boatshow several years ago because the rep at the show thought I had no business spending that much time in the engine room trying to find through hulls to check access. He thought I was crazy-and he did not even know how many or where they were on his own boat! A friend about a year ago took a captain position on a 175' yacht that had just undergone a $3M refit and had electric valves put on all the through hulls. He insisted that manual valves be added in front of the electric ones and the owner almost fired him! He told the guy-"What if one pops, shorts out the electric valve and you watch about $8M sink to the bottom of the Med? they added manual valves!

I'd love to know where the boat was registered? In most flag states this would be highly illegal and also the insurance would be void instantly with something so idiotic as this! It obviously wasn't commercially registered.

You'll also find most boats built in Europe come under the ECB and need CE certification to be sold as new within Europe. So metallic thru hulls are specified as anything plastic doesn't cut the mustard in their certification.

Remember a lot of insurance companies don't cover plastic thru hulls (check your policy if you don't know) and a lot of countries don't allow them for commercial use either I actually don't know of any that do allow them!

It's a pretty well know fact that a few companies out there use substandard fittings it's not only limited to thru hulls or Lagoon. You'd be amazed at how cheap rigs are done by certain companies all you have to do is look at the cheap fittings these guys put all over there boats. You get what you pay for!

In the end its buyers beware! It's why forums like this exist.

[dirkdig]

I have 13 to replace on my lagoon 2005 and they look nowhere as bad as the photos of the 2007 lagoon.
They may be a better quality,but I will do it now while it's a bit easier.

Given it's all about metal quality and dis similar metals what impact does copper based anti foul have sitting on brass fitting in water I wonder?

[amarinesurveyor]

The metal they use is a bronze alloy, not brass. Bronze is much stronger than brass, they are two different metals.
Brian

[dirkdig]

What do you recommend I use to replace them with?
Boat is in Qld and there is the thru hull plus the valves.

[Celestialsailor]

Originally Posted by cat man do

but its pretty silly to shitcan a boat based on a single observation of one part.

Unless that obervation is at the bottom of it's slip.


...oh...I almost forgot... < there, that's better.

[Lagoon4us]

Facts:-
1)Every metal part on a non-ferrous hull should be commonly/electrically connected or you will get galvanic corrosion no matter the metal. Noble/less Noble etc. Saltwater is an Electrolyte!!!!!!

2) If you cannot replace your own thru-hulls do your family a favour and get off your boat now cos' there's many more things that are going to let you down.

3) Brass i very much doubt, cheap i can believe. Brass will screw up in 12 months, 5 years is a bronze.

There seems to be a lack of understanding that disimilar metals in an electrolyte causes a reaction it ain't rocket science......

Plastic is ok but nothing lasts forever it's called maintenence.

Cheers