Broken seacock valve handle

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Originally Posted by jen1722terry

Maybe check with Beneteau to see what kind of seacocks they used. Looking at your photo, it does appear to be bronze. May be salvageable with a new handle.

Just a thought.

Beneteau never uses bronze, end story. IN EU production boat nobody use bronze on boat. REad maintenance manual receive when you buy new boat.
Beneteau and other production boat in EU don't talk with nobody except dealers, you have right under warranty only talk with dealers where you buy new boat.
after 10 years your boat is for recycling and for order new boat (by wish EU production boat manufacture empty capacity)

you are customer and you have under warranty right talk with you dealer but after the warranty expire you don't have right talking with dealer (30-70€ hour) except for ordering overpriced part you want buy.
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for example purpose only, i am an ex-owner dufour dealer company hour of employment cost me 50€ and you want talk with my employment and ant he spend 2-3 hour 150€ .for good name why i give you 150€ this money i save for children hospital donation or hungry children in world

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what is in manual
The skin fittings

Every skin fitting under the waterline has a ball valve on the inside. These require no greasing or
maintenance. All valves should be operated now and then. In freezing conditions they should be left
open.
Our advice is to knock on the through hull fittings with a hammer and a screwdriver once a year. If the
metal is porous it is time for changing, if it is not porous, we see no reason to do anything at all,regardless of age.

Our advice is to knock

but for example Hansegroup use the following material: CW602N

but with my experience, this is maybe some shittest .after 7-8 year of use i on my eyes see a simply missing Hose Nozzle on a couple boats. but also I am dealer this C602N CR fitings and this product come direct from factory. for my boat i use trudesign and for customer i sell bronze or C602N.

[Jubilee39]

I have used the groco seacocks installed 35 years ago on my boat for that long. Inspect on haulout and have replaced some over the years with the approved plastic type. All the bronze seacocks have the same failure of the handles after many years but never worried about the integrity of the seacocks. A good quality wrench will work in a pinch but replacement handles can be fabricated

[NevilleCat]

What a hilarious thread. In Aus we usually just have a through-hull fitting with a ball valve on it, and that looks like a $20 Chinese bronze ball valve. like this

It's a good idea to replace those every 7 years or so anyhow as, even though the body is bronze, the shafts are sometimes brass or stainless and they can fail whereby the handle no longer turns the ball leaving it either open or closed or in between without you knowing. They also sometimes arrive with steel nuts not stainless.

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Originally Posted by NevilleCat

What a hilarious thread. In Aus we usually just have a through-hull fitting with a ball valve on it, and that looks like a $20 Chinese bronze ball valve. like this

It's a good idea to replace those every 7 years or so anyhow as, even though the body is bronze, the shafts are sometimes brass or stainless and they can fail whereby the handle no longer turns the ball leaving it either open or closed or in between without you knowing. They also sometimes arrive with steel nuts not stainless.

but our college on forum to you from the East Pacific, to me west of the Atlantic Ocean think that only Thru-hulls and Seacocks valves made by England’s Blakes & Taylors from 1789 is good.


look who normal buy this valve
https://www.amazon.de/-/en/Groco-Fla...=sports&sr=1-2

if i be owner of yacht manufacture must be stupid and install this on boat

10 valves over 4000€ and 10 hours install work this additional 1000€

[deblen]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6WdSnolj24

[Bycrick]

Over a 50-year period, I’ve owned two Taiwanese boats, one a cheapy and the other considered expensive. One new, one about 20-years-old when bought. Both had a random sampling of ball valves screwed onto "bronze" throughhulls when purchased. Over all those years, I have only had a ball valve itself fail by breaking twice . Both times, the stem itself corroded away. The handles, OTOH, go away regularly. I’ve never had to replace a throughhull fitting that got "old." The fittings were replaced when I couldn’t get the valve or some other part off the fitting. It was easier and cheaper to remove it all and start over.

NB. When replaced, I use the Groco adapter plates. All "bronze" pipe failures (there have been several) were Taiwanese cast plumbing fittings: T-fittings and hose barb adapters.

[Dieseldude]

Originally Posted by CruisingOz

I was exercising the stern tube water inlet seacock and the valve handle has broken off. Looks like a brass type one. Should the whole seacock be replaced or can one source just the handle?



Attachment 252157

Attachment 252158

Looks like somebody fitted a household fresh water ball valve. It exists on borrowed time before it catastrophically fails. The whole valve needs to be replaced with a marine rated bronze. The weakness of brass lies in its zinc content. The zinc dissolves in sea water, leaving a very weak spongy mass that can easily disintegrate. Brass should never be used for below water line applications. Another weakness is that this type of valve has a stainless steel ball. This dissimilar metal combination is vulnerable to galvanic corrosion. It is essential to replace the valve with one spec'ed for sea water before it fails and the boat fills with water.

[Bycrick]

The Groco sea cocks and valves also have a stainless shaft and ball. How can one tell just by looking whether it’s "brass" or "bronze?" Buy good stuff from a manufacturer you can trust, or be prepared to replace it on a schedule, rather than wait until something breaks.

[Statistical]

Originally Posted by Bycrick

The Groco sea cocks and valves also have a stainless shaft and ball. How can one tell just by looking whether it’s "brass" or "bronze?" Buy good stuff from a manufacturer you can trust, or be prepared to replace it on a schedule, rather than wait until something breaks.

While I agree you should buy replacements from reputable manufacturers identifying brass vs bronze is not that hard. Brass is going to have a smooth finish and be lighter in color and shiny. Bronze is going to have a rough darker colored matte finish.

Not saying it is guaranteed bronze but the reverse is almost always true. If you see a shiny light colored smooth finish "seacock" or hose barb it almost certainly brass and should be replaced.



Personally I prefer bronze given the multi-decade track records but the high density marine plastic stuff seems to hold up pretty well. I would certainly use a TruDesign valve over a brass one.

[Dieseldude]

Originally Posted by Bycrick

The Groco sea cocks and valves also have a stainless shaft and ball. How can one tell just by looking whether it’s "brass" or "bronze?" Buy good stuff from a manufacturer you can trust, or be prepared to replace it on a schedule, rather than wait until something breaks.

A valve that you can trust should have an approval number on the package. Alloy material should be stated. Approval could be from US Coast Guard or a classification society such as Lloyds, ABS, DNV, etc. You can roughly visually confirm the material of the internal part by looking inside with valve closed or partially closed. If it looks like a different metal from the body material, do not buy it.

[stormalong]

Originally Posted by Statistical

While I agree you should buy replacements from reputable manufacturers identifying brass vs bronze is not that hard. Brass is going to have a smooth finish and be lighter in color and shiny. Bronze is going to have a rough darker colored matte finish.

Not saying it is guaranteed bronze but the reverse is almost always true. If you see a shiny light colored smooth finish "seacock" or hose barb it almost certainly brass and should be replaced.

Personally I prefer bronze given the multi-decade track records but the high density marine plastic stuff seems to hold up pretty well. I would certainly use a TruDesign valve over a brass one.

Or you could use Forespar Marelon or Trudesign and not worry about the alloy.

[Statistical]

Originally Posted by stormalong

Or you could use Forespar Marelon or Trudesign and not worry about the alloy.

I don't worry about the alloy because I buy from a reputable company.

That is different than identifying what is already on a boat. If the boat has a mix of brass and bronze then it would make sense to replace the brass first regardless of if you replace it with bronze or marine grade plastic.

[Dieseldude]

Originally Posted by stormalong

Or you could use Forespar Marelon or Trudesign and not worry about the alloy.

Plastic has its immunity to corrosion in its favor. But it is just hard to trust it to this life critical application. Anyone know if there exits a plastic valve approved for below water line application? I mean by US Coast Guard or classification society? Plastic threads are easily damaged too.

[Bycrick]

Statistical is right, sort of. A lot of "brass" fittings are machined, and a lot of "bronze" fittings are cast. But that’s certainly not a certain way to distinguish. Where I’m at, any yellow metal outside a jewelry store is called "bronce." When I use the proper word "latón" I get blank stares. And even if the supplier says "bronze" in their detailed description, unless they specify (truthfully) the specific alloy, you don’t know what you’re getting.