Thank you all again. Here is how I did it. On my 1977 Catalina 30 underneath the seat at the helm (against the transom) there is a fiberglass shelf; if thats what you want to call it. I guess some people store stuff there, but I think it woould have been a better design to leave if off. This way a person could access the cockpit drains, the bilge, and the steering. So I took a roto zip saw and cut big holes in this shelf. That way I could access the drains. When I opened it up I found thys drain holes glassed directly to the boat. Part of the problem was the metal fittings were rusting away where you put the rubber hoses on the end of the pipe fittings. The other problem was just as I imagined. Reeds, wood splinters, dirt, and charcoal, yes charcoal,(the PO stored the charcoal in this compartment) were all the culprit. I replaced the hoses and used double stainless steel c clamps. PROBLEM SOLVED. Sorry I didn't take a picture. I was hurrying before this storm hit Pensacola. Thanks, Tony
Cockpit drains solved
- Thread starter Traumaguard
- Start date
- Status
How Was Your Trip
Traumaguard.....didn't you recently bring your boat from Lake Ponchatrain's North Shore? If so, how was the trip?
Traumaguard.....didn't you recently bring your boat from Lake Ponchatrain's North Shore? If so, how was the trip?
New Orleans to Pensacola
I had a great time on the trip back, here is some of what I learned. We had a reservation for the north pass causeway bridge in the lake. This was at 04:30 am. We reached the operator via CH 16 the previous night and he said he would pass it on to the next guy. Well 04:30 came and we were at the north pass. The operator mentioned that the guy he relieved told him about us coming at 04:30, however he denied an opening saying his supervisot would not approve it and the traffic was too heavy. Well the curfew started at 05:30 so I don't know what the problem was but we had to go to the south pass which was way out of the way. We made it through the hwy 11 and railroad bridge just fine. The rigolees sorry about the spelliing, was shut down until further notice. this we found out after after radio contact. We had asked several people if it was open and they said yes, well it must have broke inbtween the time they went through and we were wanting to go through. So... we had to go to the Chef pass. WHOA! we were very up close to the damage it was unbelievable. Not much traffic on the waterways. From there we hopped into the ICW and headed North. Between the two bridge mishaps we lost about 8 hours. We left the river in Mandeville at 3am that morning and got to Cat Island (off the coast of Gulfport,MS) at 5pm. We awoke again at 3 am and were home in Pensacola at 10pm. We motored the whole way due to damage to my transom where the backstays are connected. In the lake with no wind we were doing 8.2kts by GPS thanks to a 3 bladed prop and unversal m25 xpb running at 2200 RPM. the second day was slower at 6-6.5 knts due to current and wind off the bow at 20+ kts. The navigational aides were all up for the whole trip. I was worried we would hit a sunken car, house, boat, or tree. We did see some tree branches in the lake next to I-10 on the eastern side. The only other problem was the engine overheated whil we were going down the river in Mandeville. We pulled the raw water intake hose off the seacock and water was just trickling in. We cleared it with a screwdriver. It was full of wooden splinters and reeds. Other than that a great trip. I just wish we could have sailed.
I had a great time on the trip back, here is some of what I learned. We had a reservation for the north pass causeway bridge in the lake. This was at 04:30 am. We reached the operator via CH 16 the previous night and he said he would pass it on to the next guy. Well 04:30 came and we were at the north pass. The operator mentioned that the guy he relieved told him about us coming at 04:30, however he denied an opening saying his supervisot would not approve it and the traffic was too heavy. Well the curfew started at 05:30 so I don't know what the problem was but we had to go to the south pass which was way out of the way. We made it through the hwy 11 and railroad bridge just fine. The rigolees sorry about the spelliing, was shut down until further notice. this we found out after after radio contact. We had asked several people if it was open and they said yes, well it must have broke inbtween the time they went through and we were wanting to go through. So... we had to go to the Chef pass. WHOA! we were very up close to the damage it was unbelievable. Not much traffic on the waterways. From there we hopped into the ICW and headed North. Between the two bridge mishaps we lost about 8 hours. We left the river in Mandeville at 3am that morning and got to Cat Island (off the coast of Gulfport,MS) at 5pm. We awoke again at 3 am and were home in Pensacola at 10pm. We motored the whole way due to damage to my transom where the backstays are connected. In the lake with no wind we were doing 8.2kts by GPS thanks to a 3 bladed prop and unversal m25 xpb running at 2200 RPM. the second day was slower at 6-6.5 knts due to current and wind off the bow at 20+ kts. The navigational aides were all up for the whole trip. I was worried we would hit a sunken car, house, boat, or tree. We did see some tree branches in the lake next to I-10 on the eastern side. The only other problem was the engine overheated whil we were going down the river in Mandeville. We pulled the raw water intake hose off the seacock and water was just trickling in. We cleared it with a screwdriver. It was full of wooden splinters and reeds. Other than that a great trip. I just wish we could have sailed.
- Status