Electric bilge for 250wb
- Thread starter Erik J
- Start date
I have spent some time with bilge pump projects on boats with no bilge compartment and shallow bilge compartments but the questions is what are your expectations about installing a bilge pump for your boat? The usual misguided reason people give is, ' I want it for safety as the boat is left unattended and would like the pump to expel any water that may find its way into the boat'. Let me say that boat manufacturers include a bilge pump in their boats as a convenience feature. The small electrical pumps are unable to cope with any significant influx of water. They are designed to automatically expel incidental water that may collect in the bilge so that you don't have to scoop it up manually. The typical electric bilge pump is rated in GPH but they are rated in a bench with no load, so what means is for example a 500 GPH pump by the time you add a length of discharge hose with having to lift heads of water a few inches the efficiency of that pump drops drastically. These pumps as they run their motors generate heat and this heat further eats into their efficiency. Let's not forget about connections and electrical wiring mostly under water which also generates heat and voltage drops. It has been tested that on the average these pumps only provides 20% of its rated capacity. So that 500 GPH pump is only good for around 100GPH. A 1/2 inch hole in your hull or a busted hose can deliver 100 gallons in less than 15 minutes. There is a saying that the smaller the boat the larger the bilge pump should be as they will sink the fastest. The real secret to boat safety is periodic inspections of all through hulls, valves, hoses and clamps and prompt repair of any leaks taht may be found. For boats with available shore power a 120V sump pump can be installed to expel large volume of water. While under way a gusher manual pump is the best to keep a boat afloat until help arrives or influx plugged. Buckets are also quite handy. Now what I have used in the past to remove incidental water that may collect in boat in the cabin sole of a boat with no bilge is to use a portable 12V plug in, electric pump with a short hose that can pull water from crevices. Some people just up for using a wet vac when they get back to the dock. I had an old boat that had no bilge, the cabin floor was the hull and it leaked water through the keel trunk and in a matter of an hour you could have 2" of water in the cabin floor so I installed a bilge pump in the lowest part of the floor. I would turn it On and OFF manually with a switch near the companion way. It never expelled all the water as it would loose priming, suck air and water in the discharge hose would flow back but would keep the level at about 1/2 inch which was a big and improvement and convenient.