fresh water Question~

[SEADANCE]

Good Sunday to ya!..you should see the blue skies and beautiful winds we have here today..a tease to me. Can't go sailing just yet so the kids and I spent the morning flying kites on the beach Hubby wants me to askCan a fresh water boat be moved into salt water?The offer we put on the boat we liked did not go thru, he wants way to much for it and won't budge and so we walked away from it. It's sad too because she is just sitting there rotting. For the amount he was asking for, we found a better boat in better condition with everything we are looking for and nothing needs replacing and lots of new equipment/cushions/rigging. So we made an offer on it about $1,000 less than what he was asking for and if he does not accept tomorrow morning than we are just going to pay asking price on it because she is a beauty. Wish us luck, I hope this is the boat I can write back about and show pictures of!~B/Seadance

 

[Don S/V ILLusion]

just change bottom paint and good-to-go

also want to change the magnesium or aluminum anodes used for fresh water to zinc(s)

 

[CalebD]

I envy the nice weather you are having

down in Florida. It is raining, cold and windy up here in the NE; not kite flying weather here.There was a recent discussion on this same topic entitled 'salt water to fresh' which you can find by searching for this phrase in the archives.My Tartan 27 was sailed on Lake Erie for many years before it was brought down to the LI Sound so it has spent about half of its life in fresh water. This probably explains why our 40 year old Atomic 4 engine is still running. Fresh water is better for raw water cooled engines and is much less corrosive to all metal hardware. Some bottom paints are better for a fresh water environment than salt water so you might want to consider switching bottom paints to an ablative paint designed for salt water use. You will get a lot more marine organisms trying to attach to your hull in salt water whereas slime seems to be the contaminant of choice in fresh water.Assuming your boat will have an inboard engine I would make sure that any raw water intake thru hull has a screen of some kind over the hole to protect the cooling system from sucking up all manner of flotsam.Good luck with your pending purchase. Keep us posted.

 

[David10790]

As the saying goes

Water corrodes and salt water corrodes absolutely. The warmer the salt water, the more damage it will do. So the least wear and tear from water is on northern fresh water boats, and the most is from southern salt water boats - which is your neck of the woods. Also bear in mind that there are fewer critters in cold fresh water than warm salt which means you do have to worry about paint.

 

[Honeyman]

Certainly...

the boat has had it easy being in fresh. As posters have said, main issue is making sure you get proper bottom paint on before going in. Where will the boat be splashed if purchase goes through? Attention as to type of zincs is a good "catch" as well. I'd possibly do a good polishing up of all the stainless on the exterior as salt will be much more active on all the metal. Hope all goes well with your deal.