Congrats to Hunter for at least putting seacocks on the sink thru hulls. a lot of manufacturers still don't . and some owners don't bother to close the seacocks in heavy seas, allowing sinks to 'siphon.' this happened to our crew once (on a boat without seacocks on sink thru hull discharges.) when the galley sink outlet was submerged a certain way , it siphoned a foot of water into the boat before someone noticed. it scared the hell out of many.
H40.5 Owners ALERT: This could sink you
- Thread starter Rich Stidger
- Start date
Thanks Rich. I've took care of everything I could have in the time I had (Thanks for all the advice here on this forum). I couldn't get a haul out so I'm on my mooring. The bimini, dodger and genoa are all off and at my house along with everything that was loose and could roll around. The sea cocks are all closed (I do that anyway when I leave the boat) and there is duct tape over the sliding companionway hatch. There is chafe protection on the mooring lines. The only thing I didn't get done was removing the main sail but I double wrapped it to make it very tight and round instead of the Doyle Stackpak that is a mini-sail in high winds.
Now we just have to see how it rides out the storm. I'll let you know.
Looks like I still have a boat! It survived on the mooring as all my preps paid off, however others were not so lucky. 6 boats at our club broke loose and at least one of them crashed into mine. It ripped off the anchor roller and raked down the stbd side taking out the pulput, stbd stantions, life lines and damaging the radar mast. All those things are repairable and minor compared to the other loses that occurred in our area. Several marinas were destroyed along with the boats there.
Dan- I am so sorry to learn of your damage. Yes it could have been worse, but it is still unfortunate. Sadly no mater how well you prep your boat, others can become loose and cause you damage.
My 1996 Hunter 376 also has corrugated hoses for the galley sink as well as the head sinks. They may not be rated for underwater use, but they have lasted on the boat for 20 years and at least 20,000 offshore miles with some of them quite rough. I do believe they are standard adapters with barbs though. I am not saying this is ideal but it seems to work. Keep in mind, we are only talking about 15 psi down there and I am pretty sure these hoses are rated for much higher psi.
With that said, this post helped remind me that they are 20 year old hoses so replacing them would be a good idea.
Note: and I think even 15 psi is overstating it. At sea level it is one bar (14.7 psi) and you have to go down 33 feet to reach 2 bar. So, there is 14.7 psi on the inside of the boat and another .445 psi on the inside of the hose down a foot which is farther down then the bottom of my hose. So based on that, there is practically no pressure on the hose.
With that said, this post helped remind me that they are 20 year old hoses so replacing them would be a good idea.
Note: and I think even 15 psi is overstating it. At sea level it is one bar (14.7 psi) and you have to go down 33 feet to reach 2 bar. So, there is 14.7 psi on the inside of the boat and another .445 psi on the inside of the hose down a foot which is farther down then the bottom of my hose. So based on that, there is practically no pressure on the hose.
My 34 had corrugated hose on the vanity sink and the galley sink. The galley sink has been changed and the vanity sink hose failed. Luckily I was there at the time. It failed as I was closing the thru-hull. It had a crack right at the sea cock. Scary
After giving it more though, I think I understand why Hunter uses corrugated hoses on sink drains and not on other things such as frig raw water cooling hose. I think the pressure is a lot different on hoses that are closed off, such as a hose that leads to a pump vs a hose that leads to an open sink drain. I can't explain why so maybe one of the physics majors on here can help explain why.
An update for the h40.5 owners:
At my fall decommissioning, I took a closer look at the galley hoses and thru-hull. Attached are pictures of everything.
Here is some information for those of you who are going to replace the corrugated hoses. The OD of the sink tail pieces is 1.25". Some of the info in my original post is wrong- First the hose is connected to a straight cuff, not a right angle cuff as I originally thought. Also this cuff is connected to a hose barb that is attached to the ball valve- I originally thought it was just a short nipple.
In my case, this ball valve is EXTREMELY hard to operate, and so I wanted to remove the valve and bring it home to see what could be done to get it to operate freely. I was unable to remove it because I did not have appropriate tools. The size of the nut that secures the thru-hull and the size of the flats on the valve are both 2". The distance from the bottom of the valve nut to the bottom of the valve is 3/4". This means that the wrench on the thru-hull nut cannot be any thicker than 3/4". The inside diameter of the thru-hull is 1.125". I did manage to twist the thru-hull and break the seal to the hull. I will remove this valve in the spring and re-bed the thru-hull. If I find that the threads are mismatched (NPS vs NPT) I will correct that issue also.
On the subject of hard-to-operate ball valves, most of the ones that I have do not operate easily. Out of nine valves I think only one operates easily. The galley sink valve is especially difficult due to it's hard-to-reach location. Over the years I have tried every suggestion I have found to lubricate these valves to no avail. So if any of you know of a method that actually works (meaning you have actually performed the solution) please let me know.
At my fall decommissioning, I took a closer look at the galley hoses and thru-hull. Attached are pictures of everything.
Here is some information for those of you who are going to replace the corrugated hoses. The OD of the sink tail pieces is 1.25". Some of the info in my original post is wrong- First the hose is connected to a straight cuff, not a right angle cuff as I originally thought. Also this cuff is connected to a hose barb that is attached to the ball valve- I originally thought it was just a short nipple.
In my case, this ball valve is EXTREMELY hard to operate, and so I wanted to remove the valve and bring it home to see what could be done to get it to operate freely. I was unable to remove it because I did not have appropriate tools. The size of the nut that secures the thru-hull and the size of the flats on the valve are both 2". The distance from the bottom of the valve nut to the bottom of the valve is 3/4". This means that the wrench on the thru-hull nut cannot be any thicker than 3/4". The inside diameter of the thru-hull is 1.125". I did manage to twist the thru-hull and break the seal to the hull. I will remove this valve in the spring and re-bed the thru-hull. If I find that the threads are mismatched (NPS vs NPT) I will correct that issue also.
On the subject of hard-to-operate ball valves, most of the ones that I have do not operate easily. Out of nine valves I think only one operates easily. The galley sink valve is especially difficult due to it's hard-to-reach location. Over the years I have tried every suggestion I have found to lubricate these valves to no avail. So if any of you know of a method that actually works (meaning you have actually performed the solution) please let me know.
Yep....replacing them. Your boat is 20 years old and in my experience, if you get 20 years out of your sea-cocks you are doing good. Once they get hard to close it is not far behind they stop working altogether like handle breaking or the shaft breaking. In my opinion, sea-cocks are not something to go cheap on.
Mine work fine. Not too difficult on any of them. As to maintenance: basically none. I have them lubricated every haul which is about four years on average which simply is greasing them (hopefully with a synthetic) by way of a long swab and opening and closing them a couple of times. In general I am very pleased with their durability and ease of handling.
Looking at your photo of the hose to valve, that's a pretty radical change of direction. I would thing a 90 degree barbed fitting there would be appropriate at the (small) risk of clogs.
Looking at your photo of the hose to valve, that's a pretty radical change of direction. I would thing a 90 degree barbed fitting there would be appropriate at the (small) risk of clogs.
Just looking at that corrugated hose and particularly that tight turn at the thru hull brings back the heebie-jeebies.
When I redid mine I had the same tight bend. Replaced it with a bronze 90 deg. elbow and solid sanitary hose. Never had a clog in all these years since.
When I redid mine I had the same tight bend. Replaced it with a bronze 90 deg. elbow and solid sanitary hose. Never had a clog in all these years since.
this!
Bronze sea cocks are expensive because you buy them only once!
Curious as to why they don't fit non return check valves on these, it would be another layer of defense?
They do!
Here is a bronze one made in USA. But I would never put one on a service that may have food particles in it.
http://www.apollovalves.com/products/by_product_specific/444
Attached for @Rich Stidger is the detailed drawing of the ball valves found on my boat. Note, that you can replace the Teflon® ball seat and more, which is normally the anti-friction part, but the stem also has a packing glad of Teflon® too (that may be too tight). I don't rebuild them because (minus labor to rebuild) only $5 difference.
Tip: Stuck ball valve. Loosen the packing glad very slowly (don't remove it) and work the valve. It is rare that the ball seat wears out. At worse you will get a small leak through the packing gland.
________
Flex hose...
This cheap drain hose has been used, for years, behind your home washing machine. It was NEVER designed to make a piping angle greater than 120°. In other word a ≈180° turn is too much.
(post#35)Standard piping angle fittings are 45°, 90°, and 120° (Wye).
I would use a 120° Wye for a double sink drain. Pick one sink has the potential of small food particles and the other for wash/rinse. The straight part under the "food" sink and the other sink using the angled input.
When I re-pipe, and need flex hose, normally for angles <45° and I sometime uses them for minor vibration control/isolation.
_______
The bronze ferrule (post #32) should not be painted. Bronze needs the Oxygen in water to reduce corrosion.
I will replace all my sea cocks in 3 years when she comes out for a bottom pain and some key hoses.
Jim...
PS: This is the drawing attached.
I have just completed the hose replacement for my galley and head sinks in my 40.5. The OEM corrugated vinyl hose with cuffs is not rated for below-water-line use. I ended up using some ShieldsFlex II wet exhaust hose that is wire reinforced. 1.25"ID for the galley and 1" ID for the two head sinks. There may be a better hose choice, but this was all that was available to me locally and in a timely manner. The hose was flexible enough and the internal wire kept the hose from collapsing at bends.
Additionally, I re-worked my galley thru-hull. As is very typical the thru-hull with NPS threads was directly screwed on to the ball valve that has NPT threads. The other problem that I had (mentioned in post #32) is that the galley ball valve was extremely hard to operate. Having it in a very inaccessible location worsened the problem. So last fall I removed the valve and thru-hull completely. My first thought was to simply replace the ball valve with a real flanged seacock. But after getting one of these seacocks I discovered that it was even harder to operate than my existing ball valve.
My solution was to free-up my existing ball valve. It took several weeks of soaking both sides of the ball with PB Blaster, but finally the valve began to operate much easier.
I then got a Groco IBVF 1250 flanged adapter that accepts the NPS threads on the thru-hull and the NPT threads on the ball valve. I removed the wood backing circle that was OEM and replaced it with a 1/2" thick 6" diameter fiberglass circle. After cleaning the inside of the hull and wiping with Interlux 202 and then roughing the surface, I dry-fit everything together and marked the proper alignment for the valve handle. I drilled three holes through the hull for the flange mounting bolts following Maine Sail's procedures. I epoxied the backing plate with West System epoxy, then mounted the IBVF adapter with the three bolts and bedded the bolts and thru-hull with SilkaFlex 291. I installed a 90 degree street ell on top of the valve and fitted a piece of 1.25" wet exhaust hose to the existing tee below the galley sink. This tee is above the water line so I did not replace the vinyl corrugated hoses from the tee to each sink.
Now the installation is complete and I can now operate the valve lever with one finger!
While I was at it, I also replaced the hoses on each of the head sinks with 1" wet exhaust hose, so I have eliminated all of the OEM vinyl corrugated hose below the water line.
See pictures below for details- For the benefit of all the 40.5 owners, the first four pictures are of the galley sink and seacock. The next two are the aft head,and the last one is the forward head.
Additionally, I re-worked my galley thru-hull. As is very typical the thru-hull with NPS threads was directly screwed on to the ball valve that has NPT threads. The other problem that I had (mentioned in post #32) is that the galley ball valve was extremely hard to operate. Having it in a very inaccessible location worsened the problem. So last fall I removed the valve and thru-hull completely. My first thought was to simply replace the ball valve with a real flanged seacock. But after getting one of these seacocks I discovered that it was even harder to operate than my existing ball valve.
My solution was to free-up my existing ball valve. It took several weeks of soaking both sides of the ball with PB Blaster, but finally the valve began to operate much easier.
I then got a Groco IBVF 1250 flanged adapter that accepts the NPS threads on the thru-hull and the NPT threads on the ball valve. I removed the wood backing circle that was OEM and replaced it with a 1/2" thick 6" diameter fiberglass circle. After cleaning the inside of the hull and wiping with Interlux 202 and then roughing the surface, I dry-fit everything together and marked the proper alignment for the valve handle. I drilled three holes through the hull for the flange mounting bolts following Maine Sail's procedures. I epoxied the backing plate with West System epoxy, then mounted the IBVF adapter with the three bolts and bedded the bolts and thru-hull with SilkaFlex 291. I installed a 90 degree street ell on top of the valve and fitted a piece of 1.25" wet exhaust hose to the existing tee below the galley sink. This tee is above the water line so I did not replace the vinyl corrugated hoses from the tee to each sink.
Now the installation is complete and I can now operate the valve lever with one finger!
While I was at it, I also replaced the hoses on each of the head sinks with 1" wet exhaust hose, so I have eliminated all of the OEM vinyl corrugated hose below the water line.
See pictures below for details- For the benefit of all the 40.5 owners, the first four pictures are of the galley sink and seacock. The next two are the aft head,and the last one is the forward head.
Just did my galley drain also. Found out my OEM ball valve had a hollow ball (many do) the ball had gotten water inside and split over the winter. A couple of things - Groco ball valves have solid balls and Groco now makes a series of ball valves and fittings that are BPSS (British Parallel Straight). They fit the straight thread fittings common on through-hull fittings and screw way down. Since you are not forcing tapered threads together you need to use a thread locker to keep them from turning. I was able to reuse my existing through-hull as a result. Groco also now makes and sells their won flange backing plate. It seats threaded nuts that you can drive your flange bolts into and don't need to drill your hull. My galley drain hose was the same cuffed corrugated hose that Rich shows, it delaminated internally and was virtually clogged. I replaced with it with 1.5" Shields 148 hose.
