Removing ancient OB head seacock

[IH82BL8]

I mentioned previously that I've reconfigured the head to omit the dump-overboard option. Now that the boat is on the hard I'm ready to remove the thru-hull and close the hull. I'm unable to get a wrench on it and even if I could I don't have room for the leverage I need to remove a 30-year-old seacock from the thru-hull.

My solution is to use a holesaw and drill out the thru-hull from the outside. Then I just have to close up a 4" hole instead of a 2" hole.

The person whose boat is sitting next to mine seemed to think that's a bad idea. He didn't say specifically why, he just recommended asking one of the marine service providers at the yard.

What do you all think?

 

[captcoho]

If it's not broke, Don't fix it.......

 

[Nom De Guerre]

If you try and can't get the seacock off of the thruhull (you should at least give it a whirl), then your next best option is to grind the mushroom head off of the thruhull and remove the rest of it, along with the seacock, from inside.

I wouldn't drill a hole around it.

 

[Paul Mermelstein]

Last week, we took the Sea Scout boat to a yard to remove and replace the thru hull, including the mushroom. What they did was put a wrench on the thru hull on the inside of the boat and another worker unscrewed the mushroom from the outside. Obviously, it was a two person job. Seemed to work remarkably well.

 

[Chris Patterson]

No, don't drill it bigger. While you CAN fix a hole as big as a galvanized trash can lid, why add to the work. I take old ones out the way Paul indicated, and that has been a few. You're not worried about the seal, quite the opposite. If you can get a pipe wrench jammed up inside, with your thru hull tool on it from outside, you can use a four foot cheater bar. It's coming out.
In the worse case, and sometimes there is, I usually use a four inch angle grinder with a thin cut-off wheel on it, and make two slices down on the nut from inside. You may trash the backing plate, but if you are going to eliminate the hole, it doesn't matter. And IF you are going to reuse the hole, a new backing plate should be in order anyway..

 

[Benny17441]

The bigger the hole the faster it'll sink. I agree that you may have to do it from the outside but not by enlarging the hole. Just take an angle grinder and grind off the mushroom head on the thruhull. Then you could just pull it out from the inside. It is much easier to plug a 2" hole than a 4" inch.