Water Ballast Freezing

[Paul Housman]

Talked to Hunter Marine service dept. They told me you can add a couple gallons of propylene glycol to the ballast to keep it from freezing. Generally, he said ,if the water surrounding the boat does not freeze don't worry about draining the ballast.

 

[Russ King]

Is that the "environmentally friendly" antifreeze?

You don't want to dump car antifreeze in your lake, even if you don't like fish.

 

[Patrick Ewing]

I would be more worried about

the water outside of the hull freezing. If you think about it, water freezes from the top first. That is because the greatest expansion in volume takes place just above freezing. Note that the greatest ice pressures will occur when the water thaws not when it freezes. The water level in your ballast will be lower than the water level outside of the boat because of the boats weight and therefore the ballast water would be slightly warmer to start with than the ice outside (assuming the boat is floating in the water). If your boat has heat inside, it likely would not freeze and if it did, it would probably thaw sooner than the ice outside. That may be good or bad. The pressure from the ice outside of the hull will be unopposed unless the water inside were to freeze as well and even if it did, the difference in levels would result in some serious localized forces on the hull. If the freeze you expect is not too severe, you might use salt instead of glycol antifreeze in the ballast water. Just remember that salt is bad for fresh water life. You and Russ might read my response to engine antifreeze in another post re: toxicity.The issue of ballast freezing is much more complex than you might think at first.

 

[Rick Webb]

I'd Sleep Better

I think I might be inclined to blow the water out of mine using a shop vac as was recomended before. The boat would still be in the water ready for the next nice day and I could blow the ballast out again. A few bags of rock salt in there and I would not worry at all.

 

[Mary Connaughton]

Where do you add it?

I'm still figuring out my Hunter 26'. If I wanted to add antifreeze to the ballast - where do I put it in?Also, can someone explain the ballast? How do you fill it up with water? Know that it's full or empty, etc. The manual was a bit sketchy on this.Thanks for bearing with me as I try to learn this.Mary

 

[Paul Housman]

Water Ballast

Mary, Under the last step as you enter the cabin is the pin for the ballast. There is a rubber stopper next to it. Take the stopper out when you fill or drain the ballast. If you want to drain the ballast ,take the wing nut on the ballast pin and unscrew it as far as it will go,push the pin down and rescrew the wing nut so you don't have to sit there and hold it. Assuming you are out of the water,it will drain. You'll be able to hear the water draining from the opening where the stopper was. To fill do the same thing. You can hear the water filling the ballast and feel the air rushing out of the stopper hole. The water stops when the ballast is full. Pull the pin up and tighten down the wing so its tight. As far as putting propylene glycol in the ballast,Hunter says a couple of gallons should do the job plus it's environmentally friendly. From the comments on this thread there are plusses and minuses to deciding to leave your ballast full during the winter. Depends on where you live more than anything. Hope this helps. We're a new H26 owner ourselves. Love the boat.Paul HS/V Linda Belle