How do you get all the water out of the bilge of a sun cat?

[bfelton]

How do you get all of the water out of the bilge of a sun cat?  My sun cat's bilge has water in it after I pump it out.  The hose is all the way down.   Does a strum box help?  I know it will not completely solve the problem.  I have hull #16 which has foam in block form separating the bilge from the storage lockers in the cockpit.

Thank you for any suggestions,

Bert Felton

[capt_nemo]

bfelton,

I'll answer your question, but first, why do you have so much water in the bilge in the first place?  The bilge should be practically DRY. If it isn't, and you have that much water, you need to determine the cause for the ingress of so much water. Your centerboard pennant pipe may be leaking.

OK, now for the answer - remove the step and shelf under the bridgedeck in the cabin, reach down into the bilge with a small hand pump, rag, or sponge, and simply mop it up! Not sure whether a strum box on the hose would help.

One of the first modifications I made to my NEW Sun Cat was to provide access to the bilge, which was non existent. The area around my centerboard trunk originally looked like this, with no way to get a hand or arm into the bilge for any reason.



I decided to enlarge the opening to gain access to the bilge should I ever need or want to in the future. This photo shows how I cut aditional liner away to provide a larger opening. You can clearly see the large hose from the manual bilge pump and reach into every corner of the bilge.



Since this is a storage area I needed to make sure that items stowed here didn't fall into the bilge. I cut strips of thin plywood, coated them well with epoxy to seal against moisture, and fastened them down with a few well placed screws. The final arrangement looked like this.



capt_nemo
Sun Cat "Frisky"

[bfelton]

I have owned the boat for about 5 months and there was water in there when I purchased her.  My centerboard trunk is different than yours; it's stainless steel.  The deepest  part of my bilge is just aft of the bridge deck.  It looks like your bilge pump hose runs forward of the center board bolt.  Or am I looking at it wrong?

Thanks,

Bert Felton

[cavie]

I have owned the boat for about 5 months and there was water in there when I purchased her.  My centerboard trunk is different than yours; it's stainless steel.  The deepest  part of my bilge is just aft of the bridge deck.  It looks like your bilge pump hose runs forward of the center board bolt.  Or am I looking at it wrong?

Thanks,

Bert Felton

My '02 is as yours is. My piviot bolt is the lowest part. The rest is concrete ballast. Water got into mine from the port windows and the deck hatch. Port windows stained the seats and the water came in from the deck hatch between the liners and the deck. Reseal the hatch.

[capt_nemo]

bfelton,

I think you are looking at it wrong. The deepest part of my bilge is under and aft of the bridgedeck also. And, the centerboard bolt (pivot bolt) is nearest you, looking at the photo where you see the gray paint! The view is facing aft.

Have you taken the interior of the boat apart under the bridge deck -  especially the removable step and platform on which most people store their porta pottys? I would love to see a photo of that Stainless Steel Centerboard Trunk protruding into the cabin of a Sun Cat.

It is my understanding that the much touted Stainless Steel Centerboard Trunk (which, by the way, I also have in my boat) is a stand alone module which is inserted into a well that is moulded as part of the keel and hull, and fastened in place to the underside of the stub keel. It is that moulded fiberglass well protruding into the cabin that you see in my photos.

capt_nemo

[bfelton]

Cap Nemo

I'll take some photos as soon as I can.  But the part of the trunk you can see on my boat is the stainless steel.  I'm hull #16; hull #20 is like mine.

Bert

[bfelton]

Butch,
     I resealed the forward hatch and am going to get my brother to help remove and reseal the port port.  I am unable to do it myself at this time because I had spinal fusion in August.

Bert

[cavie]

I didn't reseal the port windows. I had to buy 2- $20.00 gaskets. When I unscred the forward hatch it came right up. No adhearsion at all to the deck.

[capt_nemo]

bfelton,

My apologies.

My Sun Cat is a 2010 model. As an Engineer I can certainly come up with several good reasons why they decided to isolate my Sun Cat's stainless trunk from the inside of the hull with fiberglass in some fashion. And, I'm certainly glad that they did so. Didn't realize that earlier models had the stainless trunk sticking proudly into the inside of the hull.

capt_nemo

[cavie]

2002 The bilge is only about 8" deep and only at the pivot bolt. The rest is  concrete. The SS trunk sticks up about 8". I can reach back about two feet before I hit the front wall of the cockpit foot well. The SS trunk is sealed at the top. I told the newer ones like Don's are open at the top. Looking in from the lazaret, I see the pump hose going do the the bottom that I can't see from this vantage point but I know in my heart the it is the same level as inside the cabin. Don't know what's holding the end of the hose down. That being said, if I have water in the bilge, I lower the bow and dip it out from in the cabin. Yours being an older there my be more changes than mine and Don's version.

[bfelton]

I put photos of the center board trunk in CPYOA photo bucket under the name of Bella. You may be able to see that there is a depression under the  center board bolt, on both sides.  Then the bilge rises up.  I believe it drops down again where the bilge pump hose drops in on the port side.  It seems to be fresh water which is good considering she's be tied up to a dock in salt water for over a month.

Bert Felton

[bfelton]

Oops, it's under sun cat Bella.

Bert Felton

[Tom Ray]

Getting back to the original question, how to get water out of hard-to-reach places in boats, I use a shop vac. Sometimes I use the extension hose that is for dust collection on a sander, as it is smaller in diameter and can fit more places.

[bfelton]

Thanks, I woke up this morning wondering if a shop vav would work as a temporary solution.  I'll give it a try.

Bert Felton

[skip1930]

You could work the hose diameter down to a small clear plastic hose and snake it where it needs to go to extrapolate the water.

Or stuff a natural sponge into an area and use that for an evaporation pad.

skip.