[Rhodes22-list] leaks

[Rory Orkin]

We have the same weather down here and my boat is in a very exposed location
on a lift.. Which is probably one of the reasons I get the water .. The
Lazarette leak is not minor however.. We are talking gallons.. Since I cant
find it in the tubing or with a hose I keep coming back to the hatch being
overwhelmed.. This year I am going to be very careful to have the lift level
front to back.

Leland wrote:
> 
> I like leaks.  It gives me an excuse to go visit the boat.
> 
> I don't get water in my bilge and lazaretto (spellchecker made me do it)
> when it rains.  I get it when it rains and blows hard, which is frequent
> around here.  I've had it blow in between the door and sliding hatch.
> Never amounts to much.  Old salts at my marina have told me that all
> boats leak eventually.  Stress on the chainplates if nothing else.
> 
> Not to insult anyone's intelligence but my own, but I eventually
> determined that water in my lazarete came from the hole for my fuel line
> and slot for my electric motor lift belt.  Only happens when it blows
> and doesn't fill a sponge.
> 
> Lee
> 1986 Rhodes22  At Ease
> Crab Alley (Kent Island, MD)
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: stan [mailto:stan at rhodes22.com] 
> Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2007 12:25 PM
> To: The Rhodes 22 mail list
> Subject: [Rhodes22-list] leaks
> 
>     I am too busy but feel obligated to repeat the following for those
> new to the list.
> 
> When a boat comes off the line and makes it  through our in-the-rain and
> in-the-water testing, perfectly bone dry,  we keep it.
> 
> On the other hand, boats can be made close to perfectly dry under all
> conditions, if you don't mind the effort it may take - particularly on
> older boats that we did not build or may have materials that have
> deteriorated with age, like your builder. 
> 
> The obvious first task is to find out where the water is coming in from.
> For many owners, how this works is not that obvious.  Other than
> actually seeing a wetting out of the dried gasket material around the cb
> cap or water dripping down from around threads in items like the bow
> pulpit bolts, or from worn gaskets on opening ports (new boats use all
> fixed ports) or from hose connections that run from the cockpit seats
> out through the transom, spotting water coming into the hull on the
> inside is a misleading clew since its source can be elsewhere.   That
> is, once water gets past the outer gel coat it can travel anywhere
> within the laminate before it finally gets to where you see it coming up
> into the interior of the boat.  So the area you see water coming in, is
> not necessarily  the leaking area.  Yet untold used boat buyers spend
> untold useless hours sealing the floor around the cb bunk because this
> is where they think they see the water coming in.
> 
> The positive way to test for leaks from under water fittings or actual
> hull leaks (rare and as opposed to rain leaks) is to see water coming
> out of the boat, not into it.  This means having the boat out of the
> water.
> 
> If you suspect the lazaret area, tilt the bow up and put water into the
> lazaret to a height that would be above the top edge of the self bailing
> cockpit thru-the-hull fitting that is in the bottom of the lazaret and
> see if there are any drops coming from outside the hull in the area of
> this fitting.  On some boat this is a molded-in hose barb - on others it
> is a commercial 1-1/2" thru the hull fitting.  In either case this hose
> barb can be a culprit.  The 5" length of hose can also be the problem as
> can the sealant that was used.
> 
> The most common source of leakage in older boat has been the cb cap.
> Particularly ones that used sealant instead of the newer neoprene gasket
> with machine screws with fender washers under the machine screw heads
> and under the nuts.   If your cb cap was put on with sheet metal screws,
> these can loosen up and it may be advisable to go to machine screws and
> fender washers and nuts rather than just re-tighten the screws.   On
> older boats the cb pulley system was screwed to the cb cap at a below
> the water level, level and these screws would show signs of wetness.
> The cb on new boats has a direct pull system with no below the water
> level hardware so on newer boats this is not a potential leak problem.  
> 
> Some older boats had inserts screwed inside the trunk to cut down cb
> noise at night and these screws could leak.   And on older boats, where
> the cb pin did not have bearings, the ss pin itself could eventually
> damage the gel coat interior finish of the cb trunk and lead to water
> seepage.
> 
> All this can be best tested with the boat out of water.  The cockpit
> seat drains must be dry and no water allowed to drip into their channels
> while doing the test because that water will go out through the cb
> pennant hole and drip out the bottom of the cb trunk/keel slot and abort
> the testing.
> 
> Level the boat and put water in the bilge just to cover the top of the
> ballast.   See if any water starts to drip out the bottom of the keel
> slot area.   If nothing. increase the level of the water in the bilge
> but do not bring that level above the cb trunk lip, i.e. you do not want
> the level to get to the cb cap seal itself.   If still no drippings from
> the keel slot then increase the water level depth in the bilge until it
> is above the gasket level.   If still no dripping increase the water
> level (on older boats) until it covers the screws on top of the cap that
> hold the pulleys that control the old style cb), if still no dripping,
> you did all that work for nothing.     Start bailing and call me in the
> morning.  
> 
> A  few other sources: overfilling the water tank has often been the
> problem.   We once watched a buyer stand there with a garden hose
> filling his water tank instead of using our suggested measured bucket
> technique that keeps you from putting more than 10 to 15 gallons in this
> not-that-good a sealed tank top).  As we watched the boat sinking lower
> and lower in the water, I finally said enough already and we discovered
> that the hose from the deck water intake had not been connected to the
> water tank.  Do you have a sea cock for the head intake water? - the
> older type did have leakage problems.  The sink drain system has, on one
> occasion, been found to be using the bilge as sump instead of going
> overboard thru the hull fitting.  Even ice melting in an ice box was
> once spotted flowing out the bottom of the ice box door down to the
> bilge.
> 
> While the insulated construction of the Rhodes keeps condensation lower
> than other boats - condensation can still be a minor source.   We
> suggest a sponge be left in the bilge and that the bilge (which, in a
> non-leaking boat, should not have more than a fraction of an inch of
> water - or, in Rummy's case, Rum, be dried every week or 4 with its
> stored sponge to help keep down any mildew formation. 
> 
> If nothing works we give good trade-in credits on leaking Rhodes so we
> can take them out of circulation.
> 
> ss
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