76 cuddy bilge
 

Hey guys, what a relief to find this V community.

I've had a 76 cuddy for 10 years and have always launched and hauled with only a day or two in the water at the dock at a time. Now I would like to keep it in the water for weeks or months at a time and am concerned about the bilge.

I'm getting water in the hull whether via leaks or the 2 recessed deck compartments. I've drained it when I pull it but would like to install a bilge pump in the bottom of the hull. I was thinking of cutting into the recessed battery area next to the transom and dropping one in there. Has anyone tried this method?

Welcome to the site , I am not sure about your configuration , but I would never leave any of my boats on a mooring or in a slip without having at least a 1200 GPH auto bilge pump instaled on a good battery, I run (2) 1200 GPH auto ATWOOD bilge pumps on my 84 V20 cudy along with with (2) 500 manual pumps 1 in the cuddy and one in the fish well. You can never be to safe any way welcome and we love boat porn (photos)

I had a 76 I/O so getting in there was not a problem!! Use 2 pumps!! 2 battery's!! Glue a old cutting board to the floor so you can screw into it instead of the bottom of the boat! Put one float a little higher then the other this way a small leak one pump can do it, a big leak the 2nd one kicks in and you have both! also hook 1 to each battery, then if one is going alot, when battery dies the water will fill up a ;ittle higher and the 2nd one comes on with a fresh battery, in hopes someone comes along before its sitting on the ocean bottom!

First things first .... your boat is sinking.... FIND the leak and fix it before you launch it.... small leaks can become REALLY BIG leaks fast..... boats can go from seeping a little to on the bottom in very short time...


Next I would consider putting a small (say 300-500 gph) pump on a float switch as low as possible and as big as you can afford on a float switch 6" higher with an alarm siren wired in parallel with the pump..... the small pump should take care of any small amount that finds it's way in but if it fails or gets over run the big pump will both pump water and sound an alarm that something is wrong.

If you tell the marina people and your dockmates that the alarm means "she's sinking, call me right now!" there may be time to save the boat.

Thank you both!

I have it at a shop due to an alarm on my 150 VRO but will post pics when I bring her home. I think I've spent 6 hours looking at the threads here in the past 24. So many great mod's. Can't wait to do a new panel and rewire too.

I think I read in a thread that a dremel works well to cut the deck? - for the bilge. I don't think the I/O has the same recessed battery compartment in front of the transom? But it seems logical to drop a bilge pump in that location, right in front of the transom. I will definitely use a platform for it. I don't think my wife will miss a bamboo cutting board ;)

Would also like to get the battery(s) forward into the cuddy ... Previous owner had a power head on the bow with heavy gauge wire so I think I can use that. This boat excitement makes getting old acceptable ...

[QUOTE=smokeonthewater;206493]First things first .... your boat is sinking.... FIND the leak and fix it before you launch it.... small leaks can become REALLY BIG leaks fast..... boats can go from seeping a little to on the bottom in very short time...


Good point! How exactly?

no "exactly" to it but plain and simple, if it's leaking then something has failed... they aren't supposed to leak and until you find the leak you have no idea what has failed or how close it is to getting a lot worse

quick example... cracked thru hull fitting... seeps a few drops an hour till it finally pops off and then it "seeps" say, 1700 gallons per hour
OR I/O rotten bellows several years past needing replaced have a small pinhole and just drip a little till all of a sudden they rip and it starts coming in fast.....

the REALLY scary part is that for every inch lower the hole gets in the water due to boat taking on water the speed that the water comes in goes up exponentially

a 1" hole 2' under water will sink a boat in a couple minutes

I guess I meant, how check for leaks, but I searched the forums and found some great suggestions. Thanks though. You're right of course, I should definitely clear up the leak issue as job one.

Welcome to the site!
You may not have enough space to do what you want to due to the angle of the hull.
Might I suggest installing an access hatch between the last floor box and the bilge. This will give you a lot of room for most anything you want to do.
Also you can make the drain hole between the inner bottom and bilge bigger.
By putting the pump(s) in this area you will have them against the bottom of the boat which would be even lower than the shell in the bilge area.

Thanks, Benny! That is exactly what I wanted to know.

So midway between the last floor hatch and the transom? From the threads here I understand that as long as I retain the width of the floor hatch I will stay between the stringers? How and where do I run the line out from the bilge?

The guy who did the transom for me 10 years back put a second drain hole in below the original. He said water was getting held up below the original hole.

Sorry for the lack of pics. I hope to get her back home in the next week so I can post pics and get to work.

Dan