Thoughts and observations from my failed Bimin Crossing

[Murf'n'surf]

Sorry for the hijack...so if I wanted to upgrade my pump, are you recommending a 2000 gph and just remove the existing one? That would be the easiest thing to do I would think. Thanks!!!

You need to look at your battery supply, if you've got multiple batteries you can go with 2 pumps. One 1500gph is a reasonable pump for a 23' boat, two 1500gph is a little overkill but good peace of mind for a few hundred extra bucks.

When you upgrade the old pump you will need to run a bigger discharge hose and install a bigger thru hull fitting for the hose.

Note --- those 2000GPH pumps are not for my boat, they are going into another 33' Intrepid.

 

[Bruce]

Sorry for the hijack...so if I wanted to upgrade my pump, are you recommending a 2000 gph and just remove the existing one? That would be the easiest thing to do I would think. Thanks!!!

I would add a second bilge pump instead of replacing the stock pump. You might choose to move the stock pump into the bilge or have two side by side in the engine compartment. I prefer having a backup. @veedubtek discovered that his bilge pump was not functioning during the first attempt to cross to Bimini. He replaced it at the fuel dock.

 

[Englewoodcowboy]

I would add a second in the system and leave the stock alone. I am redoing mine so the stock automated one will come on when I have the battery switched on and connecting the switch from the dash to the second bilge pump in the stern (really the only place you can add a second) and it will also be hooked to a water witch high water alarm. This way I can manually turn the pump on when I want it to run or it will also automatically come on if the high water alarm is activated. The HWA will be placed about the same height as the top of the stock bilge pump and will also have a speaker in the dash to alert me to an issue. Water Witch alarm have a very nifty all silent feature after it goes off you can trip it to silence it for 5 min then it rearms the alert, if the condition is still present it will go off again. One issue I don't quite understand with the factory bilge, all of my boats I had years before I could manually turn the pump on or set it to auto. We had this on all pumps and also loved the auto sensing since there is less of a chance of a float getting stuck etc.

 

[waterboy]

All of this talk about bilge pumps seems to me to be getting off track from the original point of this post... or maybe it's just a slight hijack off the original topic. I have made 2 trips to Bimini and my biggest fear is people jumping on board to do this trip without proper experience, planning ,etc. (and that is not meant as a slam against the guys who had problems this year). I know none of you are suggesting that but also need to keep at the forefront the inherent risk involved with this trip. I hope all who even consider this trip look inward to make sure they are fully prepared for what can present itself in any situation.

I agree a working bilge pump is important. A second one is also a good thing. A bilge pump is not going to save you from the proper planning, experience and seamanship to keep you from getting in trouble in a rough inlet or in the open ocean. As Julian quoted, the amount of water before the bilge kicks on is not alot, and neither will a bilge pump (or two) have enough capacity to evacuate water in an emergency situation to get you out of that situation. Do the math, a 1500 gph pump only is pumping about 25 gpm at the pump outlet, add in height to the outlet and hose restrictions and the TRUE output is much less. When you have 20 gallons per wave coming over the bow (or way much more than that if you stuff the bow), you are in a losing situation quick. I just don;t want everyone to get overly confident that because I have 2 bilge pumps that now I can make the trip and be safe. It's not going to save you... (although it may save you a costly TOW Boat Salvage bill !!!)

Let's face it, we have "lake boats" as The Hull Truthers' like to say. Yes they can handle the conditions as long as the captain can handle them too. We all see 60 footers on the rocks too due to pilot error, so it's not the size of the boat... But being small boats, they are much more sensitive to loading, weight placement, handling in rough seas, etc and that puts a bigger burden on the captain and his crew, so the risk multiplies.

Sorry for the diatribe here but our goals are all the same... keep us all safe so we can get back home after a trip like this. Sometimes these hard conversations help us all and I hope all who consider this trip in the future take heed in all the advice to be gotten here and not take this lightly. It is the trip of a lifetime... hats off and God Bless the captain and crews who were involved this year and those who were close by for immediate help !!

 

[Britboater]

Good to know^ I was embarrassed to ask this question. Having a 190 which is both small and slow compared to the 24s, I would worry about not being able to keep up and being left behind stranded in open ocean while everyone else speeds away listening to music and thinking about the week to come in Bimini.

Quite a few do the crossing in 190's, I think @1948Isaac does it quite often I beleive, as well as the Keys.

 

[Englewoodcowboy]

Where water gets into the bilge the fastest is if it is higher than your seat cushions. I agree with @waterboy and his assessment, he is very much right in the scenario and situation. I am adding a second pump for a back up as well as more general discharge duty but as waterboy stated it will not save the boat if you are to a point water is coming in faster than you can get rid of it. As I have said or implied all along in all of my posts on this matter that it comes down to personal ability. It never hurts to plan or prepare but if you have those on board who can't keep their head on straight in an emergency situation then you need to have plan B with the ferry or flight for them. My dad has been on boats to hit large objects or have catastrophic failures and because he kept his head cool he stopped the issue from being a total loss and saved every vessel he was on. On our old Sport Fish he was crossing to the Bahamas and had a 8" exhaust hose fail, that equated to an 8" hole below the water line in a sea jumping straight into the bilge. They grabbed a blanket and cushion and plugged the hole enough that the pumps could keep up and got in so he could repair it. Another time at night while running a 46' Viking they hit a submerged piling sending both screws through the hull, not an easy site to take in when you see 38" screws inside your bilge and water gushing, again, towels, blankets, pillows, cushions, anything they could find to plug the hole they did and where towed to safety and the boat was pulled from the water and saved. Another crossing down by Haiti he had a boat call for help in rough seas, it was a wood hull gallion with diesel power and massive sales, the sea had beat the caulking out of the hull in places and water was over 4' deep in the engine room. He dove in and disconnected the sea cocks for the engine raw water intake, pulled the hoses and turned the engines into massive bilge pumps saving that ship. The moral of these stories is to reiterate that you can fix about any situation if you keep your head and witt about you. Lose your cool and you will lose every time.

 

[Yamaha242lsdallas]

"we had 4 adults and 4 kids on a boat built for 9"
I was thinking our boats (242s) were built for 11 people? Or really based on weight and number of seating designed into the boat. At any rate I have had our boat loaded down with some pretty healthy sized adults and that bow seems like it can get so low in the water a 6" wave looks like it could break over it. That's one area i wish Yamaha had done a little different is make the bow not drop so much (yes, i know on the 2015 design they are a little better).

Glad you all come out in relative good shape.

 

[DoubleThrust]

I'd treat # people rating like tow weight... -25 to 40% for a trip with danger involved. Plus remember there's also a weight rating that means it's not all adults per the people number.

Having run into waves on Erie both times ive been on it that were NOT fun, made me very nervous, and once caused a somewhat serious issue, I don't think I'd want to put more than 4 adults & zero kids into the open ocean.

And at least one of those adults would have to be the kind of guy to keep his cool in an emergency. Better if all four were... One person flipping out could take you from bad to "sunk."

And I agree a little more freeboard up front would be good if you're not on a river / lake!

 

[Eurocat]

@kthrash - Thank you for posting about your experience, I am sure the information will help everyone reading thru to learn and hopefully prepare for their future ocean endeavors.
Maybe someone cam sum up in bullet points some of the key points being covered on this thread and make a sticky of it for future reference.

Just a couple of questions that I don't remember seeing in any of the previous posts:
- Did you have a manual pump on hand, and if you didn't, do you think in all the confusion it would have helped any?
- Assuming your boat has the same fire extinguisher access port in the front of the engine bay placed the same as the 192sx, since this is directly above the air filter intake, do you think this might have been where most of the water went into the engine bay? and if so, if the filter box was turned around (or if the intake was the highest in the engine bay) would it have given you more time with power to the engine and maybe avoided the domino effect afterwards?

 

[David Hoff]

I took on similar water as Keith, but even with two very large bilge pumps running (with two large batteries), it took over 45 minutes to get the water out of the boat. We could see it spewing out both the bilge outlets the whole time while we circled from the Coast Guard boat. Regardless, manual pumps would not have made any difference when you take on that much water. In regards to water in engine bays, my boat is an AR210, but the water was so deep that it wouldn't matter how well sealed the engine compartment is. The water was up over the back seats, so I don't think these much that could be done to prevent it getting sucked in at that point.

 

[kthrash]

I just re-read this whole thing and one thing I discovered after I got my boat back home was the 1" bilge hose mounted to the through hull snapped off (black plastic) on the inside of the boat.. I suspect due to a case of water I had shoved back there and bouncing around .. so whatever the 1100GPH bilge was pumping was not going overboard but right back into the boat.. When I installed the bilge pump in my new 242 I made sure the exit port for the bilge was high enough up that it would not have any risk of being broken when putting items into the rear compartments.

 

[swatski]

I have not reread this entire thread. It is great that you posted your experience here, it is very educational!

With that said I’d like to express two opinions.

First regards the pump capacity. Those gallons per hour are relating to theoretical output at zero elevation with regards to the outlet. Once you raise the outlet high enough the pumps capacity becomes a fraction of what is its marketed rating. In addition, the hose diameter is important, 1” is great.

Second point is that relying on a bilge pump in case of swamping the boat is just not the best strategy to start with. The Yamaha decks are self bailing and as long as you are able to keep the bow up after getting water overflow the deck, all water should run out through the scupper. That is the only way to do it efficiently as there should be no (or minimal) water intrusion from the deck into the bilge under swamping circumstances. (It is similar to a “sub move”)

Edit: Just to be clear, I strongly recommend a secondary bilge pump, and I always have one.
But no pump operated of a regular 12V battery can be a match for total swamping situation - if there is enough water intrusion to stop the engines and one cannot raise the bow... you’re pretty much done.

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[BigAbe75]

@swatski ballast question: when I bought my boat, the previous owner had pulled the ballast pump and installed a shutoff valve in its place. Was easy for me then to buy a new pump and wiring kit and be back up and running. Previous owner told me exactly what I needed so all the holes and everything lined up perfect.

This just made me think, is installing a shut off valve on the ballast intake line a good practice? I know the pump is supposed to act like a valve when it’s not running. But would that be better if you planned on longer “more adventurous” trips where ballast is not needed? What would you imagine the difference in fill time would be with an open valve in play? I guess it would alter the interior diameter of the hose.

My thought is that if you bumped the switch, you’d rather run a pump dry and replace that when you got home. Thoughts?

 

[Amar Nanduri]

The front bow cover stuffed with a couple of towable tubes from Costco virtually prevented any water from coming onboard into my Yamaha on the 2017 crossing. I would highly recommend this for any crossings. So even though I had 2 bilge pumps they hardly had any work to do.

 

[swatski]

@swatski ballast question: when I bought my boat, the previous owner had pulled the ballast pump and installed a shutoff valve in its place. Was easy for me then to buy a new pump and wiring kit and be back up and running. Previous owner told me exactly what I needed so all the holes and everything lined up perfect.

This just made me think, is installing a shut off valve on the ballast intake line a good practice? I know the pump is supposed to act like a valve when it’s not running. But would that be better if you planned on longer “more adventurous” trips where ballast is not needed? What would you imagine the difference in fill time would be with an open valve in play? I guess it would alter the interior diameter of the hose.

My thought is that if you bumped the switch, you’d rather run a pump dry and replace that when you got home. Thoughts?

I simply disconnect power to the pumps for trips like Bimini. I have it set up in the helm, so it’s easy for me - to disable all of the switches.

As far as valves, my thinking is those tend to be rather heavy and with new boats thin FRP hulls that Yamaha uses in my opinion it would be necessary to enforce it with at least an aluminum plate or plywood embedded in fiberglass to be able to mount the valve securely, which creates its own issues.

In my case, given the position of intakes/outlets and the way that my hoses are attached to the intakes and secured with SS clamps and 3M 5200 it is this virtually impossible for those to slip.

My pumps are all located in the wet compartments above the swim deck and way above the water line. While those pumps do serve as valves, even if any of my impellers broke and failed (inside a pump) and lost intergrity water wouldn’t be able to get past, by gravity.
(Hope that makes sense)

That’s just my two cents, simple thinker that I am, LOL

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