Motor Boat Forum

by **strickers** » 01 Sep 2016, 07:46

Well I thought I'd already confessed to being an absolute novice, but it would appear my level of understanding was even less than I thought!

Our new boat has been fun but an epic learning curve.

Our 3 year old daughter left us no choice but to test out the toilet, we were told it was all in full working order so went ahead.

What we didn't know about was seacocks (again...we knew nothing). We pumped that toilet within an inch of it's life....it exploded! sh@t flew everywhere!!!! took 3 hours to clean and it exploded a further 3 times as we tried to unblock the pipes.

Fast forward a couple more days and it's now fixed and clean.

We now know where all the seacocks are and how they all work :oops:

I guess it's a bit like buying your first car, you kinda learn as you go...unless you've got a parent or someone helping you check the oil etc.

by **ColinR** » 01 Sep 2016, 08:58

Brave man sorting that one out.

Lessons will, and have, been learnt :lol:

by **strickers** » 01 Sep 2016, 09:45

Hubby was very brave to clean it up, but I must admit I had to run to the back of the boat after it exploded for the 3rd time.

I really didn't think he'd appreciate me laughing :lol:

by **betty boop** » 02 Sep 2016, 07:37

strickers wrote:Hubby was very brave to clean it up, but I must admit I had to run to the back of the boat after it exploded for the 3rd time.

I really didn't think he'd appreciate me laughing

sounds similar to my experience of that only that it was in the caribbean on the tall ships Challenger yacht. I 'used' one of the heads and pumped it out only to receive a not so nice blow back and rumbling noises.

Red faced I told the skipper and got the look and attitude of you're an idiot. Unfortunately that wasn't the end as they found it wasn't my fault the 'exit' pipe had been restricted with numerous 'items' being flushed.

What made the 1st mate / mechanic go mental was the pipe burst in the bow crawl space and he had to wiggle is way in up to his waist in slush to fix it, at least 4 times. If that sounds bad, remember its a steel hulled yacht in 35deg + Caribbean sunshine. All we could do was evacuate the boat and leave him to it. :lol:

by **_Ed_** » 02 Sep 2016, 10:20

Not very constructive, but if you can see the s*** is about to hit the the fan, you get a bloody massive fan to blow it well and truly away from you, in the direction of someone else!!

Not sure how that helps here mind... :mrgreen:

Not knowing about seacocks is a pretty basic user error however!!! :lol:

by **argonaut** » 02 Sep 2016, 11:29

I spent a week on dive boat .... the toilet was an electric pump one - so no seacocks .... it seemed to get blocked daily.

On one occasion the S.African dive master/deck hand/gofor went down to the toilet in the bow ..... a few minutes later there was an almighty amount of shouting & swearing ..... he appeared fully covered from the waist up ........... with all sorts of stuff stuck in his hair.

The it was a mixture of guest laughing & throwing up ..... it really was quite bad.

by **jcwads** » 03 Sep 2016, 23:14

The joys of boat ownership! I am with you on the learning curve par.

Just returned from a weeks cruise to Dartmouth and back. Holding tank was close to full (prior owner left it 3/4 full, it's a new purchase) so when offshore switched on the macerator. Wasn't convinced all was going well so opened the engine bay to see the holding tank contents pouring out of the macerator and into the engine bay and bilge.. The resulting stink was unforgettable and my wife was mortified at attempting to sleep on the boat that night...

Turns out the macerator had 2 bolts missing from the seal with a 3rd bolt wearing lose and unsealed. Waste just flowed out of the holes.

Dart Marina were great and replaced the pump next day. Also helped get a cleaning company in to antibacterial the bilge and engine bay and treat the whole area.

To top it off my VHF was not being read when I was calling for yacht taxis and harbour masters and on diagnostic (again by a helpful Dart Marina) it turned out the aerial was faulty and the coax cable just freely pulled out the housing.

All in all an unexpected £500 bill, one month into owning my boat!

The joys of boating!!!