Freshwater System Problems

Leaky Fresh Water System

Just before leaving for our five-day cruise around Lake Pend Oreille this year I partially filled the fresh water tank with around twelve gallons of water.  I had not previously emptied the bleach from the tank that I’d put in last fall to ward off algae growth – something that I do each fall.  So, the process was to put two or three gallons in and then pump the tank dry.  This took four times until the bleach smell was gone.  So, now we had twelve gallons in the twenty-two gallon tank; and off we headed for Whiskey Rock (our first destination).

Kathy and I arrived at the Whiskey Rock public dock at about three-thirty and tied up on the inside (protected side from storms)… and began to get ready for that evening’s festivities – including a pot-luck dinner.  Kathy was busy down below in the galley and I was helping boats that were arriving.  Four boats arrived after we did.

As Kathy proceeded to get out pot-luck contribution ready, she used the fresh water pump several times.

After dinner, Kathy again was using the fresh water system – but no water was coming out of the galley pump.  “I think we are out of water,” she said.  Of course, I felt that this was impossible since we really had not used that much water.

The next morning Kathy and I awakened at about 4:30 and found that there was a nice breeze blowing.  We had more than twenty miles to go to reach our next destination (Sandpoint, ID); and decided that we would get a head start and leave now.  We motored out of the bay with our Torqeedo electric motor making almost no noise to waken the “residents” of the other seven sailboats tied to the dock.

I got the sails up and we began a nice beam reach sail in 4 to 6 knots of breeze.  Kathy made coffee and later made breakfast.  After breakfast, Kathy noted that the pump in the galley still was not pumping water; AND that the pump in the head also did not pump any water.  It was hard to believe…

After arriving at the Boat Basin docks in Sandpoint, ID., I filled about ten more gallons of fresh water into the tank through the deck fill.  The pumps now worked fine… and we went to dinner at around five o’clock at a nice restaurant.  When we got back, Kathy tried to use the galley pump only to find that there was no water again.

Yikes!! - - 

A year-and-a-half ago, the galley pump failed (after 30 years), and I had replaced it.  I began to wonder if the water hose from the fresh water tank to the sink pump had come off the pump and had drained the tank’s contents into the bilge.  I got the bilge pump handle and we started pumping.  Gallons and gallons of water began to be pumped out of the bilge; confirming my fears.

I didn’t want to remove the drawers and drawer frames from below the galley sink while we were in Sandpoint… so, decided to wait till we got home to Bayview in a couple days.  And, except for no water in the fresh water tank and a persistent thunder/lightning/rain storm that lasted most of the next day, all went pretty well for the trip back to Bayview.

The day after arriving back at Bayview, I removed the drawers and drawer frames from below the galley sink so-as to be able to see if the hose had truly fallen off of the pump.  The answer was no… everything was in tack and sound.  So now the question was where was the water coming from.  My second thought was that the water hose had somehow come off of the fitting on the fresh water tank.  But, the tank is carefully placed in a space beneath the starboard settee – just forward of the battery box.  A cover that is screwed onto the settee fiberglass with five sheet metal screws makes up the “lid” over the tank.  And I have to say that the engineers and builders of the Catalina 25 did a great job engineering and building the space.  There is hardly any excess room in that compartment.

The hose from the fresh water tank to the sink pumps exits the freshwater tank at its lowest and most aft position.  There is less than two inches between the aft end of the tank and the forward end of the battery box.  In between these two “extremes” is a glassed in piece of three-eighths plywood that holds the tank in place.  The fitting is meant to fit through a cut-out in the plywood.  A two-inch hose connects the fitting with a little “T” fitting.  Using a flashlight, I could see that the little two-inch hose was not clamped to the fitting.  I needed to remove the tank to determine what was wrong.

Removing the tank meant detaching the filler hose and the vent hose from their respective fittings… both held on with hose clamps.  Evan after the hoses were detached… I still had to unscrew the filler hose’s fitting so that the tank would come out of it’s compartment.

Sure enough, the fitting was broken.  I was able to loosen the clamp on the “T” fitting and removed the two-inch hose.  The hose is clear, and I could see the broken end of the fitting still in the hose.

Obviously, the fitting had failed at some time and finally the hose had fallen off of the tank while Kathy and I were on our trip.  The fix was to replace the broken fitting and reattach the hose.

When I got back to Spokane, I went to “The House of Hose” and purchased a new fitting and thirty inches of hose.  I decided that there simply was not enough room for my hands to attach the little two-inch hose after the tank was put back in its compartment. 

When I got back to Snickerdoodle, the new fitting went in easily.  BTW – I put Teflon “plumber’s” tape on the threads for a good seal.  The thirty inches of hose attached and clamped in just a couple minutes.  Then,  I had to wiggle the tank back into place.  Thirty inches was more than enough; and I cut off six inches of hose and attached/clamped the hose to the “T” fitting.  Now, I applied the “plumber’s” tape to the deck fill fitting and screwed it into place.  Finally attaching and clamping the deck fill hose and the vent hose in place.  After this was done, I filled around three gallons of water into the tank through the deck fill and pumped this water out of the tank with the galley and head pumps.  Everything now works just right, and I replaced the lid and screws.

Lesson learned - - having the right tools made the job go much easier.  And having a diagram of the boat’s plumbing system also helped me analyze what might be going wrong with the system.  I started trying to locate the specific problem by doing the easiest things first.

BarnacleBillHolcomb@gmail.com