How much is too much water in your bilge?

I had my boat out for about 12 hours yesterday fishing for hybrid stripers and catfish with my dad.

Towards the end of the day I noticed there was about 1-2 gallons of water in the bilge area in the back of the boat in front of the transom. Not a big deal and it was actually not even enough for the bilge pump to suck up unless we both leaned all the way to the right so everything pooled on one side near the pump.

I've noticed it seems to grow after we've taken the boat up on plane, to move spots or reposition ourselves after drifting. I thought at first it may just be coming from spray, getting in the boat from the motor. But I looked carefully yesterday and couldn't find where any water is spraying in when the motor is up on throttle.

It is a 30 year old boat and its aluminum so its full of rivets and stuff. I understand its not going to be perfect.

But is this amount normal? Or do I need to start looking for the leaking rivets or seams?

Lugo, is it possible to relocate the bilge pump to where the most water accumulates ??
A hefty downpour of rain, plus your leaks, can put a lot of
water into a small boat very quickly.

After using the bass boat I bought last summer, the plumbing was not
up to par. The boat had a few bad leaks but all the flooring and sides are riveted
in so I had no idea. The bilge pump pumped a LOT of water all the time.
Then, after I took it apart, I found out that the bilge pump hose was old and cracked.
Pumping about 50% of the water back into the boat. Pretty scary when you think about it.

Yes, the older boats will have some leaks, but a couple of gallons (IMO) is too much
to have inside your boat at any given time.
personal suggestions:
#1. fill your boat with water and address the leaks from the outside.
#2. relocate the bilge pump to where it will do the most good. (if possible).
Happy Boating !!

My boat does the same thing but not bad as yours I guess. If I'm out on the water for 4-6 hours I end up with something like a quart or two of water in the boat. I filled the boat with water to see where the leaks were and re-bucked all the leaking rivets, and there were lots of them, all leaking at a very slow rate. It might have stopped a few and slowed a few but there's still water in my boat every trip. I have a raised floor in my boat so the only way anything is going to get wet is if I leave something in the back by the transom where there is no raised false flooring and the water can be seen.

The way I look at it now is I can either paint the hull to seal them or live with it. Since water only weighs about 8 lb to the gallon, I'm dealing with 2-4 lbs of shifting additional weight. Other than that, there's no effect. 1-2 gallons is a bit more to deal with but in the grand scheme of things it's not that much. A small rain shower could easily dump that much into your boat in a mater of minutes. If you have a good working bilge pump, I wouldn't worry about it unless it's bothering you. I decided I can live with with mine, especially considering the expense and work it would take to stop it. And that's not even counting the fact that I don't want to put paint on my boat. I'm older now and have gotten to where I live the motto "Don't sweat the small stuff" more and more with every passing year. :mrgreen: $0.02

Barefoot_Johnny said:

Lugo, is it possible to relocate the bilge pump to where the most water accumulates ??
A hefty downpour of rain, plus your leaks, can put a lot of
water into a small boat very quickly.

After using the bass boat I bought last summer, the plumbing was not
up to par. The boat had a few bad leaks but all the flooring and sides are riveted
in so I had no idea. The bilge pump pumped a LOT of water all the time.
Then, after I took it apart, I found out that the bilge pump hose was old and cracked.
Pumping about 50% of the water back into the boat. Pretty scary when you think about it.

Yes, the older boats will have some leaks, but a couple of gallons (IMO) is too much
to have inside your boat at any given time.
personal suggestions:
#1. fill your boat with water and address the leaks from the outside.
#2. relocate the bilge pump to where it will do the most good. (if possible).
Happy Boating !!

Click to expand...

It is where all the water accumulates. But a certain amount of water has to be present in order for the pump to actually be able to prime itself and work.

The amount of water never goes over the amount needed to trigger the water level switch on the pump, so I have to run it manually from my console.



If I move the pump to the very center, I lose the ability to put my gas tank back there, which is important when towing with my small car, in order to reduce tongue weight.

I may be exaggerating on 1-2 gallons. If we lean all the way to the side so the water is concentrated in that one corner, the pump sucks it all out in about 10 seconds.

Last wednesday we were out on the lake and there was an insane downpour. Bad enough looking clouds that we raced back to the dock, tied it up, and ran to the car to get out of the rain.
It poured for about half an hour. This was a really hard downpour too. I kept an eye on the boat and the pump was kicking on and off at about a 1/10 duty cycle, so it was keeping up just fine with the rain.

After the season is over, I'll take all the flooring out, fill it with water from the hose and see if I can find a leak.

I had a similar problem.

Since I rarely need a livewell, I put a small cooler in with an aerator for occasional use. I didn't need any through-the-hull plumbing. I disconnected the maze of piping that the prior owner had added.

I then found that water was seeping into the floor-mounted pump and then leaking under the decking. I didn't try to remove the original pump since the prior owner had gummed everything up with 3M5200. Removing it would have left a large hole in the bottom of the hull.

I cut a taper onto a wine cork. I jammed the wine cork up into the pump orifice and .....VOILA!.... a dry boat. I have a permanent plug made up and will replace the wine cork soon. Check any similar connections on your boat.

richg99

I had a little Jon boat that had the depth finder wire drilled through the transom. The wire had one of those quarter round covers on it and when on plan water would fallow up the wire into the boat.

seeing your saying its after you have been on plane wondering if its not water washing over the transom after coming off step quickly??? just a thought,,, have a 1548 with a 15'' transom and 25 etec add my 160lb butt sitting on the tale end along with fuel tank battery and what ever,,, 1st time out with the 25 came off step and had 2'' of water wash over,,, went back to the shop bent up 4'' splash shield

I guess it depends on how much you can tolerate. Myself, I don't like any. I was fishing a crappie TX one day in a small cove with one other boat in the cove. The bites were coming pretty fast then I got to noticing the one other boat fire up about every 30 min. and make a couple laps around the cove. All day I wandered what he was doing? Stirring/mudding the water up or just being disrespectful? After the weigh in the guy and his wife came over and apologized. He said his boat was taking on so much water that he had to plane it out and pull the plug to drain it.lol To much for me but didn't seem to bother him. He fished the whole tx.

my boat would have just enough where the bilge couldnt get it. i only worried when the bilge would get it. in my experiences you will have some water in a boat. no matter how big or how small

I'm mounting mine this week and I was thinking of putting it about an inch off the bottom, does anyone have the mount sitting on the floor? I'm also thinking about using a rubber band and some screen wire to keep junk out of it.

put mine on the bottom of the boat next to the plug,,,put it as low as you can get it,,,, want as much water out as possible,,, in 2 years have never turned it on boat never gets a drop of water in it,,, have 5 boats 2 welded 3 riveted,, 3 leak 2 don't, never a drop in the welded boats and well the others, lets just say if ya got shoes on plan on them being wet or better have some rubber boots on