livewell fill and dump

this is my livewell set-up on my decks.
what i want to know what will be the best way to empty my livewells after a day of fishing...ive got a livewell pump going thru the back of the hull and a y valve before the back livewell. so if i fish by myself i can just fill the front one. but i cant seem to figure out how to get them both to empy

this is how i want it to run. i can get it to fill up but im stumped on how to empty them

Do you have airator pumps in each livewell?

no i have one at the back and a y-valve before the back livewell so i can shut the front one off or i can shut the back one off

How about just putting a drain hole in the bottom of each livewell and then after you are done fishing and want drain the water, just unplug the hole. The water will flow to the back of the boat and then you can just unplug your the transom plugs and let the water drain out. Just an idea and it's what I do because I always pull the transom plugs after a days fishing in case it rains a lot while the boat sits.

Is your "out" line an overflow for both of the livewells or does another pump from the livewell push the water out? If it's the overflow, then do the same thing I mentioned above about a fitting in the middle of the livewell and then run a hose from that back in to your "out" line with a "T" fitting. That's what most guys I know have setup.

I've always wondered why the live well draining process gets so complicated for some people in this forum. I've seen people moving pumps all over the place and doing other crazy things to get water out.

• The three easiest ways I've thought of to do this are:
• (Previously mentioned) Put a plug in the bottom of each live well and drain into the bilge. Either use your bilge pump or drain plug to drain the water from the boat.
• Use a T on your fill line after the pump. One end from the pump, one to the live wells, one to a drain out the bottom of the transom with a plug. Of course, this only works if you're not using a sprayer bar inside each of the wells. With this method you could run a plugged drain out the bottom of the wells to the fill line. Then, when you get back to the dock you'd pull the bottom plugs and the transom plug. This complicates things when you could just do....
• Run a drain pipe from the bottom of each well to the bottom of the transom.

For the last two the drains exit the bottom of of transom, or at least below the lowest live well, and are plugged from the outside. I suppose you could also use a ball valve on the interior side of the transom, but that doesn't seem as safe to me. In both cases you'd install individual overflow drains out the side of the boat.

My dad used this setup on our old 14 footer in an cooler and it worked really well. I don't know why it couldn't be adapted to use with a two live well setup.

well i figured out the drain...i am just going to put a hose coming from the bottom of the livewells and run them to a Y fitting in the back of the boat and plug them while in use and put a ball valve at the transom.

now for the fill...im not sire my pump will pump enough water to the front of my boat...what do yall think...my hose from the pump to the front livewell is 15' long im not sure if it will pump water that far?

I don't have alot of experience with pumps, but from what few times I have seen a bilge, livewell pump work, they put water out with quite a bit of force for such a little pump. I assume livewell pumps are same as bilge pumps, same gph? So you shouldn't have a problem.

well the pump i bought is a 500 gph pump before i open it i want ton know it will work...anybody else

I need to make a new post of my livewell... I haven't finished it yet, but I've got 2 800 GPH pumps running a 150qt cooler.

I have an actual livewell pump which aerates the cooler. I took out the drain plug and put the livewell pump into that hole, then circulates the water back in - it is nice, but I need to redo the inside plumbing so it circulates the water better.

I also have a bilge pump that I throw over the boat with about 8' of hose attached to. It took me approximately 5 minutes to fill the cooler to the level I wanted. You should have no problem at all pushing water into your livewell. The water has to go somewhere and it's not just going to sit in the hose while the pump is running.


Just saw your post about the 500gph... that's what I used before I upgraded to the 800gph - I think it will still work. Even if it doesn't, you can still upgrade later because the fittings/sizes will be the same.

well i was thinkin about getting the 800 or 1200 and just taking the one i got back

I'm not sure how big your livewells are but as far as 500,800 or 1200...thats just the speed they will pump.It just might take longer to fill up with a 500gph,should still pump fine,but a 800gph would almost be twice as fast

2007NNBS said:

well i was thinkin about getting the 800 or 1200 and just taking the one i got back

Click to expand...

Then I would go for the 1200 to fill it up... it will be worth the few extra bucks I promise. It's amazing the difference between a 500 and 800. But I'm pretty sure the sizes of the holes change when you go to a 1200.

yeah when you go to a 1200 it goes from 3/4" to 1 1/8"...im gonna go with the 800 and hope it works if not ill upgrade

russ010 said:

I also have a bilge pump that I throw over the boat with about 8' of hose attached to. It took me approximately 5 minutes to fill the cooler to the level I wanted. You should have no problem at all pushing water into your livewell. The water has to go somewhere and it's not just going to sit in the hose while the pump is running

Click to expand...

Why not use a screened bulkhead intake fitting for this instead of messing around with the extra fill pump? You could do the whole deal with a single 800 gph pump.

Maybe i'm not reading right, or perhaps this isnt how this is done but the way I was planning on doing a livewell was to have a fill pump feeding a spray bar and a hole in the bottom of the well with a pipe that leads to a fitting on the transom. For using the livewell, place a stand pipe in the hole that goes up to the level that you want the well to be full to. once the pump fills to the appropriate level it will drain out. This would keep fresh lake water pumping through the well the whole time the pump is on. When you want to drain it, just pull the stand pipe and it drains. This involves 2 holes though. One for fill and one for drain but it seems like the way to go. Do any "off the shelf" livewells work this way?

the only thing im not seeing is how it will circulate the water...the fitting ono the transom will have to be pluged or valved so water wont fill the hose while you are fishing

stinkynathan said:

russ010 said:

I also have a bilge pump that I throw over the boat with about 8' of hose attached to. It took me approximately 5 minutes to fill the cooler to the level I wanted. You should have no problem at all pushing water into your livewell. The water has to go somewhere and it's not just going to sit in the hose while the pump is running

Click to expand...

Why not use a screened bulkhead intake fitting for this instead of messing around with the extra fill pump? You could do the whole deal with a single 800 gph pump.

Click to expand...

I didn't want to drill any holes into my boat.. plus I wanted to make the livewell removable since I'd only use it for tournaments

If I didn't already have two holes in the side of the new boat for the livewell, I would keep my same setup.

(1) 120qt removeable cooler
(1) 800 gph pump

No holes needed in boat.

Place pump in lake and keep spraybar in cooler to fill.
Put pump in bottom of cooler to circulate.
Put spraybar in lake to empty.
Lift cooler out to empty any remaining water.

Wouldn't be suprised if I just plug the holes in the new boat and do the same thing.