Irrational fear of sinking?

[Coaster]

I think that fitting an electric bilge pump is a sign of irrational fear of sinking; all it will do is flatten the battery before you sink.

Not if your boat is connected to a mains electricity supply and a sufficiently sophisticated device is charging the batteries connected to the automatic bilge pump(s).

Then you worry instead about stray currents, electrolytic action and failure of hull fittings...

[photodog]

Never give sinking a second thought.

Yeah, thats what captain smith said as well....

And the skipper of the Hans Hedtoft....

[parsifal]

Never give sinking a second thought.

I sink you should.

[Minn]

Not if your boat is connected to a mains electricity supply and a sufficiently sophisticated device is charging the batteries connected to the automatic bilge pump(s).

Then you worry instead about stray currents, electrolytic action and failure of hull fittings...

That takes me back... to a big floating dock... built to dock battleships in WW2 , that we had just bought a few years earlier...rat got in junction box one night.... rat fried... next morning our dock was on the bottom - luckily without a ship in it!

There were - we counted them - 724 cement boxes in the bottom tanks, but a certain Classification Society saw nothing wrong with her! !

[jerrytug]

No but I'm paranoid about the boat falling over when she's on the hard,I check the belt-and-braces scaffolding cradle daily.It's always ok,so I worry about the heavy Vancouver next door blowing over and knocking my boat over (Vancouver propped up with sticks), Also hate working on side decks on land,guaranteed broken bones if you slip off. Sinking,just keep the cocks closed and don't sail into shipping containers when asleep simples! Jerry at 0300 waiting for the crash.

[galadriel]

I sink you should.

Galadriel is an Etap!

[blackbeard]

Just to add that our club once had a boat which took on a lot of water over a long period, would have sunk if someone hadn't noticed it was floating a bit low. Cause was a pinhole leak in the engine cooling system and the engine cooling water seacock left open.

And on electric auto bilge pumps: generally will not shift water fast enough to deal with a disintegrated skin fitting, and I take the point about flat batteries; on the other hand, a typical pump is claimed to shift about 500 gallons (ie about 2 tons)/hour using about 2.5 amps, if your battery has about 100 amp-hours that's a lot of water.

And, yes, I'm paranoid about sea cocks and even more paranoid about gas.

[wiggy]

I know of a flotilla engineer who put the fresh water hose in the filler, turned it on and got distracted, after an extended lunch (about 8pm) he came back to find the boat sat on the mud with the Mediterranean about 6 inches from flooding over the side deck.
Someone had taken the inspection hatch off the fresh water tank!
Dried out and back on flotilla the next week, thank goodness for shallow waters.

[viejo gringo]

yep, i worry sick all the time, sea cocks are probably the main worry even though theyre checked off daily, followed by gas, which is a bit stupid as i only have a little bottle for the barbie, followed by anchor dragging, rigging failure engine failure engine room fire, wiring shorts, i think it,ll be worse when i get out of the boatyard and afloat !!!!!!!!

[OR4751]

Does anyone else suffer from an irrational fear of their boat sinking when it's unattended? I go round closing seacocks that haven't spilled a drop but I still fear them spontaneously failing. I find it hard to have more than a week go by without a visit - just to check. We fitted an auto bilge pump with an alarm loud enough for half the marina to hear. I've even taken to giving the stern gland greaser a couple of turns before we leave "just in case".

Am I mad?

To ask the question is to answer it