ynnad

Thanks all for your replies. I have bought some acrylic 3mm panels from hertsplastic and some magnetic tape from ebay. i ave als noticed that where the inner window lining meet the wall panelling a lot of cold air get through. I went to the 99p store and bought some foam excluder tape which i intend to put between the frame and the wall.

Hi boatman, thank for your reply, could you give me a bit more detail please re where to put the excluder.

a quick update, Found some leaky joint under bath, had to cut a hole in the wall to get at it. Still getting some water under the floor but it seems to have slowed down a bit. My thought now is it could be a combination of water getting in through the windows and vents. My boat has 18 windows and more flying saucer vent than any other boat I've seen. We havent had to much rain of late, i want to check the levels after a good down pour. I bought a wet and dry hoover from ScrewFix fot less than £30 ponds that will work as long as the engines running. This is quite compact and very effective at sucking the water up. I am managing to keep on top of it, but the hunt for the source of this problem continues. thank again for all the advice everyone.

We have a back boiler in the Morso, this heat the water which is on a thermostatic pump. I have the flying saucer type vent, i am thinking of putting a little rockwool in them from the inside to stop the draft but still provide ventilation. our boat is an ex hire boat and it has more vent than ive seen on any other boat which i guess is fine in the summer

Hi was wondering if any on had any tips re the maintenance of aluminium sliding windows and the single pain with the tilting top section. i have notice that the condensation cant escape on many of my windows (i have 18) and there is also moss in some of the seals on the outside.

Hi all i thinking of fitting secondary glazing using clear acrylic sheet and magnetic tape. Has anyone done this and if so how effective has it been. My boat has 18 windows and umpteen vent on the roof. i am looking at way of keeping the boat warmer. I have a morso squirrel with a eco fan but this only tends to heat one end of the boat. we also have a back boiler but this only heats the radiators if the fire is absolutely blazing. we are just getting the hang of keeping the fire going all night but it is still really cold in the mornings and I feel having so many cold pain of glass and draft has a lot to do with this problem.

Thanks you

I have an isuzu diesel engine do I need a particular anti-freeze or can I use off the shelf from a car shop.

sorry i am new to the site and having some trouble navigating Our pipework is mainly plastic we have 2 pumps one of which I have replaced i have also redone all the connecting pipework in the vicinity of the pumps a question I did not answer warier is that I have pumped almost a bucketfuls every 1-2 day since discovering and fixing the leak under the bath (i had to cut a hole in the wall to access this) the pump is kicking in far less I am hoping that the water under the bilge now is water that is gradually draining from this long term problem Impressed with all of the replies, and some really fun to read. we are new to boating. Despite all these issues no regrets and we have learnt a lot about our boat in doing all this (sometimes the learning curve was painful though) I am sure this string will from useful guide for anyone with leaks in the future as i have searched and struggled to find info on boat leaks

HI everyone First I would like to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who responded to my very brief message for advice about a leak. To be honest when I left that message i had just annoyingly lost a much better and longer explaination to the ether, and was not in the mood to rewrite it at the time, but I wanted to see if it worked and if people would respond. ... I have been really impressed so far, so thanks to all of you! To summarise the issue as much as I can: We bought our boat, Prestige, in May, its an ex hire boat circa 1989, Colcraft hull, and have been living on her since. We had a hull survey on purchase which was sound and minimum readings of 9.7mm throughout, however we soon discovered that the whole of the back third of the boat flooring had rotted because of what must have been a very longstanding, almost certainly internal, leak which had left the bilge full of water. Since then i have had countless eurika " at last this is the solution" moments, only to find more water in the bilge under the back cabin deck soon afterwards. I think I must have fixed leaks at something like 15 different points, quite a few of them significant ones. There is something primeval about this and it is really getting to me now, but i am determined to get to the bottom of it! Had I known at the start that this was going to be such a journey I would have approached it in a more systematic way and kept notes about things like how long it takes to find water in the bilge, exactly what we had done immediately before that e.g. Take a showerh, and what the weather was doing. That would have helped narrow things down sooner. Anyway I ripped out the whole back cabin and toilet floor deck, removed the balast, managed to get it dry and appeared to have sorted the leak ( we were at about at least the number ten count by then I think), wax sealed the floor, replaced the balast and fooring and off we went, problem solved..... . Only it wasn't of course. When i removed the deck there was a period where we had no tell-tale pump noises in the night, and no water in the bilge, which gave us a false sense of security. This was when we were in a marina having a morso filled and linked to our central heating system, but the leaks are not related to this. I took the opportunity to familiarise myself with all of the pipework at that point and was able to establish or rework it all so that either everything was assessible to the eye and could be checked, or if not that there was no join in any pipework where it could leak, at least not where it was not easily accessible under the floor. The only places where this was not the case are under the bath, which was virtually inaccessible. However after several days of colouful language and bruised hands I believe i have fixed all the leak points there and cannot think of anywhere else it can be coming from, but the **** pump is still going off periodically and there is water in the bilge! Other points are: The water appears to be clear, its is never oily or soapy from the shower, and when i tried a number of tactics to identify where the water originated using strong acidic solutions (lemon juice), various water testing kits for fishtanks and water soluable kids paint none of it helped for a variety of reasons. I don't think it is riverwater but if it is coming in through a very small apature perhaps it would be enough to filter out the silt you would normally expect to see in river or canal water and make it look clear. The watertank which lies under the front deck is stainless steel and sound, i have crawled under the deck and its dry. My questions are: How long is it likely to take water to flow down under the deck, through the balast to were it collects, if the leak were at the front end of the boat? The other suggestion is that it could be a crack in a weld somewhere although when I called the surveyor he said that was possible but very unlikley. Someone else suggested water could be coming in from window seals when it rains ( we have 17 windows) which although sounds possible I think we have had too much water in the bilge appear suddenly for that, and the window seals are old but dont seem in such a bad state that they would let such a lot of water in..... Or could they? Has anyone got any other suggestions about tracking this leak or is there anything else it could be? I have noticed that there does not appear to be any sytematic troubleshooting guide to finding leaks, does anyone know of one? If not is would be really useful thing to have if anyone has the mind and the time to do it. Many thanks in anticipation for all replies. Danny

Hi everyone First I would like to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who responded to my very brief message for advice about a leak. To be honest when I left that message i had just annoyingly lost a much better and longer explaination to the ether, and was not in the mood to rewrite it at the time, but I wanted to see if it worked and if people would respond. ... I have been really impressed so far, so thanks to all of you! To summarise the issue as much as I can: We bought our boat, Prestige, in May, its an ex hire boat circa 1989, Colcraft hull, and have been living on her since. We had a hull survey on purchase which was sound and minimum readings of 9.7mm throughout, however we soon discovered that the whole of the back third of the boat flooring had rotted because of what must have been a very longstanding, almost certainly internal, leak which had left the bilge full of water. Since then i have had countless eurika " at last this is the solution" moments, only to find more water in the bilge under the back cabin deck soon afterwards. I think I must have fixed leaks at something like 15 different points, quite a few of them significant ones. There is something primeval about this and it is really getting to me now, but i am determined to get to the bottom of it! Had I known at the start that this was going to be such a journey I would have approached it in a more systematic way and kept notes about things like how long it takes to find water in the bilge, exactly what we had done immediately before that e.g. Take a showerh, and what the weather was doing. That would have helped narrow things down sooner. Anyway I ripped out the whole back cabin and toilet floor deck, removed the balast, managed to get it dry and appeared to have sorted the leak ( we were at about at least the number ten count by then I think), wax sealed the floor, replaced the balast and fooring and off we went, problem solved..... . Only it wasn't of course. When i removed the deck there was a period where we had no tell-tale pump noises in the night, and no water in the bilge, which gave us a false sense of security. This was when we were in a marina having a morso filled and linked to our central heating system, but the leaks are not related to this. I took the opportunity to familiarise myself with all of the pipework at that point and was able to establish or rework it all so that either everything was assessible to the eye and could be checked, or if not that there was no join in any pipework where it could leak, at least not where it was not easily accessible under the floor. The only places where this was not the case are under the bath, which was virtually inaccessible. However after several days of colouful language and bruised hands I believe i have fixed all the leak points there and cannot think of anywhere else it can be coming from, but the **** pump is still going off periodically and there is water in the bilge! Other points are: The water appears to be clear, its is never oily or soapy from the shower, and when i tried a number of tactics to identify where the water originated using strong acidic solutions (lemon juice), various water testing kits for fishtanks and water soluable kids paint none of it helped for a variety of reasons. I don't think it is riverwater but if it is coming in through a very small apature perhaps it would be enough to filter out the silt you would normally expect to see in river or canal water and make it look clear. The watertank which lies under the front deck is stainless steel and sound, i have crawled under the deck and its dry. My questions are: How long is it likely to take water to flow down under the deck, through the balast to were it collects, if the leak were at the front end of the boat? The other suggestion is that it could be a crack in a weld somewhere although when I called the surveyor he said that was possible but very unlikley. Someone else suggested water could be coming in from window seals when it rains ( we have 17 windows) which although sounds possible I think we have had too much water in the bilge appear suddenly for that, and the window seals are old but dont seem in such a bad state that they would let such a lot of water in..... Or could they? Has anyone got any other suggestions about tracking this leak or is there anything else it could be? I have noticed that there does not appear to be any sytematic troubleshooting guide to finding leaks, does anyone know of one? If not is would be really useful thing to have if anyone has the mind and the time to do it. Many thanks in anticipation for all replies. Danny

Sorry all I did not expect to hear back so soon. I did put a I did type a detail message but it seams to have disappeared. I will try again later as I am working. Thank you all im amazed by the response.

Can find where the water is coming from under my floor. Tried everything please help.