One of the most depressing and difficult places to work is the bilge! It is a very tight space and it's dark. Without a head lamp, it would be impossible to see what you are doing. It's also a somewhat wet space as a boat with many holes in its hull has leaks...it always has a leak somewhere.
In this episode, we have an issue with a bilge switch, but it also turns out to be an issue with the bilge pump. You will see that we did not do a great job of diagnosing the issue before jumping in to try and fix it. We have since learned from our errors. And, at the end of the video, Eileen shares some valuable lessons learned while tackling this task. Enjoy! And, as always, your feedback is invaluable.
NEW TO OUR CHANNEL? We are Eileen and Brown Councill. Welcome to our channel and a glimpse into our life adventure! 2020 was a year of uncertainty and change (for all of us, right?), but we overcame the challenges and decided it was time to chase our dream, to sail around the world! Did I mention that we had very NO sailing experience? Before leaving Qingdao, China, our home of 4 years, we sold almost all of our earthly possessions and started our international search to find the right sailboat that we would call "home." After 5 months of unanticipated twists and turns, we found what we were looking for, a used Leopard 44' Catamaran located in St. Lucia.
So, here begins our journey, filled with unmatched excitement and honestly, a bit of trepidation as well. We have much to learn as we travel the world on our floating home and we intend to document that journey and share it with you. We are so glad you have decided to join us, and we hope that you will find our story so compelling that it will inspire you to chase your dreams too!
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This project is officially over!
Mwahahahaha!
We're crazy on this boat!
Yes, man, this boat's making us crazy!
We were already crazy starting out, but we're really crazy now!
I think it's going to help you if you don't know what you're doing in the bilge like we didn't know.
If you like these kinds of videos, we'd really appreciate it if you would subscribe, like the video, and share it with your friends.
We're in paradise, but our head is in the bilge.
Absolutely. Working on boats in beautiful places.
Snubby flat or snubby pilted?
In our minds, we thought it was a simple diagnosis. The float switch had stopped working.
But our first mistake was to not properly diagnose the problem or confirm that our assumption was correct.
So we cut out the old switch and installed the new one.
I thought this was going to be super easy, but it actually is.
Oh, yeah. It is a beautiful day outside.
Let's go to the bilge because the bilge pump doesn't work.
And we're going to figure out how to change the bilge pump.
We spent about two and a half, three hours this morning to determine why the switch wasn't working.
I'm proud of you.
No, because I didn't have to do it!
Determining switch issues.
And in the end, we floated the bilge and the bilge pump didn't pump out the water.
So we are assuming that the bilge pump is the culprit.
So we're going to change the pump and see if that helps things.
And then we could go out and enjoy that beautiful view.
But in the meantime, here's the roommate.
All right, let's get going.
The automated bilge pump.
You know, I love the way I'm doing all the work and he's getting the cameras up.
While you're down there, I'll be your little nurse ratchet.
Actually, you'll have the ratchet. I'll hand it to you.
All right, I'm getting started, whether he comes with me or not.
Here is the bilge pump that we think is not functioning.
Ain't it pretty?
First thing is clamp off.
Yeah, clamp off, clamp on.
Did you get that?
Clamp off, clamp on, clamp on, clamp on.
Let's look at the light.
Did you just learn that from me?
Okay, lights, please.
Oh, you got it, girl.
You got it, you got it.
I need a pillow for my face.
Oh, gosh.
I'll provide the background music.
We're looking for easy bilge.
Except for our next post.
Today is day two of bilge pump repair.
And just to make sure things are working, I connected the new one to the terminal.
And when I connected it to the terminal and ran the override bilge pump, the pump went on.
So that is really good news.
And now I just need to install it.
It's going to be a challenge.
That hose down at the bottom is the one that I need to get the bilge pump into.
So I've taken this part off, which I'm going to insert into the hose.
And then after I get that properly inserted with the hose clamp tightened, then I will put that on it.
I cannot get this in any farther.
It might be enough just to clamp off.
So we're going to try it.
All right.
So that end is on.
Now I've got to get the other end on.
This is not going to be as easy.
Connect the ground wire and the brown and white, which is manual override.
The solid brown I'm not going to use.
And I'm going to probably cap this off to waterproof it.
But the first thing I want to do is make sure that the switch will actually turn the bilge on.
And here we go.
Oh no.
That did not sound like it's turning this on.
Huh.
All right.
I've reconnected everything.
And these two middle contacts were not working.
So I have sandpapered them, trying to make a better contact.
And the switch worked.
So now I'm going to fill the bilge with water to figure out if it's activating the pump.
And the pump is actually taking water out.
So that's the next step.
All right.
Here goes nothing.
Oh my goodness.
It's working.
Holy cow.
It works.
I cannot believe it.
It works.
Yes.
This project is officially over.
Yeah.
Great job, sweetie.
Wow.
I'm really excited to share with you a little bit about what I learned during this project.
Because I think it's going to help you if you don't know what you're doing in the bilge like we didn't know.
First of all, if we were to do this again, I would have taken the time to diagnose the problem correctly.
We made the assumption when we saw that the switch wasn't working that it was the switch that had gone bad.
But the reality is that we should have checked to see if there was an open circuit, to see if there was power coming to the terminal.
Because if we had done those things, we would have known that the switch actually was fine.
We did a lot of extra work that wasn't necessary because we didn't diagnose properly.
Secondly, know the function of each of the parts you're working with.
I did not realize that the upper switch was just an alarm and the lower switch was an activation of the pump.
On the starboard side, the upper switch is a different float switch.
But on the port side where I was working, the float switches were identical.
So I assumed that they could be switched.
And that was a wrong assumption.
Make sure you know what your parts do.
Know that the switches have specific positions for a reason.
Lastly, our friends Deb and Fraser always remind us to take breaks and don't try and work projects through all day long for several days.
Because you will start to hate your boat.
And actually the breaks helped me be able to think more clearly about the issues that I was facing.
In the end, it turned out that that float switch was fine and it just needed to be sandpapered.
And after doing that, the float switch worked perfectly and changing out the pump was the solution.
I hope these tips will help you in the future.
And if you have any questions, let us know.
