| Author | Message | ||
     glen (Glen) Rating: |
I noticed leaks around our pump while on the hard last fall so I went ahead, pulled the pump, dug out the wet core and filled it. Or rather I should say my wife, who's really good with the epoxy filled it. We were both concerned about getting a good fill, so she mixed up a peanut butter batch and filled the core and then dammed the bottom and filled the whole hole up with a liquid batch. I recut out the hole with a hole saw and drilled out the mounting holes mounted the pump up. It's best to make a template for the drilling from some plywood scrap using the pump as a pattern. Seems to be pretty solid now. One thing I learned, wet balsa is scooped out by a finger! Dry balsa comes out with a screwdriver! Don't scrap out more than you have to. | ||
| jeffr Rating: N/A |
I had to rebuild my whale pump and found the core around it was soaking wet on my boat as well. This was a mid season repair so I did not address the core problem. That will be a winter project. | ||
| Lance Staughton (Twospeed) Rating: N/A |
Thanks for the heads up on the wet core around the bilge pump. I just took out the water heater and had to remove the bilge pump to get it out. It was wet but not to bad. Glassed and fixed now. This bulletin board is great!! | ||
| Gary Hendrickson Rating: N/A |
The cockpit floor is balsa-cored! When I removed the Whale pump for checking and rebuilding this winter, I found the core around its mounting holes to be soaked and soft, especially the two bolt holes off to one side. I found no sealing compound under their screw heads, and the rubber gasket used on the the large center mounting hole wasn't screwed down snug. Had to dig out the soft balsa about 3/4 inch around the central holes, and also drill out and dig out around the two side holes, fill in with thickened epoxy (using a mold-release barrier sheet around the circumference of the large pump-handle hole in the cockpit floor), and then re-drill the 6 screw holes, before I could put the bilge pump back in. Whew! Won't ever get wet again. |
