Water Tank

M

mcc272

New member
My boat does not have a freshwater system and I plan on adding one to match the factory system. That raises a few questions:

Does anyone know the manufacturer of the standard tank which is located under the aft dinette seat? Its size and model number?

Is there an external vent on the side of the hull or the house or does the open top hose on the inboard side of the dinette seat extend high enough that the water overflows the deck fill before coming out the top of the open top hose? I would have assumed that the open top hose runs to a fitting located on the top of the tank and serves as the tank vent but a review of past threads suggests that it is plumber into the side of the tank towards the bottom. Can someone confirm? Any reason not to use a vent mounted in the side of the house rather than the open top hose?

Would you duplicate the factory tank setup or, if you had a chance to do a water system from scratch as I do, would you do something differently?

Thanks for your advice.
 
There is a vent for the freshwater tank. Mine is under the rearmost window on the portside cabin wall very near the water filler cap. The clear tube inside by the aft dinette seat is a water level indicator. I marked mine with tape at 10 and 15 gallons. Nothing shows up until the tank has over 5 gallons in it. Were I to start from scratch I would want a better waterlevel indicator, maybe a window with gradations. All in all I am reasonably satisfied with the factory setup with the tank under the aft dinette seat and with a plywood top allowing for storage. That's where my spare anchor, spare propeller, spare lines, etc. reside. I like the KISS quality of the footpump rather than an electric pump.
 
I've actually been thinking about replacing the factory system with a custom 8-10 gallon tank that would sit under the gunnel on the port side. There are several motivations for this.
1) With the way I use my boat, I've never gone through more than 5 gallons on a single trip, so 20 gals is overkill. That might change if I was sleeping on the hook often or if I had a fresh water washdown hooked up but neither is true for me.
2) The water from the plastic tanks doesn't really taste that good to me, especially after a couple of warm days. Stainless would help this a lot.
3) The area under the gunnel is space that isn't used and isn't that usable whereas the area under the seat is much more useful. I'd rather have a decent cabinet there with access from the side. When you have to pull up the seat to get to stuff, it somewhat relegates the storage area to infrequently used items.
4) By having a custom tank made the tank will be narrower and taller. That will make the level indicator more accurate and should make it easier to more completely drain the tank.

The potential downsides to my proposed changes are
1) The water will be a little further outboard. This could make the boat list slightly but with the reduced tank size, I'm not too worried about that.
2) Maybe once I'm getting the water out of a stainless tank, I'll want to drink it more and my usage will go up.
 
I think if I were doing this on a fresh pallet so to speak as Jim is I'd look long and hard at putting the tank under the v-berth reserving the cabinet for storage. You'd probably have to have a custom tank made and it would be a lot of work but in the long run I believe it would be really great. With it centered weight distribution wouldn't be and issue.
 
http://www.tank-depot.com/product.aspx?id=1164

We replaced our 20 gallon tank with a 6 gallon unit from Tank Depot. I can't remember what model it is...there are 5 different 6 gallon tanks of various dimensions...but I'll get some measurements today and post them. You gain a LOT of storage space. We didn't need 20 gallons of water. I'll second the idea of staying with the foot pump...simple and it works just fine. We just use the tank water for hand washing, dishes, brushing teeth...we carry a gallon jug of bottled water for making coffee, etc.

On edit...I think we got the Todd tank.
Rick
 
The source for marine water tanks is Ronco:
http://www.ronco-plastics.net/marinetanks.html

There are several hundred tanks to choose from--and specficially tanks made for the V berth.

Personally I probably would remove the foam from under the v berth, and put the tank there (it is under the v berth in the 25). The loss of the foam does not make a difference to me--since I don't plan of swamping my boat....but for some, it might be a safety issue.
 
Just measured the tank and it is indeed the Todd unit that we got from Tank Depot.

Part Number: 85-1531WH
Capacity: 6 Gallons
Size: 16"L x 12"W x 8"H
Online Price: $44.10

I'll load some pics in our "projects" album when I get done with this post.

You can fit a lot of crap in that space now. Loaded for the summr season, we have:
2 12v fans
1 110v fan
4 PFD's
flare kit
LCD TV and DVD player
Large fillet knife kit
12v inflator for water toys

and there's still room left for more.

Very much worth it if you don't use much water.

Rick
 
Thanks everyone for your comments and suggestions. Dr. Bob, thanks for confirming that Ronco, which I had found previously, is THE Tank Place. They sure have a wide selection. Also, Colobear, thanks for the confirmation of the external vent and the information on its location.

Many of you suggested either smaller tanks or relocating tanks to the V berth. Coming from a larger boat, and even with plans to use a pump sprayer for a shower and a manual water pump, 20 gallons seems too small already. While we might get to a smaller size, I just can't bring myself to start out that way.

I am still thinking about locating the tank underneath the V berth. The one concern I have is the amount of work required to put it there. I did look at RedFox' V berth modification. I have a bit of time to figure it out. The concern I have is that I am making such extensive modifications to the boat already that, if I modify the V berth, I may not be done in time to use the boat next summer.

As I expected, you guys have given me a ton to think about. Thanks.

Jim
 
Just for completeness in case someone looks at this thread in the future, here are a couple of details of what I have decided to do:

On my boat, the inside dimensions of the aft dinette seat box where the factory water tank is located are 21 3/4" x 21 3/4". The depth is 23" at the inboard forward corner and 20 3/4" at the outboard forward corner. Ronco tank B227 is 20 gallons and is 20 3/4" x 17 3/4" x 13 3/4" deep. That allows it to be placed in the box with the long dimension running fore and aft. I plan to use this tank in the dinette seat location. I will build in a level 3/4" plywood shelf for the tank to sit upon. I will get a fitting relocation kit so I can put the 1 1/2" fill in the top aft outboard corner, the 1/2" vent in the top forward outside corner and the line to the pump in the lower, aft inboard side. I intend to omit the hose alongside the door and instead, I will rout a 1" slot in the side of the dinette box and mark the tank at various fill levels when the boat is floating in the water. After marking, I will put a piece of clear Lexan over the slot to keep dirt out. The fitting relocation kit comes with a 4" clean out port which I will center in the top of the tank. Since I will put a piece of plywood over the top of the tank, I plan to put a larger screw in port (just happen to have one on my parts shelf!) so I can reach the clean out port without having to remove the plywood over the tank. Ronco is www.ronco-plastics.net and the tank and relocation kit will be ordered from www.tank-depot.com

Jim
 
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