Not always a good thing, if it happens to be your cooling water for your
engine, or in the case of a fuel line, and it's not necessarily an easy fix.

otn

Simple Simon wrote:
"otnmbrd" wrote in message ink.net...

I'd go along with holding off till convenient to replace the gate valves
if they are still fine, but at the earliest convenience, replace them.
Gates have a tendency to leak due to a number of reasons, and older ones
can have the gate fall off the stem due to wear.



True but they fail safe. When the stem breaks as is often the case the
gate falls and closes the valve. This is the ideal situation for a thru-hull
valve to fail safe. A ball valve will never fail safe.

S.Simon