Another report of a checkvalve installation that works.

Maybe you would answer the question that I didn't get an answer to
from the other checkvalve user.

Do you pump or strip out your bilge by any other method?

I also have a hand pump plumbed in on a separate line which I plan to
take a few strokes on to remove the residual water in the bilge and
keep it as dry as possible. Since it is positive displacement and a
suction pump, it will clear its own line. This will bring the water
level below the inlets of the two Rule pumps. If these pumps can
become airbound as I see numerous references to, it seems that water
draining back from the pump and line up to the check valve would
certainly disable them as well. It's pretty hard to get an airbound
pump going again because you have to get down in the bilge and break
the line.

I'm sure check valves work fine as long as you don't let the water
level drop below the pump inlets.

Interesting about the "dump everything in there" method. I'd like to
know what Peggie thinks. I can see how it could work. Odor could be
from one type of bacteria thriving. By dumping so much stuff, the
ecology is constantly changing so that no one bug ever finds favorable
conditions long enough to grow to the critical numbers that cause
odor.

--

Roger Long



"Larry W4CSC" wrote in message
...
"Roger Long" wrote in
:

Most of the time though, the bilge system
will be experiencing very slow accumulations and level changes.
Things
happen very differently at this time scale.



"Lionheart", an Amel Sharki ketch, dumps everything into a very deep
bilge
in her keel...sinks, shower, seepage, everything except the cockpit
scuppers. When Geoffrey first got this boat, I was concerned the
Rule 4000
gph pump down in there with its little Rule float switch was going
to seize
if anything went down the drain. I mean, we wash dirty dishes into
the
bilge, not just shower soap! You may have suggested why this
arrangement
works so good.....

Every time someone washes anything out, there are no "very slow
accumulations" into this deep, but narrow bilge. No sooner than you
pull
the plug on the dishwater, it all goes flooding into the keel and
cycles
the pump...HARD...to dump it overboard above the waterline. There
IS a
Rule checkvalve in the large hose going overboard, about 4' from the
pump
outlet, to keep it from backflushing into the pump, especially when
we're
heeled over to port, submerging the outlet if we're lucky...(c;
Maybe
flushing all that detergent, abrasive coffee grounds, sanitizing
booze? and
SoftScrub through there is what keeps it from clogging up! Whenever
we
fill the 200 gallon keel watertank from the plughole under the
center
cockpit helmsman's footrest, we dump the hose running wide open down
into
the 8x6 hatch right above this sump for a while to stir up any
solids that
may be down there while we have the chance.

What I find really odd is this chemical/food/booze/soap soup DOESN'T
smell
anywhere near as bad as the old Endeavour 35's leaky bilgewater that
never
had anything but "very slow accumulations" of rainwater from the
mast and
seepage around some through-hull fittings and the packing gland. It
stunk
like a dead swamp whenever you lifted the Endeavour's floorboards in
there.
The Amel's bilge is damned near refreshing in comparison....

I never clogs....and amazing stuff has made its way down in
there.....

Unfortunately, the original bilge pump, a big diaphram, self-priming
beast
with big hoses, was worn out when we got it. That thing LOOKED like
a
sewage pump!