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ianfossett
United Kingdom
3 Posts |
 Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 06:41:21
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Forgive the ignorance where is the bilge on a Norman 20?
Cheers |
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df
United Kingdom
5994 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 07:42:06
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I'm guessing you mean where is the access to the bilge, the bilge is the lowest part of the inside of the hull below the floors and decks by the keel, if you have a moulded in cabin floor you should find access in the very front locker but it may only be via a small drain hole in the bulkhead which get easily blocked, in the cockpit check below the outboard well, you may be able to lift the whole floor if you're lucky.
NBAS--The communal colostomy bag of the boating community.
Visit leomagill.co.uk |
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cliveshep
Thailand
1324 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 16:00:52
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Later Normans can be a pig to drain bilges as not only does the front cabin bunk/floor moulding rune across the bilge but they glassed it in to the hull inside the lockers. This left a sealed void you couldn't get in to. Likewise the cockpit floor/locker moulding is also glassed in right up to the small area under the motor well where the floor liner stops about 400mm short of the transom. You can drop a bilge pump in there but given that outboard Normans are notorious for being trimmed bow down it may not do a lot.
On these latest models trapped water can run through most of the cabin/cockpit bilge, even if it cannot be extracted, and therefore the gap between the two linings, cockpit and cabin, where the main bulkhead is located, can remain wet. This is bad news for the bulkheads and they most often rot at the bottom as they touch the bilge.
Earlier models did not glass the bunk mouldings to the hull but sat them on a member glassed in to the hull thus leaving a void right under. You could get things in the lockers slide down the V of the bilge and be lost forever under the floor but you could also get at the bilges. The earliest models had plywood cockpit lockers, this continued up to the early 70's, and these models had a lift out plywood floor so bilges were easily accessible.
On the later ones you will find it best to drill two 6mm holes in the cabin floor just inside the bulkhead and approx 75mm either side of the centre line so they are 150mm apart and buy yourself a Pela pump. (Google it) They are for sucking oil up a dipstick hole in an engine but will quite happily suck up bilge water. The reason you drill your holes 150mm apart is this places them to either side of the hog which is a timber glassed in from bow to stern, 150mm wide, upon which the rib stiffeners were fixed before glassing them in. So you can get to either side of the hog and suck out water which, if you have one of the last made models, would otherwise rot bulkheads. You shouldn't get a lot of water in anyway unless your hood is completely rotten.
The cost of boating is insignificant compared to costs of a young wife and two teenage kids! |
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tigtog
United Kingdom
421 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 20:12:19
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| after reading the last post i now no without a doubt i know nothing about boating. |
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cliveshep
Thailand
1324 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 23:07:17
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quote:
Originally posted by tigtog
after reading the last post i now no without a doubt i know nothing about boating.
Oh, sorry if I confused you then? I built my 1st boat at 20 yrs old, the folk at the bottom of next doors garden had a garage that had doors at both ends so my parents neighbours kindly allowed us to remove their fence and their bottom fence and that boat went out via the kindness of the various neighbours.
I never made that mistake again - before building make sure you can get the "Oh my word" out! Over the next 45 years I've built others from scratch, and re-fitted no end of cruisers, some I stripped back to hull, other were not such drastic rebuilds. I've managed to work on carvel, ply, grp and steel over the years, naturally not only on boats I own but those owned by others. So - 45 years of experience but a knack of confusing folk when I try to explain how it all goes together.
However, that first design and build came from watching, asking, reading, looking at boats and studying how they were built and what makes a boat look "boaty" and what makes it look like a heap of s**t or a floating shed. There is no magic, get books from your library and have a read about how boats used to be made to gain insight into proven principles of construction and repair and get out on the water and make the same mistakes we all made (and sometimes still make) and build up a knowledge and experience base. Don't be discouraged, if at first etc........! Don't be afraid to start a job, very often the way forward only becomes clear after you start and then brood on it overnight.
The cost of boating is insignificant compared to costs of a young wife and two teenage kids! |
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Knighty
United Kingdom
654 Posts |
Posted - 24 Jun 2011 : 23:26:58
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| The little bilge pump on my 20 is at the stern, there is a small piece of floor cut out and it sits down in there. I do stick my head under the front cabin locker as the boat seems bow down when no one on it. Worth getting a bit of wire and poking the holes that are through cross members in the front locker to stop any crud building up. |
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Norman 20- Bilge
