wi4x4man
Member
Greetings all,
This forum is new to me, so I am a newbie here, but I am not a newbie when it comes to boats.
The reason I decided to post is becuase of a recent issue and I have not been having luck finding the root cause of the problem... Here goes:
I keep my boat up in Saxon Harbor, WI. As anyone who plies the waters of the Great Lakes knows (and Lake Superior in particular) the ice is finally starting to go away and winter appears to have lost her grip. So it wasn't until Friday of last week that I was able to get the cover off of my baby and start to get her ready for the year. I did the usual things, checked every square inch of her, started to clean, and etc. I noticed a little bit of red fluid by the rudder shaft, but otherwise nothing. As I did some steering work last year, I just chalked it up to steering fluid as it did not exactly smell like diesel.
Then on Sunday night, I got a call from the Harbor Master saying that my boat is leaking fuel! So Monday (yesterday) morning I zoomed up there to find out what is going on, and sure enough there was fuel held between the stringers and was seeping down into the bilge, and then through the drain in the keel. In all total, about two gallons (give or take a few ounces) had leaked out.
Thinking it was fuel lines, I checked those. There were not any leaks in any of the fuel lines, all as dry as a bone. Sure enough, it must be the tank! I pumped the tank dry, cleaned everything up, and of course the leaking stopped. I have been wracking my brain trying to figure out what the heck is going on and more importantly, why did it suddenly start to leak the day after I started to get her ready.
In particular, it "seems" to be leaking from the aft end of the starboard fuel tank. Both tanks are located under the cockpit deck, and as usual, are completely inaccessible with exception to the fuel connection points. You can see the sides of the tank through the cockpit hatch, but that's about it. Heaven forbid any boat manufacturer ever make a HATCH over a crucial item of the boat.
All of this being said, I have been looking around and it appears as though this model commonly has fuel tank issues. My question, is does anyone know the root cause of the failures? Is it because they are aluminum? Is it because the welds break? Does the starboard tank always fail or is there an even failure between starboard and port? Has anyone seen a port tank fail? I cannot find any information out there as to why it would fail, other than they do fail. I know that aluminum has a finite fatigue life, and right now I am thinking it was a fatigue failure at a weld. But as I have not removed the tank I am unsure.
I am fully aware of what I need to do to fix the problem. I know that no matter what, I need to cut the deck off. And when I do, I am going to replace BOTH tanks regardless of the fact that my port tank is not leaking. I am also going to go one better and actually put in access hatches to get to key items (like the fuel sender for instance). Besides, the end grained balsa core has some spongy spots, and the deck needs work anyways.
The conundrum I also face, is should I chance this year running on one tank, in this case, the port tank before I tear the deck off in the fall. The fuel return line empties into the port side tank, so I can isolate the starboard tank without any issues. Of course, I would need to ballast the boat accordingly since over 700 lbs would be sitting on the port side. But, without knowing WHY these fail, I am scared to death. What's to say that the port side tank decided to pop a leak while she is in the water, the bilge pump kicks in, and dumps a ton of fuel into the water. NOT GOOD!!!
At this point, I am thinking of draining the port tank and centralizing into a "temporary" permanent tank under the cockpit hatch, something in the neighborhood of about 40 gallons so that when we do go out for the weekend, we can hit our normal spots and still have enough to make it back to port with plenty to spare. She is a very fuel efficient boat, so that should give me more than enough cruising capacity at this time. But at the same time, I would rather not spend money on a fuel tank that I will not be using next year since I am going to be putting in new tanks. The kicker of course is that a fuel tank is a LOT cheaper than a fuel spill, so I know what route I am going to follow here.
Can anyone inform me as to the failures seen out there? Why they failed, pictures, anything? It would be greatly appreciated!!!
This forum is new to me, so I am a newbie here, but I am not a newbie when it comes to boats.
The reason I decided to post is becuase of a recent issue and I have not been having luck finding the root cause of the problem... Here goes:
I keep my boat up in Saxon Harbor, WI. As anyone who plies the waters of the Great Lakes knows (and Lake Superior in particular) the ice is finally starting to go away and winter appears to have lost her grip. So it wasn't until Friday of last week that I was able to get the cover off of my baby and start to get her ready for the year. I did the usual things, checked every square inch of her, started to clean, and etc. I noticed a little bit of red fluid by the rudder shaft, but otherwise nothing. As I did some steering work last year, I just chalked it up to steering fluid as it did not exactly smell like diesel.
Then on Sunday night, I got a call from the Harbor Master saying that my boat is leaking fuel! So Monday (yesterday) morning I zoomed up there to find out what is going on, and sure enough there was fuel held between the stringers and was seeping down into the bilge, and then through the drain in the keel. In all total, about two gallons (give or take a few ounces) had leaked out.
Thinking it was fuel lines, I checked those. There were not any leaks in any of the fuel lines, all as dry as a bone. Sure enough, it must be the tank! I pumped the tank dry, cleaned everything up, and of course the leaking stopped. I have been wracking my brain trying to figure out what the heck is going on and more importantly, why did it suddenly start to leak the day after I started to get her ready.
In particular, it "seems" to be leaking from the aft end of the starboard fuel tank. Both tanks are located under the cockpit deck, and as usual, are completely inaccessible with exception to the fuel connection points. You can see the sides of the tank through the cockpit hatch, but that's about it. Heaven forbid any boat manufacturer ever make a HATCH over a crucial item of the boat.
All of this being said, I have been looking around and it appears as though this model commonly has fuel tank issues. My question, is does anyone know the root cause of the failures? Is it because they are aluminum? Is it because the welds break? Does the starboard tank always fail or is there an even failure between starboard and port? Has anyone seen a port tank fail? I cannot find any information out there as to why it would fail, other than they do fail. I know that aluminum has a finite fatigue life, and right now I am thinking it was a fatigue failure at a weld. But as I have not removed the tank I am unsure.
I am fully aware of what I need to do to fix the problem. I know that no matter what, I need to cut the deck off. And when I do, I am going to replace BOTH tanks regardless of the fact that my port tank is not leaking. I am also going to go one better and actually put in access hatches to get to key items (like the fuel sender for instance). Besides, the end grained balsa core has some spongy spots, and the deck needs work anyways.
The conundrum I also face, is should I chance this year running on one tank, in this case, the port tank before I tear the deck off in the fall. The fuel return line empties into the port side tank, so I can isolate the starboard tank without any issues. Of course, I would need to ballast the boat accordingly since over 700 lbs would be sitting on the port side. But, without knowing WHY these fail, I am scared to death. What's to say that the port side tank decided to pop a leak while she is in the water, the bilge pump kicks in, and dumps a ton of fuel into the water. NOT GOOD!!!
At this point, I am thinking of draining the port tank and centralizing into a "temporary" permanent tank under the cockpit hatch, something in the neighborhood of about 40 gallons so that when we do go out for the weekend, we can hit our normal spots and still have enough to make it back to port with plenty to spare. She is a very fuel efficient boat, so that should give me more than enough cruising capacity at this time. But at the same time, I would rather not spend money on a fuel tank that I will not be using next year since I am going to be putting in new tanks. The kicker of course is that a fuel tank is a LOT cheaper than a fuel spill, so I know what route I am going to follow here.
Can anyone inform me as to the failures seen out there? Why they failed, pictures, anything? It would be greatly appreciated!!!