Plumbing problem with city water connection

Hi,
I have a 31 MainShip Sedan Bridge 1996 model. My city water connection has blown out twice. I replaced it and put a flow restriction inline governor on the source spikett to reduce the water pressure from 70 lb. to <50 lb. pressure. I also restrict the flow by turning the water flow down to a trickle.
I still have water going into the fresh water tanks and leaking out of the vent and causing the side of my boat to stain. How can I fix this problem?
Also my hot water heater seems to no longer be working. How can I test it to determine if I need a new heater and if so where can I purchase one?
Any help you can give me on these problems I will be very appreciative.
Tebeau

tebeau169 said:

Hi,
I have a 31 MainShip Sedan Bridge 1996 model. My city water connection has blown out twice. I replaced it and put a flow restriction inline governor on the source spikett to reduce the water pressure from 70 lb. to <50 lb. pressure. I also restrict the flow by turning the water flow down to a trickle.
I still have water going into the fresh water tanks and leaking out of the vent and causing the side of my boat to stain. How can I fix this problem?
Also my hot water heater seems to no longer be working. How can I test it to determine if I need a new heater and if so where can I purchase one?
Any help you can give me on these problems I will be very appreciative.
Tebeau

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City water feeding into the fresh water tanks is most likely going through your fresh water pump. First pump your fresh water tanks down some by turning off the city water and opening a faucet. Then turn off the fresh water pump power and close the feed valves from your fresh water tank to your water pump. Then try resuming city water use.

Water heater: Check the breaker first to see if it tripped or was accidentally turned off. Next check the over temp safety. It's located under the electrical cover of your hot water heater. Simply a red button you push in to see if it resets from being tripped. You can test the heater element with a VOM (volt ohm meter) to see if you burned out the element. No resistance means a dead element. They are replaceable for a small fraction of the cost of a water heater.

Turn the electrical breaker off before removing the water heater cover to check either the over temp or the heating element.

BTW, it's a "water heater" not a "hot water heater", you don't heat hot water.

Ted

We never connect to city water. We fill the freshwater tanks, and pump from there. If you are connected to city water, and a pipe ruptures when you are not onboard, it will probably sink the boat. If you are pumping from the freshwater tanks, and a pipe ruptures when you are not onboard, the worst that will happen is that your freshwater tank will be empty when you return.

You can solve the water tank issue by closing the valve to tanks or installing a valve and closing it when you are connected to shore water. As far as the water heater goes I am assuming that you are talking about the electrical heating not working. In that case turn it off and check the resistance across the heating coils. A 1,500 watt heater should read 10-12 ohms. You can buy a replacement heating element or a new water heater at lots of places such as West Marine, Defender and pretty much all decent chandlers. You can also get them at Walmart on-line.

This is just an opinion, but you'll find it's shared by many: Don't use the city water connection.

You've already discovered that the plumbing in your boat isn't made to handle the pressure. Plus, you can sink the boat if a fitting fails anywhere in the system. Just fill the tank regularly, and let your on-board pump handle it from there.

No doubt someone will chime in and say they use city water all the time, and have never had a problem. Your boat. Your choice.

As for the water heater, I assume by "not working" you mean not heating the water, and further assume you're talking about using it while on shore or generator power.

To test, just check to see if the correct voltage (120VAC or 240VAC) is present at the terminals for the heating element. If so, then you need to replace the element. Usually not too difficult. Just make sure you get the correct voltage and wattage.

If not, then there are a few other things you can check. Start with the obvious; make sure the circuit breaker is on and the wires feeding the heater are live. There will be one or more small disks in series with the heating element that are designed to break the circuit in an overheat condition. These can fail. Check for continuity across them, or proper voltage on both sides of them. Finally, check the thermostat itself.

Water heaters are really simple devices. But it shouldn't be a huge job to just pull it out and replace it if it's getting ratty-looking. There are lots of different brands, and materials. Choose based on your budget and preferences.

If you have a smaller unit, consider whether you have room to go one size up. It'll take a little longer to heat up, but last longer.

If your old one sits on a shelf and water can corrode the bottom of it, consider raising it up a little to avoid future corrosion.

Finally, to keep the grammar police at bay, refer to it as a "water heater." Otherwise someone will point out that you don't need to heat water if it's already hot

PS: I must type slow. Three other answers in the time it took me to write this!

Should be a check valve before the tank to prevent back flow into it (primary purpose is to maintain pump prime). One can also go after the pump before the junction where the city water comes in.

We live aboard and never use a city water connection; we refill our water tanks and use the water from there. I thank my lucky stars that we do that as we had an incident just 3 days ago that could have sunk our home had we been connected to the city water supply.

While we were out shopping, a fitting to our guest head sink faucet "slipped" off despite being double clamped. Although we have 3 tanks of 100 gallons each, I only open the valves to one at a time. We were using a mostly full tank.

When we returned to the boat, the guest head had puddles on the floor and the balance of the 100 gallons drained to the bilge and was pumped overboard by the bilge pump. The fresh water pump shut down by its thermal protection circuit as it probably ran dry for awhile. I repaired the fitting, primed the now cool pump and all is well. I hate to think what might have happened had we been connected to city water and had not shut it off before leaving the boat.

I would advise NEVER connecting to city water.

We do connect to city water routinely, however, for some of the cautionary reasons mentioned above, I have three valves on the connection line - the valve on the supply spigot itself, a valve on the far end of the hose, and a valve just before the pressure reducer inlet in the swim step locker. As we walk away from the boat I close all three. I don't trust little kids (or adults for that matter) turning supply valves on the docks just for kicks. I also have quick disconnects on both ends of the hose. Yes, I'm paranoid about city water into my boat, but it's fresher and less skunky than our tank water. (I know, other posters will suggest that if we relied on tank water instead of the city supply, the tank water would turn over more often and be less skunky, and that's probably true.)

I guess a live aboard situation is different. When we go to bed at night I don't have to worry about shutting off the city water yet I can use the head in the middle of the night without having to turn city water back on. As mentioned, turning over the water in the tanks regularly keeps it fresh.

I removed the city water connection when I bought my boat as I felt it wasn't worth the risk. I considered a 1/4" stainless Steel large washer as a fixed orifice for the outside connection to limit the flow from a broken pipe. Ultimately decided that filling the water tanks once a week wasn't a big deal for peace of mind.

Ted

Certainly can be an either or choice with adequate safeguards for city water.

Even pros and cons for quality, etc....

I would prefer the system built for both, then use either or as appropriate.

Usually if you go to the pump manufacturing websites such as Shureflo....they have diagrams and guides for a good system....that certainly be improved upon somewhat.

Have had 6 or more major hose or fittings failures while asleep in over 10 years living aboard, never came close to sinkIng.

Had the conversation with a dock buddy several years ago. He said he turned off the shore water every night. One too many beers that night and the next morning he got up in ankle deep water. I didn't even have to say "told you so".

Yesterday a boat that had been in dry dock for 3 months, getting fixed because it nearly sunk 3 months ago, sank within an hour of leaving the marina.

https://www.facebook.com/seatowcapemay/photos/pcb.10153726265258021/10153726262243021/?type=3.



I hope one doesn't consider my boat or any other boat similar to one that nearly or did sink....whether a dock buddies or not.

Things happen...less so to some people...more so to others.

Some people kill themselves in their back yard every year.

Some people fly jets for many years, even in combat, become astronauts and do a million dangerous things yet survive without major issues.

Risk management is a way of thinking...manage those...and you can be just as safe as the guy who does nothing and still gets hurt.

You do have to actively risk manage.

If you drink, then put a gallon meter in your city line. After several hundred gallons it shuts off, and a quick turn gets you another 200.

Boating isn't all that hard or dangerous...unless you of course take TF too seriously.....or are lousy at risk management.

I suppose you folks who never use city water for fear of flooding never plug into shore power, or turn it off when away from the boat or not use it at all? A lot more fires from bad connections than sinkings from flooding due to bad plumbing and a mediocre bilge pump system.

When we lived aboard full time, and were going to be away from the boat for some indeterminate time, we simply turned the shore water off at the tap (when we remembered to.) But other than that it was on 24/7 unless we hadn't been away from the dock for awhile and wanted to cycle the tank.

I regarded plumbing system maintenance as an ongoing cycle and really had no more worry about failure than a land house though my main concern was avoiding leaks away from the dock that would drain the tanks prematurely.

caltexflanc said:

I suppose you folks who never use city water for fear of flooding never plug into shore power, or turn it off when away from the boat or not use it at all? A lot more fires from bad connections than sinkings from flooding due to bad plumbing and a mediocre bilge pump system.

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Not according to BoatUS insurance claims statistics. Sinkings were the number 2 claim while fires were number 5.

If you dig a little deeper into BoatUS statistics you''ll find that the vast majority of sinkings (about 69%) occurred dockside. Their statistics are broken down by cause but the definitions are quite poor so I can't say how much was caused by shore connections.

DC electrical fires caused 32% of fire claims
AC electrical fires caused 9% of fire claims

Off topic ..... curiously they have only ever had one propane fire claim and that was due to some idiot knocking a portable stove over.

Well, you don't know what exactly caused the sinkings so nothing proven to the contrary here. But notice no mention of shore water in this article:

Keeping Your Boat Afloat - Seaworthy Magazine - BoatUS

caltexflanc said:

Well, you don't know what exactly caused the sinkings so nothing proven to the contrary here. But notice no mention of shore water in this article:

Keeping Your Boat Afloat - Seaworthy Magazine - BoatUS

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Proven to the contrary is your comment re sinkings vs. electrical fires

Once again...comparing me or probably quite a few on this forum to the average boater I am not so sure is fair. So comparing habit patterns or operations between boaters is just as varied as any other comparison. Like lumping all drivers together then discussing which ones run out of gas or can't drive in snow or ones that tailgate....one size never fits all.

Starting with properly tying to a cleat is evidence enough that 90 percent of boaters have little knowledge of properly taking care of a boat.

The other as I pointed out is just plain old risk management.

I am neither a great boat handler, car driver or helo pilot. But I have managed to go now 36 years without a claim or aviation incident. Some have trouble going 6 months....why?

Lousy risk management.

So toss around all the stats you want...but filling in the "before incident" checklist is just more important when deciding on causal factors as just taking stats from final outcomes...learned that about day one as a trained safety manager.

boatpoker said:

Proven to the contrary is your comment re sinkings vs. electrical fires

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Nope, quite the contrary; my comment regarded sinkings solely due to city water. Reread the post and the thread for context.

There are different approaches to this issue.

When we choose to connect to city water we install a garden water meter in line so that the water supply will turn off after 100/200 gallons. Thus eliminating the sinking threat.

We have long ago installed a ball value in line from the supply from the tanks so that when we are in city water the pressure is blocked from getting to the tanks.

Generally we used our tanks at the dock, but we always fill the tanks and switch to city water the day before we depart so that we depart with full tanks. Our dock visits are short (2-3 days) with the washing machine going several times a day.

We live aboard (going on 8 years) and we do hook up to shore water. So far since Jan 1 we have cruised about 2,000 miles and been in 35 marinas and private docks. We hooked up to city water in 28-29 of those places. We have generally found that our ship board water pressure is higher than shore pressure and generally we find that if we leave the water pump breaker on, our ship's water is consumed as our on board pump supplements the shore water. I do not think shore water is necessarily that much higher pressure than our on board water. Our experience in several dozen cities and towns indicates that it is not. We turn off the water if we are going to leave the boat for a day but otherwise we do not turn it off. I have however intentionally opened up the shore water and flooded the bilge to see what would happen. Our primary bilge pump can stay ahead of the city water and we have a secondary that is even bigger. So if we go to the grocery store or to a friend's boat for dinner we generally do not turn off the dock water, unless we are leaving for the weekend. As far as the BoatUS article, Back in the 1990s I worked with the Boat US Technical exchange to research the Boat US claims and see what was sinking boats. Dock water did not and does not show up on the radar. So for each of us it is a personal decision, hook up to the city or not. The statistics do not support the worry and there are technical solutions that indicate that this is not a very big risk.

I would say to each his own except to say this. Those of you worried about a 3/4" hose sinking your boat a bilge pump upgrade project is in your very near future I'd hope. Unless your current pump is just for show because you rely on a magic wand to dewater your boat.

CPseudonym said:

I would say to each his own except to say this. Those of you worried about a 3/4" hose sinking your boat a bilge pump upgrade project is in your very near future I'd hope. Unless your current pump is just for show because you rely on a magic wand to dewater your boat.

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The 90psi municipal water where i live would easily overpower every 12VDC bilge pumping system I have seen.

caltexflanc said:

I suppose you folks who never use city water for fear of flooding never plug into shore power, or turn it off when away from the boat or not use it at all? A lot more fires from bad connections than sinkings from flooding due to bad plumbing and a mediocre bilge
.

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+1
IMHO most shore water issues are due to hi pressure...use a pressure regulator and you shouldn't blow any more fittings than w a pump. Hoses jury rigged is not a quality system...use pex & proper fittings...no problem
Disconnect when not aboard.

caltexflanc said:

A lot more fires from bad connections than sinkings from flooding due to bad plumbing and a mediocre bilge pump system.

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I was referring to this part which is incorrect and not borne out by any insurance claims statistics.
Of course id you can back that up with statistics ...............

tadhana said:

We live aboard (going on 8 years) and we do hook up to shore water. So far since Jan 1 we have cruised about 2,000 miles and been in 35 marinas and private docks. We hooked up to city water in 28-29 of those places. We have generally found that our ship board water pressure is higher than shore pressure and generally we find that if we leave the water pump breaker on, our ship's water is consumed as our on board pump supplements the shore water. I do not think shore water is necessarily that much higher pressure than our on board water. Our experience in several dozen cities and towns indicates that it is not. We turn off the water if we are going to leave the boat for a day but otherwise we do not turn it off. I have however intentionally opened up the shore water and flooded the bilge to see what would happen. Our primary bilge pump can stay ahead of the city water and we have a secondary that is even bigger. So if we go to the grocery store or to a friend's boat for dinner we generally do not turn off the dock water, unless we are leaving for the weekend. As far as the BoatUS article, Back in the 1990s I worked with the Boat US Technical exchange to research the Boat US claims and see what was sinking boats. Dock water did not and does not show up on the radar. So for each of us it is a personal decision, hook up to the city or not. The statistics do not support the worry and there are technical solutions that indicate that this is not a very big risk.

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My guess is there is a large geographical difference in dockside water pressure. In general, marinas have high water pressure in this region. I suppose it is because they are often at the bottom of a steep hill. Even many dirt Homs have problems around here with too high muni water pressure.

Risk manage...if you want....

High water pressure - regulate
Fear of broken onboard lines - turn off when not onboard, limiting timer on dock, higher bilge pump rating....does't have to beat it, just stay close to it. Use quality hose and fittings. PM your system.

C'Mon folks...this is plumbing...doesn't get much simpler. You know the pitfalls, fix them or use your tanks only. Another thread of much about nothing.

Hopefully the most important thing for newer boaters to understand....is yes, the city will gladly pump your boat full of water if you allow them to.

Like Nancy Reagan said... " just say no".....

Live a board for 19 year's and we have never connected to domestic water as over the years we have seen several boats sink, and or sever water damage. We always fill the tanks and use the boats water pump. Worse that can happen is 200 gallons in the bilge. Wr also use a 30 psi pump as it saves on water with plenty of water for daily needs.

boatpoker said:

The 90psi municipal water where i live would easily overpower every 12VDC bilge pumping system I have seen.

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You need to get out more.

boatpoker said:

The 90psi municipal water where i live would easily overpower every 12VDC bilge pumping system I have seen.

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We have municipalities around here with high water pressure too. Wonderful invention those things called pressure regulators. Cheap and widely used.

If a garden hose will overpower your bilge pumps I pity the day you actually need yours. It's the first thing I made sure my pump could handle was a wide open hose in the bilge. Woulda never left the dock if it couldn't but that's just my standard.