Know your AC condensate drain paths

[wkearney99]

I spent all day today helping a friend debug some AC condensate leaks, which turned out to be a clogged condensate sump biox he didn't know existed. He was probably about a week away from the unattended leaks causing damage to cabinetry.

Downside is his boat is all 24v so it wasn't a quick trip to West Marine for a replacement bilge pump for the sump (an Attwood using a Sahara pump). But at least now he's got some leeway to allow for some continued dumping to this bilge now that the lid is off the sump.

It had been pooling up in another bilge that had no drain path (which is a bad design, but oh well). We used a battery operated fuel transfer pump I had on hand and extracted about 20 gallons of condensate water! It's somewhat remarkable that much water didn't manage to cause other problems.

The sump box has a sealed lid, which we've left open until the replacement pump arrives from Defender. The bilge that has the sump box does at least have a drain path to another bilge area and pump that goes overboard. Some overflow here for a few days isn't going to be a problem.

Fast forward to an afternoon wasted, and I get back to my own boat to discover our kid had blocked the day head vacuflush toilet (contrary to his claims otherwise). But at least it was easy to solve and saved me from further crappy debugging. The wonders of a straightened coat hanger to the rescue. And of all the tools I have on board, a plunger is not one of them.

So if you've got AC systems be sure you know where their drains are routed and that all parts are actually performing their role properly.

 

[O C Diver]

Sounded like lots of fun.

Two of mine go overboard through the community drain, and one drains into the shower sump. Doesn't get much easier than that.

Ted

 

[jimdavi]

Mine drains into the shower sump, with a Whale gulper pump.

 

[wkearney99]

Mine drains into the shower sump, with a Whale gulper pump.

That's how my ac/sink/shower sump boxes are handled, just a float switch in them and Gulpers on the adjacent bulkheads. With a separately plumbed pump for the bilge where the sumps are installed. This way if they overflow it'll still get pumped out.

Along the process of troubleshooting it I found a low point in the line where a 'trap' had formed with a gelatinous blob of 'something' plugging it. The tricky part will be keeping that line raised such that it can't form a trap again in the future.

I attribute the knowledge of why this is a problem to Peggy's discussions about the vent lines on black tanks. Keep the lines secured and on a path that has no dips and you're less likely to have troubles with them.