CAL 25 cockpit not draining

[sailguy40]

I am going to run a snake down the drains this weekend. Then dump some water to test out the drains, if it starts to drain I will be good. I am curious if the boat would sink if a hard rain came and those things somehow got stopped up.

[Faster]

The problem would be when the water level in the cockpit was able to run into the boat via the companionway or a cockpit locker... It would take a long time but eventually it could sink... but in the meantime you'd have a lot of water below with all the attendant damage from that.

[Skylark23455]

Originally Posted by Faster

The problem would be when the water level in the cockpit was able to run into the boat via the companionway or a cockpit locker... It would take a long time but eventually it could sink... but in the meantime you'd have a lot of water below with all the attendant damage from that.

That exact thing happened to me last fall. Pine needles had clogged the scuppers and 3 horrific rain falls filled the cockpit and started to run down the companion way. Fortunately my neighbor saw the water and unclogged the scuppers. I was very lucky with the carpet being the only casualty.

Lesson? Make sure you have an automatic float switch on your bilge pumps that will kick on is a situation like that. The PO of Skylark had only a manual switch as the boat is typically dry as a bone. Had not gotten to adding one yet...stupid me. Sorry to be a little off topic, but thats a lesson that could have had my baby on the bottom...would hate to see it happen to anyone.

PS, does anyone else think that the scupper size on the Cal 34 is ridiculously small for the size of the cockpit?

[kgs113]

I've got the same boat and the same problem occasionally. There are a lot of trees in my marina and debris is always loosely clogging the cockpit drains. I went to the local hardware store and got some of that aluminium mesh for putting in your gutter downspouts to keep the crud out. Used about half for each drain. Make it a few inches taller than the drain so if some crud blocks the mesh it can still drain. Don't worry when you forget its there and step on it. It's soft. It'll flatten out and you can reshape it when you need to. I pull mine out when sailing. Works well and you don't have to get robbed at a chandlery for it.

[Hickory260]

I have a 1972 Cal 25 "project boat." The cockpit half full when I first saw her. The drains were clogged. As it turned out, one had the cap from a toothpaste tube jammed in it. I keep a piece of Romex wire handy to keep them clear. Instead of seacocks, I've wired tappered wooden plugs to the drainpipes in the cabin to insert in case of failure.