Poll on dock water supply failures

[klmmicro]

Seems an awful risky thing to have a permanent medium pressure water hose attached and ON at all times. I get the water fill system that has the dock supply hose attached, but why would you leave the dock valve open when not present for failures?

[donradcliffe]

"According to State Farm Insurance Statistics, washing machine hose failures cause approximately $170 million in damages to homes in the United States & Canada. The true figure may be even higher, as this amount accounts for reported claims only."

[Stu Jackson]

Originally Posted by Steve Bean

This won't help with the poll project, but my safety measure is simple: I will never have dock water connected to my boat.

+1

This is a recurring question, usually comes up right after someone floods their boat because they didn't read the last post about this subject.

[S/V Illusion]

To be objective in a poll such as this, people who have never experienced or witnessed a failure would also need to provide input. They generally don't.

[prosneek]

Funny. Everyone read but no one pays any attention. You read what you wanted to read. The op asked about setting up a poll and not a damn one of you that answered assisted them with it. If i knew how to do it op, i would help you.

[Terra Nova]

You don't always get what you want.

[Russ]

I have and ALWAYS shut off when I leave the boat for more than an half an hour. Others use timers and such but only way to be Sure is turn it off. I avoided it for years but dock pressure water was sooo much nicer than filling my tanks and using boat's internal WP for pressure. Got to be real careful though. Russ

[roverhi]

When we were living aboard, set the boat up with a marina water hookup for the pressure water system. It was a bit inconvenient to fill the tanks in the bilge and we burned through the tanks in a couple of weeks when tied up. Looking back on it, it was a really stupid thing to do. As others have attested, any failure of the pressure water hoses or fittings would have sunk the boat if we didn't happen to be aboard.

[Russ]

Yes I too didn't answer the question bu the already "started a poll" just by asking and frankly I don;t know how to start a poll. Bet he can count the replies on his hands and toes though, Ha! Apologies to whom ever said it right, we didn;t answer him you Guilty as charged. I too get annoyed by that stuff as well.Russ

[Steve Bean]

1."we found a couple of feet..."
2."I suffered a flooding..."
3. "My bilge pumps could not keep up..."
4." My neighbors unloading all their stuff... "
These don't sound like " rumors " to to me. "Just filled the tanks weekly" sounds good to me. No possibility of "equipment failure", forgetting to shut off anything. The more I can ELIMINATE things I need to " be real careful " about, the better I like it. "Just filled the tanks weekly."

[zeehag]

almost sank boat in lost angeles with that system--my husband at the time insisted on it, but we blew out the regulators then the boats regulator--- oops i came back to only a foot of transom of a chris craft commander 38, fg, 1968.... holy sheets, mon.. damnear down, never nbever again will i allow that on my boat. i check top make sure my boats to be do not even have the fitting installed. \
no, thankyou, no.. emphatically NO

[Terra Nova]

Dang rumors...

[Kenomac]

For two summers in Southern California I had the option to do the direct hook up. The Hunter had a direct hose attachment, it would have been so easy to do.

However, I just thought it would be insanely dumb to do it. City water pressure via a hose going in.... and only some small silly little automatic bilge pump going out... What could possibly go wrong?

[mitiempo]

I've always thought it a stupid idea to keep pressure water hooked up to a boat. It is for trailers - they cannot sink if anything fails.

[Jolly Roger]

First I want to refute Cabo Sailor’s ridiculous insinuation.
If I was looking for lawsuit material would I admit I forgot to turn the dock faucet off? Cap Erict3 said all that needs to be said.

On 21 April I started a thread “Urgent, Help!!” where I explained I had just had a massive flooding through the dock water supply.

I have now repaired the damage, and as part of my idiot-proof safety solution I installed a 12 volt solenoid water shut-off valve directly after the hose inlet. This is activated by a float switch just above the bilge float and incorporating a bell. It automatically shuts-off the dock water supply in the event of any rise in water level and rings the bell. In other words, a high water bilge alarm.

I therefore thought it would be interesting to do a larger survey, to find out how many boats use an unprotected dock water system.

A lot of responses talk about how stupid it is to have a dock water supply. But there are benefits—it just needs to be safe. If you live aboard it saves battery power and pump noise. It saves effort if you use a manual pump. It can also supply a more regular flow for say, a shower, than a small pulsating pressure pump. If you have small capacity tanks, it saves having to fill them frequently.

Actually it’s no more dangerous than shore power which everyone uses without a second thought—often with very dubious connections—and which have been the source of numerous fires.

Nobody replied how to set up a poll, (thanks Prosneek, for your astute observation), so I found out myself, and hope to have it up in a few days.

Thanks for everyone else’s observations.