Livewell design

[SlipperyOar]

I'm currently building an aluminum livewell to add into my boat, i'm going through what fittings i would all need and exploring my options.

There is the standard design (#1) with a thru-hull at the transom for fill and drain. This seems to be pretty common in the livewell plumbing systems i've seen. A seacock isolation valve installed right at the transom thru-hull, the tubed to the flow-rite valve to control whether water is emptying, filling, or recirculating. The livewell pump then leading to the top of the livewell. The drain port off the bottom leading back to the flow-rite valve to either be drained or recirculated. And then an overflow line slightly below the fill port level which will lead out the boat, routed to the starboard side just above the waterline.

The design i came up with, uses the same flow-rite valve, with the fill/drain/overflow lines all routed to the one transom thru-hull. A tee placed between the seacock isolation valve and the flow-rite valve. This system would be intended to fill the splashwell, recirculate water, and also overflow back through the tee and out the transom thru-hull. My idea behind the concept is to eliminate the need for a second thru-hull, therefore minimizing potential spots where water ingress is possible.

Has anyone ever plumbed up something similar with any feedback? I'm not particularily deciding based on the oxygen levels within my splashwell. More so just interested in the potential for proper water flow. Both livewell overflow ports are going to have threaded screens on them to allow water but act as a filter of sorts.

 

[dingbat]

Not a fan of valves on a bait well.

I have a 3/4" scoop intake in front of a seacock and pump (800 gph) on the bottom of the hull. The scoop intake eliminates priming issues and circulates water while at rest. No need to run the pump if running or anchored up.

Pump runs to 3/4” spray bar mounted at top of tank. Over flow is dumped directly overboard via a dedicated 2” thru hull

The bottom mount drain is combined with the ice chest drain and dumped overboard thru a 1” thru hull

 

[Chris1956]

Why do you have the drain connected to the fill hose? All it will do is clog it with fish guts. You could connect the drain to the overflow hose, low down in the hull. That makes sense.

 

[SlipperyOar]

Not a fan of valves on a bait well.

I have a 3/4" scoop intake in front of a seacock and pump (800 gph) on the bottom of the hull. The scoop intake eliminates priming issues and circulates water while at rest. No need to run the pump if running or anchored up.

Pump runs to 3/4” spray bar mounted at top of tank. Over flow is dumped directly overboard via a dedicated 2” thru hull

The bottom mount drain is combined with the ice chest drain and dumped overboard thru a 1” thru hull

The valve would be the flow-rite system with the cable control where I can manipulate the position of the valve for fill, drain, or recirc. Eliminates the need for additional holes in the livewell. I’m going to go with the normal method that has 1 thruhull in the transom and 1 off the side above the waterline as my overflow to simplify the system.

 

[SlipperyOar]

Why do you have the drain connected to the fill hose? All it will do is clog it with fish guts. You could connect the drain to the overflow hose, low down in the hull. That makes sense.

The drain has a screen on the bottom of my livewell, it won’t allow anything to clog the lines and if needed I can remove the screen on the drain and the pump suction to flush the system

 

[briangcc]

Pretty sure mine is setup with the intake to pump to spray bar inside the livewell. The spray bar has a valve on it to control how much water is coming from the pump. The drain and overflow are connected to a discharge port above the water line.

In my humble opinion...introducing multiple connections introduces multiple points of failure. I'd simplify that and go with the KISS method myself. Single line from intake to pump.

If I needed to, the screen comes off the intake and a standard bilge plug would seal it.