Livewell Help

[Matt Dingman]

I have recently put the livewell back in and got everything plumbed back up and wired. My wife and I catch and release (not fish-eaters) so we have never used the livewell. To be honest I couldn't tell you if I ever tried the switch before rehooking everything back up. I have 3 hoses running to or from the livewell. One comes from the back of the boat and is the filler. One is the overflow as it runs higher up the beltline of the boat and exits driver right. the other hose exits below water line right under the overflow outlet (drain?.) The fill line from the stern runs to the livewell into a brace of jets similar to what you would see on a pull-behind garden sprayer. HOWEVER, in line with these jets is a 'T' connector that drops down into the tank with a bilge pump hooked up to it. RUNNING INTO THE SAME LINE as the fill. It can't pump water out of the livewell into the jet bar and back down the line to the stern intake/pump in the back can it? I am pretty darned sure it's not an aerator as it says "bilge pump" right on it @450gph. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Matt
nmtatersk@netzero.com

 

[sasto]

Re: Livewell Help

Seems to me like you have 2 options. 1 is to pump airated raw water into the livewell constantly. 2 is to airate and recirculate the water you have in the livewell. The bilge pump option 2 would be used if you were to buy live bait before launching boat. As far as your raw water pump backflow, depends. Check this set-up at home by filling livewell and using option 2. Thanks for releasing your fish.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Livewell Help

The bilge pump inside the livewell serves as a "recirculation" pump so it is not a true "aeration pump". However, for that to work, the line going to the spray bar would need to have a check valve or manual valve (Fill-Recirculate) to prevent the backflow you mention. There would also be a need for separate switches: One for the "recirculate" pump and another for the "fill" pump. Go to Flow-Rite.com to view typical live well setups.

 

[sasto]

Re: Livewell Help

The bilge pump inside the livewell serves as a "recirculation" pump so it is not a true "aeration pump". However, for that to work, the line going to the spray bar would need to have a check valve or manual valve (Fill-Recirculate) to prevent the backflow you mention. There would also be a need for separate switches: One for the "recirculate" pump and another for the "fill" pump. Go to Flow-Rite.com to view typical live well setups.

I would think 2 valves are needed. One between the raw water pump and the aerator (spray bar) and one between the bilge pump and aerator. ?????

 

[Matt Dingman]

Re: Livewell Help

Yes it sounds like bot of you are right. It does have it's own seperate switch and there are shut off valves on the spray bar. Not sure about the check valve, but no matter. Just need to get a new pump for it the way it sounds. Thanks so much for your help! Once that's finished so is my boat project. New wood/carpet/wiring. Learned a lot by doing it myself. And surprisingly, everyting works just as I'd hoped!
Thanks Again!
Matt

 

[sasto]

Re: Livewell Help

Good luck on your project, Matt, I hope you have as much fun navigating her as you did bringing her back to life.

 

[Matt Dingman]

Re: Livewell Help

Okay, I got the new bilge put in for re-circulation. I was going to use the original wires that were hanging out to fish the new ones through but they came undone. I was livid. Took me about 45 minutes trying to grab hold of them with a spring plunger claw thingy. Anyway, I was going to re-do the neutral wires on the entire boat to one of those 6-bank grid terminals. I ran each devices neutral to one screw on the terminal plus the negative battery connection. Here's the kicker, only the device hooked up to the screw directly accross from the neg. works. I can understand why as each bank must be isolated from each other. Any ideas on what I can do here? My plan was to use this as a ground bus. Originally the negative ran to an inch by inch piece of acryllic (not my doing) with 3 spades coming off and all 6 devices connected to it with 2prong connectors. I wanted to give each thing its own spot to tidy it up and make it safer. What other options do I have? I will try to attach a picture of the bus bar that I am using that I have found on this sight. It's an 8 bank, mine is a 6. The positives are all ran to a fuse block. Again, this is NOT my setup, just trying to figure out why my setup won't work the same as the picure. Any help is appreciated greatly. The boat is DONE. Just doing some tidying.