Water tank condition

[cheesegas]

It’s water tank season it seems…decided to do mine on my 30 year old Liverpool boat whose tank had never been painted after it had left the factory according to the previous owner. Cover came off easily and there’s actually more room than I thought to move around inside.
 

However, I was very surprised as to the condition given the age. The only major rust was on the sides where I’d had some waterline overplating and anodes done, and the heat had caused the coating to bubble and fail. A few spots here and there on the bottom and the underside of the hatch was pretty bad but that’s it. The top and bulkhead were absolutely perfect still!

 

It looks like it was done originally with some sort of epoxy which has definitely helped. A snooty shiny boater nearby saw me doing the tank and commented ‘I’d be surprised if they actually painted the tanks on Liverpools’ which did make me laugh at his ignorance…

 

I’m taking it back to bare steel (almost done with that!) and painting with Acothane DW, should be good until the next anode change.

 

So to anyone thinking of doing it, it may not be as bad as you think!

[mrsmelly]

I always preferred integral water tanks. No wasted space so the entire pointy end is used for water. Ive had posh built boats with stainless water tanks etc etc which never made sense to me. The old colecraft I owned years ago with integral tank is still going strong. Your Liverpool will last as long as anyone elses boat if you look after it. There is much snobbery in boat ownership much like cars. What always makes me laugh is the kudos of German car badges when people think say their BMW is the bees knees when reality is the build quality and more importantly reliability of Toyota and Honda is way way better.

[Tracy D'arth]

From my experiences fitting L/P hulls, sailaways and bare shells were delivered not blacked in the integral tank.

[Sea Dog]

When I first got this boat, I talked to Dot at Piper's about what water tank maintenance they recommended. The tank is integral taking up the fore end (where most gas lockers are) with a sealed tank top of a size few could wriggle through. She told me they'd been building their boats like that since the sixties and didn't expect them to need anything in their lifetime. Counter-intuitive perhaps, but earlier this year I inspected mine with an endoscope and this seemed to confirm her view.

[Tracy D'arth]

Just now, Sea Dog said:

When I first got this boat, I talked to Dot at Piper's about what water tank maintenance they recommended. The tank is integral taking up the fore end (where most gas lockers are) with a sealed tank top of a size few could wriggle through. She told me they'd been building their boats like that since the sixties and didn't expect them to need anything in their lifetime. Counter-intuitive perhaps, but earlier this year I inspected mine with an endoscope and this seemed to confirm her view.

I know of a David Piper boat that similarly has no problems with the bow water tank. Devil of a small hatch to get into though!

[Sea Dog]

3 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

I know of a David Piper boat that similarly has no problems with the bow water tank. Devil of a small hatch to get into though!

I don't think Simon changed much that his dad had already got right. I particularly love my side hatch gas locker.

[cheesegas]

All done. I don't recommend Acothane DW for this application though, in hindsight - the pot time of just 30 minutes is too short, you need to work very fast and I ended up sweating and dripping into the paint! It's difficult to mix up smaller batches as the paint has the consistency of something between cream cheese and mascarpone. 

[Tracy D'arth]

35 minutes ago, cheesegas said:

All done. I don't recommend Acothane DW for this application though, in hindsight - the pot time of just 30 minutes is too short, you need to work very fast and I ended up sweating and dripping into the paint! It's difficult to mix up smaller batches as the paint has the consistency of something between cream cheese and mascarpone. 

It has been a tad warm of late.   I put 2 pack in the fridge in summer before mixing.