Huge puddle of oil beneath engine and some water within it probably around 40 litres worth of liquid roughly

[tyrone1990]

Thanks for the help with my recent thread guys, much appreciated. Now encountered an issue!

I got up this morning and there was a puddle of oil beneath the engine with water within it too. There must be 40 litres or so there and I have no idea how this has come about as there was nothing there the other day when we drove the boat back from where we had bought it. We had driven around 20 miles or so!

 

Any help would be appreciated thanks guys 

 

Tyrone and Agathe

[Higgs]

2 minutes ago, tyrone1990 said:

Thanks for the help with my recent thread guys, much appreciated. Now encountered an issue!

I got up this morning and there was a puddle of oil beneath the engine with water within it too. There must be 40 litres or so there and I have no idea how this has come about as there was nothing there the other day when we drove the boat back from where we had bought it. We had driven around 20 miles or so!

 

Any help would be appreciated thanks guys 

 

Tyrone and Agathe

 

That amount of fluid is more than the engine holds in oil and water, I think. Do you have a cruiser deck?

 

[Chris Lowe]

With the weather at the moment is that just rainwater in the bilge?

[Richard T]

What type of stern has your boat? If its a cruiser or semi-trad could simply be rainwater getting in. Otherwise  it could be coolant with a thin layer of oil. So firtsly check your oil level with the dipstick, secondly check the coolant levels.

[alan_fincher]

Can you please also confirm that the engine is installed above an area that is bounded on all sides so any fluid lost from the engine is contained, and cant flow into other areas, such as the area under the stern gland.

 

Mind you, if you are right about the 40 litres that amount is nearly 9 UK gallons - a huge amount, and I'm not sure it wouldn't start to overflow out of the dedicated catchment area under the engine.

 

If it is getting there when you are running the engine in gear I would have thought it might be coming in so fast you could see where it was originating from.

[blackrose]

1 hour ago, tyrone1990 said:

I got up this morning and there was a puddle of oil beneath the engine with water within it too. 

 

That's real dedication to your boat. Most people get up and make a coffee to help wake up and ease themselves into the day. You get up and check the bilges. 👍

[magnetman]

Various possibilities

 

 

Rain.

Stern tube nackered and leaking a lot.

Calorifier pressure relief valve is routed to engine bay.

Weedhatch loose and water got in during previous move.

Boat is sinking.

 

I think the oil will be a small amount on top of the water which has come from somewhere other than the engine.

 

 

 

 

Presumably this is the 52ft David Pipe boat mentioned in the insulation thread. Does this boat have a cruiser stern deck? They are notorious for letting rain water in especially if the deck drain channels are blocked by things like fallen leaves and other general detritus.

 

If it is a trad stern then less likely although some trad sterns have lift up hatches which can let a surprisingly large amount of water in after heavy rain.

 

 

 

[blackrose]

It's happened to me before, but not 40 litres and not oily water because my bilges are clean.

 

I've lifted the deck boards to find water down there and assumed it was coming in from the stern gland when in fact it was just rainwater that the gutters had spilled because the downpipes were blocked with crap.

Edited September 20, 2023 by blackrose

[Mike Hurley]

How do you know its 40 litres, did you measure it?

Maybe it was 5, a teaspoon of blood looks like a pint on the floor.

[CIEL]

2 hours ago, blackrose said:

It's happened to me before, but not 40 litres and not oily water because my bilges are clean.

 

I've lifted the deck boards to find water down there and assumed it was coming in from the stern gland when in fact it was just rainwater that the gutters had spilled because the downpipes were blocked with crap.

Yes same here, my semi trad stern has a cover which prevents rain getting in there but between the rudder post and the back doors there is a hinged hatch directly above and just a little larger than the weed hatch.  This hatch sits in a steel channel which has a relatively small dia pipe welded in and runs down and out through the side walls.  

In torrential rain, or if I have not cleared the muck out of the channel, the little drain pipe is overwhelmed, the channel overflows directly down on to the stern gland in the bilge.

 

If you have got that much water/oil down there why has the bilge pump not done it's thing?

 

Chris

 

[LadyG]

If I can interject. ( not expert)

Do your engine checks before you set off, this includes looking at oil, coolant and hoses etc etc 

Then look in the engine hole when running if you need to, is there water ingress?

Do post running checks.

 

[magnetman]

15 minutes ago, CIEL said:

Yes same here, my semi trad stern has a cover which prevents rain getting in there but between the rudder post and the back doors there is a hinged hatch directly above and just a little larger than the weed hatch.  This hatch sits in a steel channel which has a relatively small dia pipe welded in and runs down and out through the side walls.  

In torrential rain, or if I have not cleared the muck out of the channel, the little drain pipe is overwhelmed, the channel overflows directly down on to the stern gland in the bilge.

 

If you have got that much water/oil down there why has the bilge pump not done it's thing?

 

Chris

 

Yes I've seen that which is why I dislike the deck hatches. Its amazing how much water can get in. 

 

If the OP boat is a cruiser stern with two sets of boards and a central drain channel between the boards rain water could easily end up in the engine drip tray which is not connected to the rear bilge where the pump is/should be. 

 

If it was coolant from the engine one might expect to have a smell of antifreeze. 

 

 

 

[alan_fincher]

16 minutes ago, CIEL said:

If you have got that much water/oil down there why has the bilge pump not done it's thing.

 

Because oil and water from the engine ought to be going into a contained area separate from the rest of the bilge.

 

The bilge pump should not be able to pump anything from that area, or you would be disgorging oil and grease into the cut.
 

Unless of course it overtops the containment area into the general bilge, (which is a bad thing to allow to happen).

[tyrone1990]

4 hours ago, alan_fincher said:

Can you please also confirm that the engine is installed above an area that is bounded on all sides so any fluid lost from the engine is contained, and cant flow into other areas, such as the area under the stern gland.

 

Mind you, if you are right about the 40 litres that amount is nearly 9 UK gallons - a huge amount, and I'm not sure it wouldn't start to overflow out of the dedicated catchment area under the engine.

 

If it is getting there when you are running the engine in gear I would have thought it might be coming in so fast you could see where it was originating from.

Yes there is a compartment, so it hasn't spread across the boat which is a real relief!

Stupidly I didn't realize until we had stopped after our 20 mile journey so I guess we will have to run the engine and see where it's coming from

 

 

 

[ditchcrawler]

5 minutes ago, tyrone1990 said:

Yes there is a compartment, so it hasn't spread across the boat which is a real relief!

Stupidly I didn't realize until we had stopped after our 20 mile journey so I guess we will have to run the engine and see where it's coming from

 

 

 

Is your engine raw water cooled, if not have you checked the coolant level to see if you still have any in the system?

[magnetman]

Also if it is raw water cooled (water comes out the side of the boat when engine is running ie a wet exhaust) a split exhaust hose could result in a lot of canal water in there.

Definitely need to establish if it is wet or dry exhaust system. 

 

 

 

Wet exhaust hose will be a ribbed black rubber hose something like 40mm diameter whereas a dry exhaust will be a flexible metal pipe probably lagged with insulation and a car type exhaust silencer. 

Edited September 20, 2023 by magnetman

[Arthur Marshall]

I reckon my cruiser deck bilge usually has well over 100 litres of water in it, if it's been raining. That would be two or three inches deep over a space about 7 foot long and the width of the boat, with some blocked up by the drip tray. It's not enough to kick the auto pump into action.

The drip tray's obviously smaller, but I've regularly taken 30 litres of rain water and oily muck out of it, and possibly more after heavy rain. It looks terrible as if it's solid oil, but when you pump it out its mostly water. I use one of those 9 litre suction pump things, always surprises me how much there is.

 

[Momac]

I guess the deck on a narrowboat has too little freeboard to fit suitable drainage around the engine hatch.

In the case where the design unavoidably allows rainwater in why are bilge pumps, and a filter to trap oil to prevent pollution,  not fitted as standard?

 

 

[magnetman]

My first narrow boat had a terrible leaking stern deck. My solution was to arrange a tarpaulin under deck boards and held in place by the boards, in such a way as to divert the water into the rear bilge where there was an auto pump.

 Worked reasonably well. 

 

One of my current boats is a 9ft wide replica inspection launch with a cruiser style starn deck and although the drains are very well done I have still rigged up a good quality ripstop cotton duck type tarpaulin coming up from the starn mooring bollards to the cabin handrails using trampoline springs to keep it taught. Does help a lot although a little bit of rain still gets in.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 21, 2023 by magnetman

[blackrose]

11 hours ago, tyrone1990 said:

Yes there is a compartment, so it hasn't spread across the boat which is a real relief!

Stupidly I didn't realize until we had stopped after our 20 mile journey so I guess we will have to run the engine and see where it's coming from

 

 

 

 

Check your engine fluid levels before running the engine

[tyrone1990]

I got up this morning and there was water in the boat again so that was after it was raining fairly heavily last night 

There is a stack/chimney by the motor and I guess that is an exhaust pipe but I'm wondering where that goes and whether that it the cause of the water entering the boat? 

[magnetman]

It will be the rain. 

 

There is a possibility there is a fake stove chimney as these are fitted from time to time for effect.  A fake (or real) back cabin stove chimney would usually be about 4 inch diameter with several brass bands around it for polishing..

[ditchcrawler]

49 minutes ago, tyrone1990 said:

I got up this morning and there was water in the boat again so that was after it was raining fairly heavily last night 

There is a stack/chimney by the motor and I guess that is an exhaust pipe but I'm wondering where that goes and whether that it the cause of the water entering the boat? 

I think we need so photos to have an idea what you are talking about

[Higgs]

13 minutes ago, magnetman said:

It will be the rain. 

 

There is a possibility there is a fake stove chimney as these are fitted from time to time for effect.  A fake (or real) back cabin stove chimney would usually be about 4 inch diameter with several brass bands around it for polishing..

 

In May's YouTube vlogs, she has her engine exhaust in that position. I thought it was a fake stove flue, at first.

 

 

Edited September 21, 2023 by Higgs

[magnetman]

I've never seen a youtube vlog. 

 

If its exhaust thats alright. 

 

Deck drains need cleaning out.