New Plumbing Lines installed

It appears back in 1978 when the boat was built, some of the water lines that were run were 1/4 copper tubing. At some point in the past one of the previous owners replaced that copper plumbing with reinforced hose. The down side is that there had been many places where it was run in small runs and then joined together or sections replaced and joined to the old.

 The results were a spaghetti twined mess in most cases with plastic Tee's and hose clamps. In the engine room there were 3 or 4 Tee's as things were added over the years and it just appeared to be a bit unmanageable. While cleaning in the engine room we decided to scrub the hoses and as we did noticed they were "gummy" When doing some research what I found out is that the "gummy" feeling was the material starting to break down.

Under Galley

This was the birth of a new project. Run new water lines for all fresh/pressure water throughout the boat, clean up and organize the plumbing runs and add water filtration to not only filter what is stored in the tanks but also the standard city water input when at a Marina. We started by running new hot and cold water lines from the engine room to the galley. We welcomed this change because someone in the past ran the 2 Flexible hoses for water along the floor in the galley (Rather than under a floor or through a compartment).

 From the Galley, we ran the new lines forward under the sole to the forward port hanging locker. From there we chose a new route over the previous one by going from section to section up to the V-Berth, across the v-berth and back down the starboard side into the forward head under the sink. We also ran hot and cold lines from the engine room to the rear head as well. In the rear head we added tee's and cutoffs so we could feed hot and cold water to the sink as well as the shower. We also added a fresh cold water line extension to provide water to the rear head rather than pumping in from a through hull.

We chose to instal Pex lines rather than the flexible hosing that was in the boat before.  After doing some research and finding out that many new boats are being made with Pex, we decided to give it a try.  In every place where the lines go through a bulked we installed a PVC protective sleeve to protect the Pex from any wearing with movement.   We also supported all Pex with clips (as seen in the picture above as well).  Pex lines are now run to the Galley and both heads. We still have to bring it all together in the engine room and connect it to the hot water heater and filters.    Like most projects, we created a map of what we intended to install so that we can keep it for reference and with the boat documentation.  Below is the diagram of the fresh water plumbing.