Hey Buddy,. You probably won't read this since you taped this 2years ago... But I m rebedding my depth sounder and wanted to see a video...RU-vid selected you! Your video helped me. Thanks!
Thanks for the share mate, I am at the point of deciding what I am going with and have found it hard to get my head around trudesign not being any type of metal. To Team TruDesign - I will be buying some in the near future :)
Im stoked they aren’t metal, many old school sailors don’t like them and say they would never have these glass composite stuff under the water but forget the depth sounder and speed wheel are both plastic 🫣
Doing a boat up now and know nothing about boats (learning fast!) Adter pulling down a transom and finding how badly done a previous repair was made (silicone etc) and then watching your video , it really helped the confidence!
Good job and looks like you have a lovely boat there. This is the first video I've seen and will start watching more. I plan to replace my raymarine thru hull speed housing with on my next opportunity with one that has a water retaining valve and your video gives a little more confidence on how to do that. Cheers.
Awesome thanks for watching, welcome aboard!!! :) Yes, it was very easy, for me being in the building industry since I finished high school, I was a little nervous messing around with holes that keep a 14 tonne boat afloat but once I did the first one, it was really quite simple!!! lol
I have a question in regards fitting these on metal boat. Our boat is currently out of water and has been recently painted and antifouled. Do we have to strip the antifouling paint before the installation? If so we install the Thru Hull fittings on bare metal with the recommended silicon only or do we use a primer and then silicon? If primer is necessary could you please recommend a type of primer we should use? Thanks ...
Nice job. One tip when using Sikaflex for bedding is to let it set for a short time so you don't squish it all out. Time is based on temp, humidity etc.
rickvideo1 I didn’t actually let it sit initially but only because I was just doing it up hand/finger tight first anyway, then waited the next day to tighten up completely. Would you suggest it’s better to let it sit initially still?
I didn’t, it would have definitely come in handy though. I used one of those key spammers from the grinder and it fit well. My partner Brittni was under the boat holding it while I was inside tightening it. If you had the trudesign spanner you could do it yourself.
I've seen a few sea-cocks replaced on RU-vid and have a question about the interior of the hole... would epoxying the hole to help prevent moisture intrusion be something I should do?
RJs Salty Adventures It definitely wouldn’t be bad to do, but I wouldn’t bother, the sika 291i completely sealed everything. For me it oozed out everywhere, covering everything essentially sealing it all and moulding it to be part of hull.
Great video! I am wondering: I sanded down through the gelcoat to the point you can actually see the GRP coming through. Would that be a problem, using Sikaflex 291i? Thanks for your answer!
I would put gel coat back over it and sand it smooth again before installing the thruhull. Silicone is obviously waterproof but you want to protect your fibreglass from water at all costs.
Great Video! Simple and well put together, I was wondering if you had to do any of them with a 90degrees elbow before the seacock? I’m not as fortunate in terms of height in my bilges and most of them are 90degrees then the seacock. Any of yours needed to be like that? Thanks
Thank you. I didn't in the end, I guess you just can't use the collar if using an elbow first. Everything always has its sacrifices though! To me, I would probably rather use composite seacocks though with an elbow still. The only thing you would need to worry about is having something heavy stored against it, but you shouldn't have anything stored against it anyway, metal or composite.
If you have a normal thru hull, hammer in a bung plug, saw it flush, then use a hole saw to cut the flange off. They recommend teflon tape on the threads, it should be enough, but I like the idea of using sikaflex/3M 4200 as it’s still removable, but will bond better. Creating that “o-ring” effect by waiting a day before tightening isn’t always the best method, sometimes the sealant could rip/loosen up.
I wanted them all sealed straight onto the gelcoat then I went over them with the barrier, primer and antifoul. I think either way is going to be fine, as I said in the video don't stress as long as everything is sealed you'll be safe.
Thx. On my Beneteau , there appear to be metal washers between the skin fitting nut and the hull skin. I noticed Trudesigm has a composite skim fitting washer,,, did you reuse the original skin fitting metal washer along with tru design washer?
No, I used the Nylon ones from Tru-Design. The fiberglass is so thick, the washer will be the last thing that fails but if your hull is thin in any areas, you can cut something larger to spread the load further, but would still need a washer of some sort for tightening the nut onto.
I need to replace my seacocks and through-hull fittings, I'm considering Trudesign. In the video, it looked like you went with Domed fittings instead of Recessed, why Domed over Recessed?
I used domed fittings because it was a quick simple straight swap over. Recessed would be much better, especially for racing, but I would have needed to do more prep work and parts of our hull are quite thin so to recess the other fittings in would have required more work on the inside and need a backing plate against the hull etc. If I had the tools and more time, the recessed fittings would have been awesome to use!
The load bearing part is to comply with the North American ABYC H-27 standards. The 2" skin fitting complies without the need for the collar. We didn't need it but we used it anyway.
Dont put a strainer over it on the outside. In an emergency you won't be able to plug it from the exterior, its much harder to clean the barnacles, etc.And in an emergency you can use a Seabung.
That's true, I was thinking of my chances though, I reckon there's a much higher chance of sucking up a jellyfish, plastic or weeds then a catastrophic emergency. But you are definitely right there, I hope I don't eat my words in the future!!!!
@@SailingSunday Revisiting this thread I had my raw water pump suddenly quit in the middle of the Gulf Of Mexico. My first thought was I sucked up plastic or a jellyfish and wishing I had a strainer I could have at least eliminated that theory.
There's honestly no real answer to that, many people had told me if they are pink colored, they need to be replaced. But, I had some that looked terrible, appeared to be full of galvanic corrosion and pink but they weren't actually that bad. I did however remove one that appeared to be in good condition compared to the rest, and it crumbled in my hand as I pulled it out... You can see that one in the video! As a guide though, these were 10yrs old from factory when the boat was built, and some were only 1mm thick around the rim and others were about 3mm thick. For me, everyone gave me different advice about how bad mine were that it was stressful which is why I chose these ones. I expect that I won't ever have to worry about them ever again now.
We chose these as we haven’t heard of a Tru-design fitting snapping and sinking a boat before, but regularly hear of metal thru hulls snapping due to corrosion and sinking boats...
There's many great videos on RU-vid installing these so we tried to keep this simple, quick but still informative. I actually kept one thru-hull original and have a Tru-Design thru hull fitting spare, so when we lift out again we will do another video and go into greater detail replacing it.
It's not plastic it's a glass-reinforced nylon composite and is ABYC approved and doesn't suffer from dezincification, electrolysis or corrosion. I bet your boat's made of plastic!
