: Group

: Hello again. Sorry to have been silent for so long. Now I'm starting to get
: motivated to finish the boats and I can't shutup. Well anyway, a while
: back there was someone who posted some pictures of a movable
: bulkhead-footrest - of the type from Nick's book - which had a internal
: bilge pump mounted right in the middle of it. I'm getting ready to order
: the pumps and I have a few questions for anyone who has done this.

: 1.) Is it easy to pull your foot off of the footrest and depress the pump's
: plunger?

: 2.) Do you have any on going trouble with the plumbing of the pump?

: 3.) Someone asked about entrapment around the cuttout area. Has this been a
: problem?

: 4.) Would you have done anything different?

Hi Mike,

I think the brace mounted pump you saw a photo of is in my partner’s (Joan) CLC 16LT. We are mostly happy with the installation, but some improvements can be made.

Joan has no complaints about moving her foot over to the plunger, but I find the center ridge of the footrest gets in the way a little. No problems with the plumbing – we kept it simple. Joan recently commented on the space above the footrest – I think Shawn’s caution and the Sea Kayaker issue got her thinking.

I have a project on the workbench right now that will incorporate some changes. The pump body is made of stacked plywood rings and is an integral part of the footrest. There will be a flat center section of the rest that will be a little wider than the plunger. The intake and outflow will be increased to 1 inch diameter. The entrapment issue will be taken care of by increasing the area of the footrests. The diaphragm and flapper valves are about $15 as a rebuild kit, and the return spring is about $8. The rest is made in the shop.

I am also considering a version that uses a larger diameter diaphragm, to boost the flow per foot action ratio. Then there is the double-action version that uses two diaphragms mounted back-to-back with, one return spring…

Keep us posted if you do something similar. Maybe you could CNC machine a couple of integrated pump body/footrace molds and make a cool carbon version.

Sam