How often should Bilge Pump Run?

[Joseph Porreca]

Thanks for everyone's input. I took the Ski locker plug and Engine compartment plug out and swapped them with the drain plugs and poof dry as a bone last night sat out for over an hour and bilge pump never ran. Thanks for everyone's suggestions. Guess the simplest explanation was the correct one. I was losing sleep thinking it was a Giant Hole in the somewhere underneath. Any directions and pictures anywhere from someone who has actually had to change their bilge pump win another factory one? Thanks again to everyone. Think we solved the problem.

 

[Evil Sports]

Im confused, how did the water get in to your boat in the first place

 

[tdonoughue]

Leaking transome plugs, Bob.

@Joseph Porreca , changing the bilge pump can be easy, but there can be some gotchas. If you are just changing the stock for the same size and type, it is a simple swap. But! If you get a bigger one, you need to check to see what size hose and thru-hull size is required. That can mean replumbing, replacing hose and thru-hull, along with drilling a bigger hole in your boat. Then, there are automatic sensing pumps (like stock), and other ones that require you to hook up a float switch (sold separately).

For all of that, I left the original and just added a second bilge pump. The second one is a little bigger, but still uses the same size hose. Drilled the hole and plumbed it with the same stock parts from the original. The second one is hooked to a float switch and then wired directly to the fuse panel (added previously), so it is on when the boat is on. And I have one of each type for redundancy there.

So, why do you want to change the pump?