www.iFourWinns.com

Welcome, always glad to see a new SD owner join up. Where do ya boat at? As to your prob:

As other have said, hatch, windshield, and anchor locker are the usual culprits for leakage. Also, an ill-fitted or worn cover can let water channel down the gunwales into the engine/bilge compartment.


There should be 3 compartments in your SD. The cuddy, the fuel tank area, and the engine/bilge compartment. Each of these is separated by a bulkhead that has a 1 inch diameter hole. The cuddy is the highest and the engine bilge is the lowest, this allows water to flow aft to the bilge pump or out the drain plug (if on a trailer or lift). However, water will flow fore if there is enough in the bilge or your boat is in a bow down angle.

ric had the best advice for checking the hatch and windshield, have someone spray a hose while your inside checking. The anchor locker leak is a little tougher to see because they will leak behind the forward bulkhead and flow into the compartment under the seats in the cuddy. The best way to test that, is to make sure those under seat compartments are dry, then fill up the anchor locker with water. If it leaks into the under seat compartments, the easy fix is to dry out the anchor locker, then use any good sealant in the bottom. A lot of folks will use spray foam to bring the bottom of the anchor locker up to the level of the drainage hole.

Again, welcome! Lets see some pics of your boat!

_________________

1996 205 Sundowner DLX
5.0FL Volvo SX Cobra
Tow Veh: 2012 Nissan Frontier Pro-4X

I found this out by getting VERY wet when on my first weekend away in the boat, I was asleep & was awoken in the early hours by getting very wet in massive rainstorm.

1) The hatch will leak like a sieve, take it off & seal it up good & proper, also adjust the tension on the catches so it pulls down tight.

2) The rain also comes in via the screen, it then drains across the dash via the doorway & any holes you might have ( mine had a fish finder that was not sealed) I've yet to have a good look at mine but there appears to be no rubber gasket in the hinge area of the center screen so I will look for a fix there.

3) My roof leaked too, but it was one hell of a storm, mostly seams which I will fix with some special sealant before next season.

The main issue is the water making its way into the cuddy from the screen, I bodged a line of sealant to make sure most of it made its way down to the cuddy floor as opposed down into the upper cuddy area. Towels also worked wonders to save the day

Should be an easy fix

Thanks everyone for your reply's, ive got a bit of work to do this week end!!

The cuddy roof hatch was very badly fitted on my "new" 2004 Sundowner; not central in the deck aperture, copious quantity of post applied sealant to try to fix the leak ( not sure if it was factory or the dealer). To be honest it didn't leak a lot, just enough to cause mildew on the route the water took on the headlining.

Their anchor locker drain positions never cease to amaze me, above the lowest points ! Likewise the under deck limber holes there to allow drainage, water will always stagnate in the sections as the holes are above the lowest points ! At one time FW knew how to keep the insides of their boats dry;

The bilge of my 1999 Sundowner was always bone dry
The bilge of my 2004 Sundowner was always wet with rainwater.
The bilge of my 2009 Vista is always awash (with rainwater)

I am not familiar with the SD and how they sit in the water but I am very surprised that you could accumulate that much water in the cuddy without it running back to the aft bilge to be pumped out. Even if the boat was sitting dead flat the water should have made its way to the the back of the boat.

Was there any water in your bilge?

Have you tested your automatic bilge switch?

You mention you are primarily in salt water so I assume you can confirm it is fresh/rain water entering the boat.

And pardon my manners, welcome to IF... This place is a great resource for us new four winns owners!

_________________
2004 - 288 Vista
Twin - 5.0 Volvo Penta GXi DP

It is weird that some of the designs on these FW boats are great and other very minor but important things are terrible. small bilge pump on my 26 food boat with now forward bilge pump. Crazy.. they put a high level alarm in, why couldn't they just add a pump to that switch... But it does have beautiful cherry wood bathroom door.

_________________
--2002 3880 Regal Flybridge | Twin Merc 8.1HO **Seven**
--2003 AB 13 VST Console Inflatable | Tohatsu 40hp TLDI **Phish'n ski**
--310 Mercury Inflatable | 1982 9.9 Johnson

Four Winns does not go above the minimum legal requirements for what's required on their boat's electrical systems. Are they wrong for doing that? No, but it would be nice if they paid more attention to detail and stepped above the minimums for long term ownership and reliability. Even Stingray installs 1100gph bilge pumps in their 18ft bowriders.

_________________
1981 Columbia 8.7
2015 Yamaha FZR - 87mph - sold
2006 Yamaha GP1300R - sold
2003 Chaparral 215 SSI - sold
2009 Stingray 195CS - sold
2000 Four Winns H180 - sold
1976 O'day Daysailer II - sold
Rick's Four Winns H180 Mods/Upgrade Thread

i have an auto 1500 in my 20' and i feel that that is the minimum for a boat this size.. It boggles my to see a new boat with a 350-500 $35 pump and no float.. i want to yell at every manufacture at every show i go to..

in the pump department your bilge pump can never be too large NEVER. and redundant system are a must on anything over 25'. and triple fail safe setup is 40+in my book. the last thing i want to do is bail or swim home..

_________________
Not Penny's Boat

1993 190 Horizon 5.0L EFI
http://www.smwebhead.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=11136
1977 14' CMF Skiff SOLD
2015 Emotion Stealth Angler 11

I have a 21k agreed value insurance policy. I wouldn't be sad if my boat sank.

_________________
1981 Columbia 8.7
2015 Yamaha FZR - 87mph - sold
2006 Yamaha GP1300R - sold
2003 Chaparral 215 SSI - sold
2009 Stingray 195CS - sold
2000 Four Winns H180 - sold
1976 O'day Daysailer II - sold
Rick's Four Winns H180 Mods/Upgrade Thread

Head out 3 miles from shore and say that again.

_________________
2004 - 288 Vista
Twin - 5.0 Volvo Penta GXi DP

I boat on a river (St. John's River). I'd just swim 100ft to shore and call a taxi.

_________________
1981 Columbia 8.7
2015 Yamaha FZR - 87mph - sold
2006 Yamaha GP1300R - sold
2003 Chaparral 215 SSI - sold
2009 Stingray 195CS - sold
2000 Four Winns H180 - sold
1976 O'day Daysailer II - sold
Rick's Four Winns H180 Mods/Upgrade Thread

Hi Mattlow,

Firstly the water leak...
I had the same problem with my 2005 Sundowner and was driving me crazy.

I think you'll find that the water comes in from the rear wet locker/engine hatch (either via the port side drain hole in the locker itself or simply from the "unsealed" edges of the engine hatch itself). On the port side these conviently drain onto the port side shelf (where the water tank and battery sits) and collects there.

This shelf is the same height as the bench seats in the cabin. So from the rear shelf the water travels under the cockpit floor onto the bench seat and fills up the storage compartments.

I fixed it by extending the drain hose from the port side of the wet locker down into the bilge proper (so it doesn't drain onto the shelf), and put a small piece of gutter extension onto the engine cover gutter on the port side so it also no longer drains onto the shelf. Finally I also fixed and silicones a small plastic strip just forward of the battery so that if there is any water on the rear shelf it can't travel forward under the cockpit floor. My problem has been completely fixed.

You can see some pix I posted here: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2313

On the listing to Port issue...
While it's true that there is slightly more weight on the port side of the boat (water tank, cooler box and a battery are stored on the port side). This only accounts for about 150lbs and can be offset by sitting people on the starboard side. However the main reason is the clockwise rotation of the propeller (if you don't have a duo-prop). The only way to counteract this is to install trim tabs on the stern (something I'd like to do to mine).

Hope that helps.

_________________
2005 Sundowner 205

5.0L MPI Mercruiser, Bravo1, 3 blade Mirage SS prop

These comments about bilge pumps got me thinking ( actually remembering) about using what is already available. I had as a co-owner an old inboard engine boat some 30 years ago ( yes, I know, prehistoric !). The raw water pump inlet had the facility to allow it to be used as a bilge pump, sucking water out of the bilge instead of through the hull inlet. ......no reason why it wouldn't work with a outdrive set up.

The same design issues on the 245 of the 2003 or so era. No sealing of the engine cover; that could have been sorted out easily with a cheap redesign of the topside moulding. On early ones the lockers used to fill up with water and overflow into the bilge ( the lids had no seals). On later one they put in drains so the lockers drained into the bilge. A shocking attitude to solving a problem really !

LOL!

_________________
2004 - 288 Vista
Twin - 5.0 Volvo Penta GXi DP