Sea chests

I for the life of me cannot understand why more boats do not utilize sea chests. This has nothing to do with gold doubloons or buried treasure but it has a lot to do with organizing the plumbing on board. Basically a sea chest is a manifold from which all sea water services are drawn. They can take many forms but I do like the one here which has been made I understand for a custom 42 foot sailboat. There are various ways of organizing a sea chest but this one here uses a fiber glass tube into which all the marked sea cocks connect. What makes this one special is that the tube reaches higher than the outside water level and has a clear removable top enabling the owner to easily clear weed and other debris from the intakes all from the comparative comfort of the engine room. If I had to take issue with this one it would be the use of a box section. Easy to make perhaps and connect up the sea cocks but I wonder about the hard corners at the bottom that could lead to stress cracking.

Comments

[Peter]

What about putting a sea cock in a waterproof locker that goes above the waterline. If something happens to the sea cock the water would only enter to the waterline in the locker. I like the sea chest idea and have a small one on my boat for the small stuff. Not sure about sharing it with the engine as it might suck water out of some of the other systems and give air a chance to enter the engine intake.

[Bill Parks]

I really like the idea of the seachest coming above the waterline so you can clean it while the boat is in the water. Why is there a garboard drain plug in the top? To let air out?
I'm not thrilled by the thru-hulls and ball valves. Unsupported thru-hulls can break. I'd rather see proper flanged sea cocks.

[Doug Bostrom]

Gussets would be nice; not sure what else is sharing that space but the whole affair looks as though it could be broken off the hull pretty easily.