Glassing Over Below Waterline ThruHulls...Pros & Cons

[longfisher]

I've had it with my through-hull fittings. Almost all of them are plastic. Almost all of them are below the waterline. And, almost all of them give me the shivers when we pound our way out through heavy seas. I can easily imagine one of the hoses putting enough continuous stress on the fitting to weaken it and then crack the stem off.

I'm also fed up with my little tiny live well. It's actually a jump seat that should have had a locker beneath it but some genius at SeaPro decided to plumb it as a live well, instead.

So, I'm thinking of just removing all the through hulls and the raw water intake strainer and glassing the holes over. That would give the boat a lot more integrity out at sea and it wouldn't deprive me of anything but the drains of the lockers. Heck, I can drain them in the drive with a bucket or with a submersible garden pump I have if they're chock full and I can just swab them out with a towel when they're just wet or just damp.

Getting rid of the live well would also let me get rid of the recirculating pump for it and getting rid of the raw water intake strainer would let me get rid of the washdown pump. I could use the then freed-up switches on the dash for the extra bilge pump I installed some time ago (now both pumps are activated with one switch) and some bright lights I installed above the cockpit (the "courtesy lights were, well, discourteously dim when you're out at sea at night tied up to a rig).

But I thought I'd post here and ask if there's any Con I'd missed before I get rid of those things. Ideas?

Oh, I hope I posted this in the correct forum. If not, feel free to move it.

Longfisher

[Capt.Troy Crane]

You could always replace them with the stainless steel thru hulls, below the water line anyway.

Good luck,
Troy