Prestige 34S rainwater leak in engine bay.

[grahamspain]

When subjected to heavy rain and wind I get a lot of water accumulating under the engines in the compartments there.  Sometimes the water gets as high as the sumps.  There is no access to the bilge from these compartments ---- is it ok to drill a hole in the floor of each to allow water into the bilge - to be pumped out from there.  Any advice would be much appreciated.

[sitara]

Drilling a drain hole to the bilge would also potentially let fuel and oil drain to the bilge as well in the event of a fuel or oil leak and cleaning up would be an even bigger problem. Jeanneau boats should not leak rain water so better to find and stop the leak.
Just my ideas.
Rob

[grahamspain]

I think it comes in with driving rain through air vents. Difficult to block them. I thought a drill hole might do the trick but you are right. Oil leaks would go into bilge.

[Martin]

I have a similar problem . . and its driving me crazy!

The bay under both engines was flooded, but the port engine was worse.

What seemed to be happening was that water was getting into the stern port quarter  - the area under the round inspection hatch under the boarding ladder. When that got full (and it did), the water overflowed first into the area under the port engine, and as that got full, it overflowed to the area under the starboard engine.

I pumped all the water out, but the problem persisted. It was rainwater, not seawater.

I replaced the round inspection hatch, but that did not improve the problem.

I then had the lower rubbing strip removed around the port stern quarter, and resealed and replaced. It had looked as if the screws had gone through the skin, and water was penetrating there. However, this did not seem to fix the problem, although it seemed not quite as bad - or maybe this was just wishful thinking.
 
Then I resealed the area around the round inspection hatch with a sealant called Captain Tolley's Creeping Crack Cure , but again no improvement.

Where was all the water coming from? There was so much! Then I had a brain wave! The port sidedeck has a drain hole is supposed to take away all the water that comes down the port sidedeck. It is under a raised piece of teak. I unscrewed this, and sure enough the drain hole was blocked. I unblocked it by forcing water under pressure down it from the end of a hosepipe.. I then screwed back the teak piece, but used washers to raise it slightly higher so that the water could easily get to the drainage hole.

Problem solved!

Or so I thought . . 

I have just been to the boat and there was STILL water in the stern port quarter. Aaaaargh !!


The boat, btw, is a 2006 Jeanneau Prestige 34 Hardtop with 2 x Volvo Penta 260 engines and a frustrated owner.


Any suggestions anyone? Please.

[Martin]

An update on the above. 

I have now had the upper rubbing strip removed, and am going to get it re-sealed and put back. Lets see if that resolves it.

I am going to start a new thread on painting the sump