I turn mine off in 3 locations then I disconnect the hose with a quick connect every time I leave no matter how long. Takes se ones but I’d rather be safe.
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I turn mine off in 3 locations then I disconnect the hose with a quick connect every time I leave no matter how long. Takes se ones but I’d rather be safe.
Had a friend that was on dock water, a fitting inside the boat broke while he was away and the boat got so low in the water someone noticed it and stopped the water before it completely sank. When a line in my house broke it made a mess but at least the house didn’t sink.
I speak from experience. It doesn't matter how maintained your plumbing system is, a fitting can let go at pretty much anytime.
I completely burned up a freshwater pump last year. At the dock, not connected to dock water. Sometime during the night a Tee fitting gave loose and dumped the entire tank into the bilge. That wasn't the problem. The problem was that the pump kept running dry and overheated. I woke up to the sound of the pump squealing. I opened the hatch to a cloud of steam. Ran to the breaker panel and shut it off, not knowing if we were on fire or what was going on.
I'm usually the last to go to sleep, and the first up on the boat. I try my best to shut the dock water off at night, as well as when we are away.
Call me paranoid, but I don't 100% trust being on dock water or on the tanks. Stuff can go wrong in both instances.
This issue of water filling the bilge, while you are away, should be treated as a definite risk! I say that because I had a fitting finally go bad and slowly flood the bilge; original part on my 1972 43' DCFB. As luck would have it, the bilge pump sensor decided to cease functioning at the same time.
Thankfully, I was there to catch this problem, or I could have sunk the boat!! However, I always shut off shore water, when I leave, but there is always that first time.
I had finished a run a few hours earlier, so when I checked the ER, I found the stbd side was filling up and water now flowing into the bunker under the engine. This condition had started, after I had hooked up to shoreside water.
I ran the bilge pump via the manual switch and pumped the bilge out. I then located the rusted, leaking nipple into the hot water tank and bypassed the tank. I re-pumped the bilge.
As luck would have it, a plumbing shop was both willing to come to the boat and also came the very next day. The bad parts were replaced and no doubt are now good for the life of the boat.
Now in the process of replacing or clearing the sensor.
We've lived aboard for 18 yrs now and hook up to dock water all the time. I DO have a water limiter from Ace, I can set it to what ever level I want. I set is at 150 gals and it is right at the wing door when we get off so I know when to reset it. We do turn the water off when we go off for more than a few hours but it works great and every time I test it it shuts off like it should