2006 23 LSV front ballast - pump access question (no access panel)

[ibelonginprison]

Boat: 2006 'Setter 23 LSV

Issue: front ballast drain pump is glitchy, likely needs to be replaced.

Challenge: The center section between the walkway and the front seating area where the tank sits is a solid piece of fiberglass, NOT removable.

After researching and searching and searching I can't for the life of me find something specific to how my boat seems to be set up. Found the "uber front ballast thread" for an 07 VLX, but it's different than mine. That thread has a center section you can unbolt and take out. Mine is a solid piece of fiberglass. I'll post a pic in a minute.

So, does anyone with an '06 have tips on getting the tank out in order to get access to the pump? Last night I went in to tinker how to do it while I'm waiting on my new pump to get here and what looked like a 15 minute job turned into a massive profanity-fest.

I can get the front hose off the fill inlet. Fine. It's a b**** but it came off finally.

I got the level sending unit out. Fine (although, does anyone have a part # for a replacement for that? I searched Bake's but didn't find anything, I guess I can call them if no one has it handy.)

So my real challenge is I tried to slide the tank out, but the pump and some hose seemed to be caught. I wasn't sure if it just needs to be just wiggled and maneuvered to get it out slowly, or if there just wasn't any extra play in the plumbing for that and I have to find a way to... hell I dunno, find a way to disconnect, then REconnect it all in that ridiculously tight space. Any of you that have my similar setup and have replaced the front pump, how did you do it? I don't mind figuring it out, but if anyone has some tips or tricks that would hopefully prevent me from breaking something I'd be most appreciative.

Last question - since other boats have that center section removable... has anyone cut a large access panel right there, and maybe used some aluminum or something as a "plate" to put back on top? I wasn't sure if the structural integrity of that area changed from 06 to 07.

Thanks in advance!

Edit: added photos

Edited October 10, 2014 by ibelonginprison

[oldjeep]

Seems like you should undo the hose clamp that is holding the pump on, remove the tank and then you can remove the pump

[ibelonginprison]

Seems like you should undo the hose clamp that is holding the pump on, remove the tank and then you can remove the pump

That hose clamp goes to the vent tube. I'll take it off, but wasn't sure what the pump was hung up on. I can't actually see what is on the other end of the pump, so I don't know if I'm just fighting a tight position or fighting zero slack in the drain tube. :/ If it just needs wiggling, great - I just wanted a little advice from someone that's done one like this before. knowwutI'msayin... I'd hate to brute force it and find out that I broke a line off somehwere. :/

Edited October 10, 2014 by ibelonginprison

[Ndawg12]

So the tank is not hitting at the front or binding on the sides? Looks like you've got enough wire so that shouldn't be the problem. Maybe disconnect the hose from the thru-hull and feed back some slack.

[ibelonginprison]

So the tank is not hitting at the front or binding on the sides? Looks like you've got enough wire so that shouldn't be the problem. Maybe disconnect the hose from the thru-hull and feed back some slack.

Free and clear up front and on the sides. I can angle it up at least a foot and can angle each side up without a challenge. So definitely no hangups up front.

I don't know where to push slack *from* since that's the drain pump - I think it runs up under all of that fiberglass shell directly to the side vent. When I tear back into it, I'll disconnect that vent tube I guess and see if it comes through a little more easily. And maybe I can get to that tube from behind the floor panel under the driver dash.

I've only owned the boat less than a month so I'm still learning every nook and cranny of it trying to get an idea of what routes where and how much slack/play I have with how each part is routed.

Thanks for the advice guys.

[ibelonginprison]

I can go back and tinker with it again next week, it's not that big of a deal I don't guess. I don't have the pump in yet anyway. I was just hoping with all the '06 owners on here someone had run into my issue before and found out a trick or at least could tell me what it looked like under there where I can't see. lol

Once I figure it out I'll do a nice little writeup with photos for anyone else searching this issue.

[dealjb]

On ‎10‎/‎10‎/‎2014 at 0:45 PM, ibelonginprison said:

I can go back and tinker with it again next week, it's not that big of a deal I don't guess. I don't have the pump in yet anyway. I was just hoping with all the '06 owners on here someone had run into my issue before and found out a trick or at least could tell me what it looked like under there where I can't see. lol

Once I figure it out I'll do a nice little writeup with photos for anyone else searching this issue.

@ibelonginprison Did you document your success here?  Friend requesting my help this weekend to change this pump out.

 

Thanks!!!!!!!!

[ibelonginprison]

Sorry - just now seeing this. Didn't have a chance to document anything, not that you could see it... but yes - I could get to mine from under the helm at the veeeeeeerry back. Takes some wiggling and I've heard that each boat is a little different... but, that's how I got to mine!

[skylerchamblee]

That new job has made more lake time @ibelonginprison hasn't it. I've seen them Monday pics in the water

[Logan]

Can you re share photos for this? I'm having the same problem now. I can't find a way to access the front tank drain pump. 

[TNWake]

I have a 2004 23 LSV and the front ballast appears to have a similar arrangement to the 2006 shown in this thread. This past weekend I had a ridiculous amount of water come into my boat (around 1/2" standing water in one of my side storage compartments. Did some troubleshooting to discover that the 90 degree plastic fitting on the inlet side to the front ballast tank had cracked and was leaking. After about an hour of looking into the situation and trying to remove the tank we decided to look up under the helm and saw that there was access to the drain and inlet hoses. 

I am debating whether to remove the hose line and attempt to remove/replace the fitting in place or remove the hoses attempt to remove the tank then replace once the tank is removed.

It looks like a couple of you guys on here have had some experience around this area of the boat. What is the best route for me to go?

[NMMalibuFamily]

On June 18, 2018 at 6:43 AM, TNWake said:

I have a 2004 23 LSV and the front ballast appears to have a similar arrangement to the 2006 shown in this thread. This past weekend I had a ridiculous amount of water come into my boat (around 1/2" standing water in one of my side storage compartments. Did some troubleshooting to discover that the 90 degree plastic fitting on the inlet side to the front ballast tank had cracked and was leaking. After about an hour of looking into the situation and trying to remove the tank we decided to look up under the helm and saw that there was access to the drain and inlet hoses. 

I am debating whether to remove the hose line and attempt to remove/replace the fitting in place or remove the hoses attempt to remove the tank then replace once the tank is removed.

It looks like a couple of you guys on here have had some experience around this area of the boat. What is the best route for me to go?

What did you decide to do?  I have 09 23 LSV and it seems to be a similar configuration. Not sure how to access the pump and I can tell there is a leak from somewhere given the standing water in the hull and the consistent need to refill front ballast to register full on the dash. 

[wdr]

7 hours ago, NMMalibuFamily said:

What did you decide to do?  I have 09 23 LSV and it seems to be a similar configuration. Not sure how to access the pump and I can tell there is a leak from somewhere given the standing water in the hull and the consistent need to refill front ballast to register full on the dash. 

The panel behind the front tank on yours should have 2 SS screws, one on top and on both sides of the pull up panel. I used a scribe to poke around and find mine. The drain pump and fill inlet is behind that panel. The vent barb and vent line are at the front of the tank. Word of caution, the vent barb is extremely thin plastic and the pump elbows are really sketchy as well.  For a bad pump cartridge, if possible I would reuse the old pump body and just insert and splice in the wires for the new pump head instead of risk breaking off the elbow or the otherwise messing up the threads on the tank ports.

[NMMalibuFamily]

15 hours ago, wdr said:

The panel behind the front tank on yours should have 2 SS screws, one on top and on both sides of the pull up panel. I used a scribe to poke around and find mine. The drain pump and fill inlet is behind that panel. The vent barb and vent line are at the front of the tank. Word of caution, the vent barb is extremely thin plastic and the pump elbows are really sketchy as well.  For a bad pump cartridge, if possible I would reuse the old pump body and just insert and splice in the wires for the new pump head instead of risk breaking off the elbow or the otherwise messing up the threads on the tank ports.

It seems like the fiberglass panel is stationary and cannot be removed. I'm not seeing any screws to remove it. Are the screws visible on the stern side or bow side?  When you say you used a scribe, I am reading this as finding a screw head on the stern side - is this correct?

[wdr]

If it is an ‘09 the carpeted section between the window walk through should be removable unless there was some strange construction changes in that MY. If it is solid fiberglass then unfortunately it ain’t happening for you. My friends ‘09 LSV is just like my ‘10. The screws are on top of both sides of the panel about 1” in from the carpeted edges of the panel. I used the scribe from my machinist square to poke around vertically to find the screws the first time I removed them.

[TNWake]

On 7/3/2018 at 10:36 PM, NMMalibuFamily said:

It seems like the fiberglass panel is stationary and cannot be removed. I'm not seeing any screws to remove it. Are the screws visible on the stern side or bow side?  When you say you used a scribe, I am reading this as finding a screw head on the stern side - is this correct?

If it is fully fiberglass and not removable the best way to access both the drain pump and inlet fitting is through the helm. Up under the helm there will be an opening to the left and you will see your inlet hose plus other electrical lines running into. Follow the line to your inlet fitting and your drain pump will be right below it. You will need a flash light. to see up in there. If you are having a tough time seeing the fitting you can see it from the passenger side. Once again you will have to crawl underneath the passenger side storage.

How we determined the leak was we emptied the front tank, dropped the boat into the water, started the filling the tank, one of us was under the helm with the other under the passenger side storage we looked at both sides of the pump and the fitting. We were both able to see that the fitting was clearly split in half.

Unfortunately I ordered the wrong fitting from Wakemakers. Actually I just looked and Wakemakers does not carry the correct fitting for my tank. It is a 3/4" NPT to 3/4" barb. I went and bought a fitting from Lowes which is longer than the original fitting that came on the tank so we could not screw it in with the tank in place. We had to remove the hose that was attached to the drain pump along with the vent hose and pull out the front tank. Once pulled out the fitting was easy to install. The hose was in bad shape so we decided to replace the hose. In this we were able to run extra which will give us the ability to more easily pull out the tank in the future (if needed). Once fixed we lowered the boat back in the water and went through the test like before.

I am still getting a little water coming from somewhere and I am thinking it may be the hose connection on the drain pump. In the winter my plan is going to be pull everything out and replace whatever needs to be replaced.

This is a real pain the rear and good luck.