In this week's episode I'll be fitting a vanity unit to my narrowboats bathroom and attempt
to drill through the hull.
The sink came with a standard domestic drain kit.
It has the plug hole, that goes through to a junction where the overflow would come through
from the top.
It goes down through 32mm,
down into the u-bend and then off into connectors, into a normal domestic system.
Now water from sinks, both from the kitchen and also bathrooms, that's called grey water
and that goes through a pipe, through a fitting in the hull and straight out into the canal.
You use sort of eco-friendly soap and that sort of thing but because there's no sewage
in it, it's not going to harm the canal or the wildlife in the canal.
It's usually connected to a fitting like this which is, a hole is drill through the
hull of the boat and then that's bolted
on and then you have a connector coming
off that which then goes onto a pipe
like this.
This is a 3/4 inch pipe.
But boy did I have a problem of
finding 32mm to 3/4 inch pipe.
I couldn't find anything anywhere.
There are things online where you can go
from a plug hole to a pipe directly, but
I wanted to keep the facility of the
overflow on for the actual sink.
The other issue you have is the height of
the hole, versus the water level.
Obviously you can't drill a hole below
the water level and guidelines indicate
that you have to have a minimum of
around about 10 inches, between the
waterline and the hole on the side of
the boat.
That's because of when boats go past or
waves when you in in choppier water.
It's not like a sailing boat.
It's nothing,
that sort of resistance but, it does need
to have that height allowance.
Now, that
also has added problems,
because already with this sort of thing
I've lost what effectively, five inches
and that eats into my allowance
effectively and then any kind of a sink
right up here.
So I wanted to try and get
my outflow effectively this pipe as high
as possible and I couldn't find anything
for 32mm and this was 32mm so I thought right.
However, on this
side I've got a, like a plug that plugs a hole.
So you can see my finger
there and I thought, I wonder if I could
connect this sort of pipe, to that
instead of using the 32mm and I
scratched my head.
I went to Midland
Chandler in Willington, who were really,
really helpful.
We went through lots, and
lots of different combinations and I
came back with this combination.
So instead of the half-inch pipe.
I've gone
with an inch pipe and that fits nice and
snug onto there.
I'll have a jubilee clip
on here, which will seal it and then that
will just go straight out of the hull.
But I still have this hole here, so if I
get rid of this.
Haven't made the job easier have I!
Now I've got a 32mm hole to plug and I scratched my
head again and I found this.
This is just a,
an access plug but all I was
interested in is this little fitting
was this end and that screws onto the
bottom of the 32mm.
It's got a black
washer in, so it's nice and tight.
So now
I've lost four or five inches of height
and I can come out of that pipe hole,
straight out of the hull.
The first thing I did was build the vanity unit.
I wanted something that would go to the floor to maximise the amount of storage beneath it.
The unit has two drawers is 600mm wide and the sink is glued to its top.
The porcelain sink has a single hole for the mixer tap and I bolted this in place.
The tails of the hot and cold pipes half inch connectors and as I use 15mm plastic
Speedfit throughout the boat. So I fitted 15mm to 1/2 inch convertors.
Despite the drain kit having a black washer, knowing from past experience they often leak.
So I applied a bead of silicon around the areas below and above the washer to ensure
no water escapes.
I then screwed the plug hole to the drain kit and fitted the sink to the top of the
vanity unit.
I measured, many times where the level of the waste pipe could flow out through the hull.
As I had no u-bend, I was able to have my hull hole at around 13-14 inches above the
water line.
I cut a small section of the foam away from the hulls side and started to drill my hole.
The hull at this point is 6mm thick steel and I took it slow and applied plenty of oil
to lubricate the cut and reduce heat.
I then ran into problems.
The arbour of the first hole drill went through the hull fine,
but quickly blunted my hole saw.
It then blunted a second brand new hole saw, and a third more expensive one.
Finally the fourth and the second Bosch Cobalt hole saw got through and I applied a small
amount of paint to the cut to avoid future rust issues.
The hole is on the canal side of Alice and I didn t want to drop the fitting into the
canal.
I formed a loop of wire through the hole and up through a porthole.
I slid the hull skin fitting down the wire and used an old chisel to align the fitting
through the hull.
It's at this point you could guarantee it would fall out into the canal, never to be
seen again.
But the wire trick seemed to solve this problem.
I applied a small amount of silicon sealant on the inside of the hole and fitted the skin
fittings washer and nut.
I slid the 1 inch braided hose onto the skin fitting and tightened it using a hose jubilee clip.
I've temporarily placed the sink unit in place and cut a hole in the side for the waste pipe
and also at the base for water pipes.
I detailed in episode 20 how I'd created bilge access holes at various points around the boat.
One of those points is here, right under the sink for easy out of sight access.
I lined up the braided hose to the sinks drain, and cut the hose.
Again, I tightened the hose with a jubilee clip.
I connected the hot and cold water supply, filled the sink to overflow and checked for leaks.
I then let the sink drain and was happy with the flow of water, down through the drain unit,
through the hose and out through the hull.
Finally, no more cleaning my teeth in the kitchen sink!