Boat sunk but had factory foam

There's an interesting thread in the Malibu forums about a guy whose boat sunk this weekend. He took water over the bow and then had a 2nd wave hit him and it filled up too quick to recover.

They beached the boat but the sheriff's department decided to tow the boat, which ended up flooding it more so it sank. It is now awaiting recovery at the bottom of the lake.

This brought up the discussion about the foam in the boat. It may very well have had enough foam to float it, but with an extra battery, tower, speakers, etc, that may have put it over the edge. He stated that he did not have it ballasted at the time.

It will be interesting to see what they find out when they raise it.

Link to thread and pics.

Those Malibu's do bow under quite easily. Must have been some serious rollers.

Kinda sounds fishy, although we all have our feelings about jet skis', I'm having a tough time with that story.
Feel bad for him either way!

What a bunch of goofs.. They could have pulled it in closer to shore and bialed it out before they towed it like that... Unreal dumb and dumber move for sure...

What the hell kind of floatation does malibu use??? None??

Moj'

Who knows what people do to vehicles in general. I would love to go on a average boat ride or daily car ride with some of the customers I have seen with vehicle problems over the years.

[QUOTE. I would love to go on a average boat ride or daily car ride with some of the customers I have seen with vehicle problems over the years. [/QUOTE]

No you wouldn't

The sheriffs office should pay for additional damage unless they had the owners permission. I once hit a monster pot hole in a small town with the right tire of of the boat trailer. It ripped off the axle on the right side of the trailer, swung around so the right wheel was where the transom of the boat would be yet the boat had fell off the trailer to the right side of the trailer still connected to the trailer at the bow eye and the whole mess got drug about 50'. Weirded out Neighbors helped us carry the boat to a guys yard. The city paid for a new trailer. They were probably happy to do that as we did not pursue the small amount of damage to the haul.

Another angle to this is the status of the boat with the USCG rules. My understanding is that any boat under 20' has to have positive flotation. It doesn't have to float upright, but some portion of the boat has to be above water when it's completely flooded.

When they test our boats, we take a current hull, install a block of iron on the engine mounts that weighs the same as an engine package, and put old upholstery in the boat. They take a razor blade and cut open all the vinyl on the upholstery so that it can't hold air, and open all closed compartments so that they flood. Then they pump water into the boat and leave it sunk for a given number of hours. If it goes under, you don't get your approval to build and certify it.

Art

I have never seen a PWC make a wave big enough to spill over the sides or bow of another boat. I have two jetskis and the only way I can throw a large enough wave is to slide it or do submarine donuts.

Even though he said that the boat had no ballast in it, I am going to guess that he had some steel plates in there. Steel will make the boat sink like a rock.

I don't know how an insurance co. would react if one were to have a sinking on an old boat that had the foam removed. It would depend heavily on what date the flotation requirement was put into effect by the USCG. I know we have foamed boats since the early 1960s, but the early foam wasn't closed-cell foam so it behaved a bit like a sponge!

I think if the boat had been built after the requiremenmt went into effect, the insurance company would have an easy out on a claim. If someone drowned as a result, I think it would be a BIG problem.

My personal experience was that I took all of the foam out of my '65 SN when I worked on it in '67. One afternoon a friend called and needed to use my trailer, so we launched my boat and moored it out in the lake. That night just after I settled in bed for the night, I remembered the drain plug was still in the pocket on the back of the driver's seat. Of course the boat was on the bottom of the lake. I got the friend who borrowed by trailer to come help (in the middle of the night) to come help, and we horsed the boat into shallow enough water to get the gunwales above water, then I bailed it out with a bucket. Took off all the electrical stuff and put it in the oven at low temp with the oven door open. Changed all the fluids and went skiing with it the next afternoon.

If I rebuilt an older model boat today, I still wouldn't put foam back in it. But I might check the effective date of the flotation law.

Art

Sure did, the foam in the deep part of the bilge between the front seats was water soaked. It was open-cell foam. I had the floor out of the boat for other reasons. {remember, the floors were not glassed over until about 1969 (??)}

The boat had lived its whole life outdoors until I bought it.

Art

My guess...when the guy gave it throttle to get the noise up after the first wave he invited disaster. A whole lot of water can come over the bow in seconds especially since it was bow heavy from the first wave. He simply drove more water in.

ArtCozier wrote: My personal experience was that I took all of the foam out of my '65 SN when I worked on it in '67. Art

Art when did they start foaming the Ski's. Dad's 63 did not have foam.

Hollywood, removing the floors was easy; peel back the flooring and unscrew the screws, only problem was they were all straight blade screws if I remember correctly...

skutsch wrote: Art when did they start foaming the Ski's. Dad's 63 did not have foam.

I'd bet around 1968 when the powers that be also decided what switch knobs to have on our dash boards and bumper heights