Bilge scraping

One of my main jobs at drydock was scraping out the rust from the bilge in the (old)bathroom. Job number one was hoovering out all the water that was sat in there. It looked like the plumbing had been having a good go at filling the bilge with water. If you've ever seen the film 'scream' you'll know that only a fool blinkers themselves into thinking problems come from a single source.
When we ripped up the floor we found that several plumbing joints were leaking, the central heating system had dumped some of its contents in there and there was a mysterious pipe coming from a mysterious place in the Fo'castle that was constantly dribbling water in there as well.

Of course, the rat's nest of pipes were tangled under the floor joists, and the secret dribble pipe was located behind the built in/tiled shower. So out it all came so we could do a proper job of it.

We spent a few hours working out what all the different pipes were hooked up to and I made a fun diagram on the wall so we could keep track.

As soon as we got the water out I set about scraping with a spokeshave and a coal shovel. There is no way my nerves could have stood doing this job if we weren't at drydock. Once I had painted it all with Vactan and finally Jotun 87 primer it looked a thousand times better.
Phew!


Oh! And I almost forgot! That mystery leaky pipe appears to be coming from some kind of water tank in the ceiling of the Fo'castle. We thought the ceiling was directly below the deck but further investigation has it about a foot lower. And the pipe from it going straight into the bilge. I'd be interested to see how the original setup worked and why anyone would build a bathroom On top of these weird pipes with nothing on the end. I'm sure we'll find out more when we strip out the Fo'castle anyway.