Advice after partial flooding

vector4

Member
Jun 24, 2015
59
Baton Rouge
Boat Info
2000 Sundancer 270
Engines
310hp
So quick version of the story. I hit something submerged, kicked the outdrive up and ripped the shift boot in half and tore the outdrive fluid line off. Outdrive locked up/died and I had to leave the boat a few days tied up before I could recover it. Since it was unknown about the shift boot tear before I could recover the boat got about 2 feet of water intrusion as the batteries died running the pumps. I will post the pictures of how much water got in. 0104201521a_HDR.jpg 0104201524_HDR.jpg 0104201524a_HDR.jpg

So a marina has looked at it and insurance sent a surveyor and that is complete. I have an offer from my insurance. I have "reasonable depreciation" on my policy so I am getting half price of a new outdrive for it. That's the bulk of what I'm getting plus half of a new water heater price, starter, few odds and ends and shop fees to install. What insurance is offering me is about midpoint of my "this sucks" and my "whew no problem" price point.

My options to move forward as I can tell are A) Pick it up, find a used outdrive, repair what is needed myself and continue boating. B) Take my insurance check and sell the boat as salvage and move on. (I owe on the boat still but that would pay it off plus some). The insurance payment is enough for me to buy used parts/do the work myself to repair the KNOWN items.

My fear with option A is that there might be items that come up in the future that I cannot plan for or don't know about now. That is the main portion of advice I'd like to find here. If anyone has experience with water intrusion and how bad it can or can not be. Will everything dry out and be fine? Will I maybe have future major issues that I should move to get away from the boat because of? They are giving me nothing for interior, they say I should dry it out and proceed.

My only downsides to option B are that I won't have my boat anymore, which isn't the end of the world as there are other boats for sale. And I will take about a 4k loss vs what I could have gotten for the boat before this. Upside to option B is much less work on my part. Now I R/R my outdrive all the time and have all the tools for that so it's not an issue from ability to do the work perspective. In fact I put on new bellows this summer! Which is crazy to me that the shift boot ripped like that.

Thanks in advance for any input or advice.
 
Salt water? Have you checked the engine oil? Does it still run?
 
Fresh, engine is fine, didn't get in the intake. The marina checked the oil, the marina changed the starter and the engine starts.
 
Amite River, Tickfaw River, Tchefuncta River? If oil is good, fire it up and get the engine good and hot. Sounds like you have mechanical skills, so I say fix it!

Geaux Tigers!
 
So your boat is 20 years old. Things will start to pop up anyway. Not sure you could tie it to this incident. I'd clean it up real good. Hit everything with wd40 and keep it.
 
You will certainly have to check that transom assembly for damage. You must have taken a serious hit. Did the surveyor indicate a new transom assembly would be needed? You know that alone would be a few thousand for a Bravo. Also an engine pull.
If no assembly is needed, transom is not cracked, and boat is sea worthy, sounds best to just re-align the engine, replace the outdrive, and enjoy your boat.

I too am from the BR area. Curious to know where you hit this object.
 
If she is mechanical sound and you feel as if you can handle what might come up keep her. Change her oil often for the next year or so keeping a eye out for any moisture.

Get a good wet/dry vac and get in there and clean her good.
Get some damprid and place them in the cabin. Everything wet must come out. Moisture and humidity will get you mold.
Keep a fan running to move air around.

I wish you the best of luck with her, I'd be heart broken to see that happen to my old girl
 
The $4k loss on taking the insurance payout vs. selling it "as was" is only theoretical unless you actually had a cash buyer you turned down. If that's your only loss getting out from under a 20 year old boat with known and potentially unknown issues, I'd say get out while the gettin' is good. Who knows if there are other unknown problems not spotted, plus the boat could be harder to sell down the road with an insurance claim against it (do they do "BoatFax" like CarFax?).
 
Amite River, Tickfaw River, Tchefuncta River? If oil is good, fire it up and get the engine good and hot. Sounds like you have mechanical skills, so I say fix it!

Geaux Tigers!

Geaux Tigahs!

I keep it in a slip on the Amite but this happened on the Diversion while heading home for the day.

It's been sitting for 2 weeks while the surveyor and such did their thing. The shop it's at is an HR away so I haven't been over there doing any of this stuff yet. Going to go Friday and pick it up and look it over.
 
You will certainly have to check that transom assembly for damage. You must have taken a serious hit. Did the surveyor indicate a new transom assembly would be needed? You know that alone would be a few thousand for a Bravo. Also an engine pull.
If no assembly is needed, transom is not cracked, and boat is sea worthy, sounds best to just re-align the engine, replace the outdrive, and enjoy your boat.

I too am from the BR area. Curious to know where you hit this object.

Yeah I mean I'm not even 100% sure what I hit or how. But the skeg had a chunk out and the brand new shift boot tore so I don't know what else could have happened.

Surveyor didn't indicate anything else wrong. I think the transom assembly is ok. I honestly haven't inspectetit good myself. Once it was out I took it to the shop ASAP in case the motor needed to be pickled. And being winter everything I did ended up at night.
 
The $4k loss on taking the insurance payout vs. selling it "as was" is only theoretical unless you actually had a cash buyer you turned down. If that's your only loss getting out from under a 20 year old boat with known and potentially unknown issues, I'd say get out while the gettin' is good. Who knows if there are other unknown problems not spotted, plus the boat could be harder to sell down the road with an insurance claim against it (do they do "BoatFax" like CarFax?).


You're right I don't have an offer but I'm estimating. The surveyor set my salvage value at 11.5k which is about half the book value. But I also have a newer genset in there with 120hr on it that I could yank and get a good chunk for as well. The shop it's at also said depending on price they might buy it.

What you mention is my concern. I have to fix stuff every year anyway and that's just par for the course. Just don't have to have to start refixing the stuff I fixed already, ie I replaced the trim stator this past year, good chance that might go out again.

Also to be honest my outdrive had some corrosion on it, was far from pristine so it was a maintenance items for me to hit it with a coat of paint every year.
 
So quick version of the story. I hit something submerged, kicked the outdrive up and ripped the shift boot in half and tore the outdrive fluid line off. Outdrive locked up/died and I had to leave the boat a few days tied up before I could recover it. Since it was unknown about the shift boot tear before I could recover the boat got about 2 feet of water intrusion as the batteries died running the pumps. I will post the pictures of how much water got in. View attachment 79359 View attachment 79360 View attachment 79361

So a marina has looked at it and insurance sent a surveyor and that is complete. I have an offer from my insurance. I have "reasonable depreciation" on my policy so I am getting half price of a new outdrive for it. That's the bulk of what I'm getting plus half of a new water heater price, starter, few odds and ends and shop fees to install. What insurance is offering me is about midpoint of my "this sucks" and my "whew no problem" price point.

My options to move forward as I can tell are A) Pick it up, find a used outdrive, repair what is needed myself and continue boating. B) Take my insurance check and sell the boat as salvage and move on. (I owe on the boat still but that would pay it off plus some). The insurance payment is enough for me to buy used parts/do the work myself to repair the KNOWN items.

My fear with option A is that there might be items that come up in the future that I cannot plan for or don't know about now. That is the main portion of advice I'd like to find here. If anyone has experience with water intrusion and how bad it can or can not be. Will everything dry out and be fine? Will I maybe have future major issues that I should move to get away from the boat because of? They are giving me nothing for interior, they say I should dry it out and proceed.

My only downsides to option B are that I won't have my boat anymore, which isn't the end of the world as there are other boats for sale. And I will take about a 4k loss vs what I could have gotten for the boat before this. Upside to option B is much less work on my part. Now I R/R my outdrive all the time and have all the tools for that so it's not an issue from ability to do the work perspective. In fact I put on new bellows this summer! Which is crazy to me that the shift boot ripped like that.

Thanks in advance for any input or advice.
You're right I don't have an offer but I'm estimating. The surveyor set my salvage value at 11.5k which is about half the book value. But I also have a newer genset in there with 120hr on it that I could yank and get a good chunk for as well. The shop it's at also said depending on price they might buy it.

What you mention is my concern. I have to fix stuff every year anyway and that's just par for the course. Just don't have to have to start refixing the stuff I fixed already, ie I replaced the trim stator this past year, good chance that might go out again.

Also to be honest my outdrive had some corrosion on it, was far from pristine so it was a maintenance items for me to hit it with a coat of paint every year.

Don't accept a check or worse, deposit/cash it! Hire an independent qualified independent 3rd party marine surveyor as soon as possible. Preferably one that has experience with sunken/flooded boats. She is soaked. This is a serious insurance claim that, in the end, you should be made whole. And... without any DIY!
 
I guess it comes down to what you want. If you are just going to turn around and buy another used boat just like this one and put yourself deep into debt on a similar boat that will have problems (all used boats are risky and have problems), then just keep this one as a project boat.

I bought a Katrina victim boat that had two feet of water in it for weeks. After doing a lot of work on it myself, my family has enjoyed that boat for over twelve years. Still have it. I didn’t care about the sale value - it was not an investment in the first place. It was a toy. Recreational boats are terrible financial “investments” anyway. We don’t always lose money on them, but usually do. I had motor work to do, but not internal work. The biggest job was replacing the rotten wood in the deck due to water getting into every screw hole in the interior of the lower decks. I cut out the fiberglass and wood and replaced it all. A lot of work but I got the boat cheap and had no loan payments.

If you were kinda thinking about an upgrade or changing the type of boat, this may be the time to do it. Just cut your losses and find another boat.

if, however, you loved the boat and will buy another one just like it (used with problems), well, hell, you got one of those right now. Just get to work on it.
 
Don't accept a check or worse, deposit/cash it! Hire an independent qualified independent 3rd party marine surveyor as soon as possible. Preferably one that has experience with sunken/flooded boats. She is soaked. This is a serious insurance claim that, in the end, you should be made whole. And... without any DIY!
I will say the surveyor send by my insurance was a local company out of New Orleans, so I would hope they would be impartial. I mean I think I could maybe argue with them that half price (4450) won't buy me a reman outdrive. Or at least I can't find a reman for that, just used ones.
 
I guess it comes down to what you want. If you are just going to turn around and buy another used boat just like this one and put yourself deep into debt on a similar boat that will have problems (all used boats are risky and have problems), then just keep this one as a project boat.

I bought a Katrina victim boat that had two feet of water in it for weeks. After doing a lot of work on it myself, my family has enjoyed that boat for over twelve years. Still have it. I didn’t care about the sale value - it was not an investment in the first place. It was a toy. Recreational boats are terrible financial “investments” anyway. We don’t always lose money on them, but usually do. I had motor work to do, but not internal work. The biggest job was replacing the rotten wood in the deck due to water getting into every screw hole in the interior of the lower decks. I cut out the fiberglass and wood and replaced it all. A lot of work but I got the boat cheap and had no loan payments.

If you were kinda thinking about an upgrade or changing the type of boat, this may be the time to do it. Just cut your losses and find another boat.

if, however, you loved the boat and will buy another one just like it (used with problems), well, hell, you got one of those right now. Just get to work on it.


I think after reading some opinions here many people believe I can fix whats there and dry her out and go. That's sort of what I was wanting to hear about. I haven't heard any, "oh you're screwed if you keep it" type sentiments.

So thank you for what you said because you know, you are dead on. When I think about selling the boat to get out of it, I definitely don't think about replacing it with another trailer-able pocket cruiser. I'd replace it with something bigger I think. Just forget all this trailering non-sense. We've had this boat in a slip on a lift for 6mo now and I absolutely LOVE it. Because launching and recovering something this size sucks. So I guess that really is the decision we should make. Keep doing what we are doing or use this as an excuse to move to something else.
 
I will say the surveyor send by my insurance was a local company out of New Orleans, so I would hope they would be impartial. I mean I think I could maybe argue with them that half price (4450) won't buy me a reman outdrive. Or at least I can't find a reman for that, just used ones.
They are not impartial. They work for the insurance company. If something doesn't seem right, get your own surveyor to take a look.
 
I think after reading some opinions here many people believe I can fix whats there and dry her out and go. That's sort of what I was wanting to hear about. I haven't heard any, "oh you're screwed if you keep it" type sentiments.

So thank you for what you said because you know, you are dead on. When I think about selling the boat to get out of it, I definitely don't think about replacing it with another trailer-able pocket cruiser. I'd replace it with something bigger I think. Just forget all this trailering non-sense. We've had this boat in a slip on a lift for 6mo now and I absolutely LOVE it. Because launching and recovering something this size sucks. So I guess that really is the decision we should make. Keep doing what we are doing or use this as an excuse to move to something else.

Sounds like there’s a little sailor inside you wanting to crawl out and start shopping for a 35-footer.
After restoring my 24-ft boat, I will emphatically state if your heart is not into the boat you are fixing, don’t even try it. Hot, time consuming, expensive, and worth every bit, IF you are passionate about the boat like I was and still am for the 1989 Sea Ray 220CC. In fact, I just got a 280 Sundancer and am not even considering selling the 220.
Good luck on your decision. How about asking the best source of advice? Maybe a short prayer tonight for guidance.
 
So I went and got the boat from the marina and parked it. I went and crawled all through it. Everything that was submerged still works even the trim pump (for now). The carpet was still wet after 3 weeks and the rear bed foam was full of water still. But somehow, no mold in the boat. I pulled all that stuff out and stuck a large dehumidifier in there. The carpet was so rotten from sitting that it actually just ripped right out, not too hard.

After looking at everything and spending some time messing with it and really checking everywhere I think I am just going to fix it for right now. It's too easy to fix to not do it. I can have this thing running without too much work plus it's winter.

I will say we did get out boattrader and look around. The wife and I liked a few larger 35'+ boats we saw so maybe after I fix this one we will see how we like it and decide from there.
 

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