New owner questions - Leaving after the weekend. 2004 Sea Ray 300

JackLabs

New Member
Apr 24, 2020
23
Boat Info
300 Sundancer
Engines
Twin 5.7 Mercruiser w/Bravo III
Greetings,

I took possession of a 16 year old 2004 Sea Ray 300 over this past weekend.
So many more questions then answers at this point but I have a couple that caused lack of sleep last night that I would enjoy getting input on. I will be a weekend summer boater with the boat located about 45 miles from the house at a marina with water and shore power hook ups. I no doubt have some issues with some systems on the boat to work through (fix). I have been around boats but this is the first ownership of a boat of this magnitude.

1. "Seacocks" keeping in mind that the boat is new to me - Do I close seacocks upon leaving the boat for the week? To include engine, raw water, generator?

2. I left Shorepower hooked up but turned nearly every switch off. On the AC side I left the outlets and fridge and AC convertor on. On the DC side I left the fridge on. Left the panel of course switched to AC / Shore. I did NOT however turn the two large battery switches in the aft port distribution box off (which was my cause for poor sleep). The air conditioning is currently not functioning (lost prime I THINK) so there was no need to leave it on.

If need be I can break away from work, make the drive, and correct these but would like to save the trip if able. Thanks for input.
 
There are no right or wrong answers to your question. You will find a wide variety of answers will follow in this thread. Many will think what they do is right and what others do is wrong.

My air conditioner on my boat is generally turned on at the launch and not turned off all season. We have perishable food that would not like being in heat all week when I am gone. The professional captain down the dock does the same.

My slip mate turns his air conditioner off every time he leaves the boat because if there is a hose failure it could sink the boat. He is indeed correct, but with proper maintenance and insurance This can be mitigated.

In the end, the answer to your question will come down to your personal style for risk management. Did you have a survey? Have all the deficiencies of the survey been corrected concerning hoses and water intrusion?

I personally know no one that closes all of their seacocks when they leave their boat.
 
Thanks MM,

You are right of course. I have seen the wide spread of answers given to questions of this variety after trolling the forums pre-purchase. No doubt there will be stories and examples in either direction. I guess what I am most trying to get out of the post is the "What the hell were you thinking" responses.
 
Well - the first thing is to look at your survey and the condition of the through hulls, hoses and other related equipment. If questionable get the replacements and updates done. Opening and closing the valves is your choice but it is also important to continuously operate the air conditioning equipment to prevent mold from taking over your boat. Once mold gets into the fabrics it cannot be removed....
For me the boat stays powered up; both DC and AC. All of the through hull valves are open; but everything is updated and installed correctly including the bilge pumps. Only the ignition main switches are turned off. I do not have the marina's water system connected to the boat and for me that would be a vulnerability.
 
Seacocks -- if they are easily reachable, then there is no harm in closing them. Especially if you find you be away for an extended time. Mine are not, so I don't touch them.

Shorepower -- I leave mine on all the time. I do shut off individual breakers that I don't need. I keep the refrigerator and battery charger on.

AC -- I turn mine off.

Water -- I would make sure that the water at the source is turned off. The fittings can fail and sink the boat.
 
Shore water should be turned off, but what about my icemaker that needs it? LOL

by happenstance I have found that my 100 foot flex hose holds enough water and pressure that the icemaker can still make about 5 pounds of ice with the water turned off. Are used to relieve that water pressure before I left but now just let the Icemaker do it. LOL
 
As a reference point - I live 2.5 hours from my boat. I leave all sea cocks open and turn my A/C on "dehumidify mode" when we leave for the week. It cycles the A/C on a set basis to remove humidity, but doesn't put the wear on the system that leaving it on would. When we return to the boat and kick the A/C on, cabin is quickly cooled. the I turn off the DC systems, but leave AC systems powered up and no longer keep a shore water connection.

With a 51 gallon fresh water tank, I fill the tank every other weekend and keep the tank water fresh. On the last boat, we used a shore water connection and the tank water just sat and sat.
 
I leave all seacocks open except the one for the toilet flush, which we don't use. Our head pulls river water in for flushing but we use fresh water from the tank for flushing. A/C gets turned off when we leave. I will have to look into that de-humidify option. I don't think we have that but I will look. We never connect to city water, just keep the tank full. The only switches I leave on are the AC fridge and battery charger. On the DC side I only leave the main on
 
I leave all seacocks open except the one for the toilet flush, which we don't use. Our head pulls river water in for flushing but we use fresh water from the tank for flushing. A/C gets turned off when we leave. I will have to look into that de-humidify option. I don't think we have that but I will look. We never connect to city water, just keep the tank full. The only switches I leave on are the AC fridge and battery charger. On the DC side I only leave the main on

If you have a Cruisair with the SMXii controller, press "heat" "cool" "fan" simultaneously and it'll go into "HU" mode.
 
If you have a Cruisair with the SMXii controller, press "heat" "cool" "fan" simultaneously and it'll go into "HU" mode.
very similar

I leave seacocks open, AC is set to dehumidify mode. leave all breakers on except fresh water pump and vacuflush and i use the tank for water, haven't used city water connection....
 
Thanks all!

Can someone check my logic here. In the owners manual for the boat it states to "turn off" the battery switches. Let's say you follow that advice and say the shore power disconnects (for whatever cause) the bilge pump will be off-line correct? It would only stand to reason. If that is correct It would seem that leaving the shore power AND the battery switches on would be the safest course <Scratching head>. Am I over thinking this? I am in the auto industry and to draw a comparison there are some system that work no matter the power setting. One would think that perhaps the bilge system is powered in the circuit before the battery switches so no matter what they will operate if battery power is still present.
 
Bilge should be powered all the time, your thoughts are correct. I only turned my battery switches to different positions when i was coved out and wanted to make sure i didn't run out of juice to start a motor....
 
Thanks all!

Can someone check my logic here. In the owners manual for the boat it states to "turn off" the battery switches. Let's say you follow that advice and say the shore power disconnects (for whatever cause) the bilge pump will be off-line correct? It would only stand to reason. If that is correct It would seem that leaving the shore power AND the battery switches on would be the safest course <Scratching head>. Am I over thinking this? I am in the auto industry and to draw a comparison there are some system that work no matter the power setting. One would think that perhaps the bilge system is powered in the circuit before the battery switches so no matter what they will operate if battery power is still present.
Hopefully the bilge pumps are wired to bypass the battery switches. Otherwise, yeah turning off the switch could be a problem.
 
Bilge pumps should be wired directly. You can test this by turning the battery switch off and manually raising your float.

I leave my battery switch turned to off when we are not there.
 
Thanks all!

Can someone check my logic here. In the owners manual for the boat it states to "turn off" the battery switches. Let's say you follow that advice and say the shore power disconnects (for whatever cause) the bilge pump will be off-line correct? It would only stand to reason. If that is correct It would seem that leaving the shore power AND the battery switches on would be the safest course <Scratching head>. Am I over thinking this? I am in the auto industry and to draw a comparison there are some system that work no matter the power setting. One would think that perhaps the bilge system is powered in the circuit before the battery switches so no matter what they will operate if battery power is still present.
First - all Sea Ray boats are wired so the bilge pumps operate regardless of the battery switch position. Same for any other critical circuits like stereo memory, CO monitors etc.
For the health of the batteries always keep shore power connected and battery charger/converter operating.
Again, it's important to keep the HVAC operating to prevent mold from taking hold.
Is there an issue you are concerned with leaving the electrical systems active? All are protected with circuit breakers or fuses.....
Herein there is ample information in postings (literally hundreds and hundreds) that can help answer many of your questions..
 
I leave my shore-power and battery switches on as our marina often suffers from temporary power outages and I wish to keep the Fridge cold. I'm backed up by Siren Marine telematics so I get a text if shore power goes out and can head to the boat if shore-power is lost for an extended period of time.

One admonishment about shore-water. It should be disconnected from the boat when you leave, as you never know if some dock-mate might inadvertently turn it on. A subsequent failure of your pressure regulator can lead to a sunken boat. Over time I've learned to just keep the fresh water tank filled and forgo the shore-water connection altogether. Doing it this way, means the water gets cycled through the tank, keeping it fresh.

I turn off the water heater when I leave as well, as some issue with the water system could empty the heater core resulting in a burned out element.

I leave my seacocks open, but all my hoses are religiously maintained, and double-clamped. Humidity is not much of a factor in my neck of the woods, so my AC gets turned off when I leave. Siren Marine helps here too as I can turn the AC on or off remotely, which means if I forget, I can turn it off remotely. Bonus points in that I can turn it on before heading to the boat, and then arrive to a cooled down cabin. Ditto for the water heater.
 
I was not aware of how the wiring worked meaning, {QUOTE} "all Sea Ray boats are wired so the bilge pumps operate regardless of the battery switch position. Same for any other critical circuits like stereo memory, CO monitors etc." That makes total sense.
My issue ttmott is that I just want to do it correctly and I could not seem to find a concise answer so I posted the question.
Thanks to all for the feed back. Feeling better now that I know.
 
I was not aware of how the wiring worked meaning, {QUOTE} "all Sea Ray boats are wired so the bilge pumps operate regardless of the battery switch position. Same for any other critical circuits like stereo memory, CO monitors etc." That makes total sense.
My issue ttmott is that I just want to do it correctly and I could not seem to find a concise answer so I posted the question.
Thanks to all for the feed back. Feeling better now that I know.
All Good!
Also, if you don't have the owner's manual you can get it from the SR web page; It has wiring schematics in it which are a great help. However, we all find they seem to have errors and are incomplete....
 

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