IceBox Drainage

[Alma]

My icebox drains into the shower grey water box under the center floorboard. It was always a mess with it's 30 or so screws holding the lid on. One of my first projects 13 years ago was to make a new grey water box from Tupperware. Make the icebox drain inlet high so shower water doesn't reach it. Make the shower drain and pump inlet low to keep grey water away from the icebox exhaust. One of the things my original owner left was a rubber drain plunger without a handle in the locker under the stove. It is to plunge the icebox drain. We sure have a huge icebox and it was one of the things that got my attention years ago.

Just how many cases of cans will fit in there???!!!

[Alma]

Here is my new shower/ice melt sump. I plumbed a piece of SCH 20 PVC to the original PAR pump and then with a pair of ball valves so I can choose to pump the sump or the bilge. For years I had a y-valve and garden hose adapters to do the same job but it no one could figure it out. This is pretty simple- S for sump and B for bilge.

The vertical PVC in the bilge is a brace to stabilize the cabin sole. It is made from light PVC and the second piece is slit to telescope over the first. That way the whole thing can be extended and holes drilled for fasteners to hold it tight against the bilge sump and underside of the sole. The top has a cut to accept the joint of the sole. It's impervious to bilge water.

[Dulcinea]

After reading everyone's posts, I decided to attack this issue on my boat last weekend.  My boat has the silly, low volume Jabsco pump on the left side of the sink which always seemed to me to be mismatched to the size of the ice box itself.  Took me forever to pump the ice box one day.   As someone noted, getting to the hose under the icebox is a PITA, but accessing the hose from under the pump on the sink is quite easy.  The hose coming from the ice box and going to the pump is a 5/8 water hose like the rest of the original water hose on my boat.  I simply added a piece of 5/8 hose using a fitting and hose clamps, ran it forward and installed a fitting in my sump.  I had replaced the original sump with an Attwood sump system that contains a float-activated bilge pump, so no need to have to activate a separate switch to pump it out.  We loaded the box with ice on Sunday and so far, so good.  fwiw

[Dave]

 

I took a low tech approach. I have the pump that outputs the water to the sink. Most of the time I use the ice box for dry goods as we have both a fridge and separate Dometic freezer we use on shore power.

On the rare occasions we use the ice box for .....ice, we drain it with a dollar store super soaker tube. Pulls all the melt water in one pull rather than pumping that small manual pump.

[Alma]

Same here. Whale dual action foot pump for emergency freshwater from tank manifold... Separate PAR hand pump for salt water at galley sink.

As supplied by Pearson.

[rkfitz]

Resurrecting a dead thread! I had the old sink hand pump, replaced it with a small diaphragm pump.

[Alma]

Me too. Top valve between tank selector valves switches between electric water pressure pump and foot pump.