220 Ballast Tanks Losing Water

[Kurpski]

The rear ballast tanks on our 220 seem to drain down over time. Once filled with water, the tank gauge reads full. After a hour or so of riding I will notice the tank gauge needles bouncing around from 3/4 to full. If I turn the pumps back on, it will fill for a while before being full again.

Am I doing something wrong? Should I close the ball valves to the ballast tanks after I have them filled to the desired level, or is it just common for tanks to drain down a little over time?

[JUST-IN-TIME]

RE: 220 Ballast Tanks Losing Water

might want to check for leaks

[Kurpski]

RE: 220 Ballast Tanks Losing Water

I am not finding a lot of water in the bilge, bilge pump never kicks on. Any chance tanks could be syphoning out the bottom of the of the inlet holes?

[MHayes]

RE: 220 Ballast Tanks Losing Water

We always close the valves and the seacock once the ballast is full and we turn the pumps off. If you are leaving everything open, then yes, there is a chance that it could be draining ever so slightly.

[DWhitt]

RE: 220 Ballast Tanks Losing Water

Depending on the routing of the vent hoses you could also leak a little under acceleration when the water pushes to the back of the tank or vice versa on deceleration. I'm not sure how the 220 tanks are plumbed. Just a thought.

[noti_dad]

Check with your dealer. It's a known problem with the impellers being too soft. The soft ones allow water to exit when the tanks are full and enter when they ar emtpy. Changed mine and they work fine now.

[MUSHEZ]

Have the same issue with our 220. The vents of these tanks vent from the back end, so figured it was leakage out the overfill/vent pipes as you get bow rise on take off. Tempted to put cut off taps on the vents, but going to put in a fly high SANTE sack system so this may reduce the leakage.

[rugdog65]

just got my 220 this week. put in in the water for the first time today. filled all three ballasts this morning and went boarding and no poblems. emptied them for my daughter to board and went in to lunch. this afternoon getting ready to surf we filled starboard but belly would not fill? circuit breaker isnt tripped? any suggestions?
thanks Terry (rugdog65)
by the way this is a used 06 (no warranty)

[JUST-IN-TIME]

if the pump turning on??
does the light on the switch light up

[rugdog65]

Yes the light was coming on but the pump wasnt making any sound. Got in this morning and port wouldnt fill either. We decided to flip the battery switch to put a charge in batt. 1 and found a second circuit breaker box back there-pushed the resets and everything came on. We had got in some trash in the water yesterday and we think it had the intakes stopped up which triped the breakers....anyway back in business thanks for replies

[tpalmer]

Consider replacing the impellers

I was tripping my breakers as well until I replaced the impellers of my ballast pumps. The impellers you want are yellow and will be provided by your dealer. I haven't had a problem since.

[JUST-IN-TIME]

RE: Consider replacing the impellers

yellow impellers are for pumps that pump in and pump out only
so if u have in/out pumps then yes