Having issues with the ballast system on my 2000 pro air.

[chris2000proair]

Valve on the bottom of the boat is open, control knobs open, hear the pump running, but tanks will not fill. Sometimes the gauge for the starboard tank reads full even when the valve in the engine compartment hasn't been opened. I popped the trunk to do a visual inspection of the tanks and they appear to be empty. I decided to leave the valve in the engine compartment open and drive around to see if I could get them to manually fill and eventually water did come out the little drain holes on the starboard side, which means that it's full........right? But I still got nothing on the port side. Which brings up another question........why is there like four drain holes on the starboard side and one on the port side? Can this system get plugged? Maybe a bad pump? Basically, I seem to have nothing happening on the port side and random moments of action on the starboard side. Any help with these issues would be greatly appreciated.

[lucey]

When you say the control knobs are open do you mean in or out ? This has happened to me but when they are out they are off and when in they are on, if that makes sense. I thought i would check to see if you in fact had them closed/in (open).

[patoloco]

Here is a diagram from the brochure, which matches my 99 Air...with the exception that is does not show the overflow holes at the back on both the port and starboard side.

http://www.correctcraftfan.com/refer...ex.asp?page=32

As for no water being drawn in with everything open and pumps running... on mine you almost always have to run the boat on plane for a couple of seconds to "prime the pump" and then the pumps will pull in water just fine sitting still.

As far as one side filling and the other not, it sounds like the port side tank is not venting. I have manual control knobs to vent the tanks and you have to put them straight up and down for them to vent 1/2 turn. But have had to mess around with the tanks themselves when they weren't venting correctly. I don't know if you have manual controls.

As far as the tanks filling with the engine valve closed..that doesn't surprise me, water was probably just passing right through the valves...a quick search on this site should turn up some more info on this issue.