Just looked at an earlier version of a 232 which has that transom wide fishbox. Have any of you guys ever transformed that box to a live well and with what success..??
232 REAR TRANSOM WIDE FISHBOX USES..?? LIVEWELL MAYBE??
- Thread starter NIGHTIDES
- Start date
I had a 91 Gulfstream. I didn't actually make a livewell, but I did use the transom box for catch. One thing I found out right away was, if you plugged the drain, and had a decent amount of water in there, it would slosh back and forth really bad, and literaly splash out from under the lids. Way too violent for a livewell.
I made 2 baffles out of 1/4" poly and installed them in tracks, so I could remove them. It worked great, (no more splashing out).
In my opinion, if you split that box by making a divider out of a solid piece of poly, seal the edges, and use the right side of the box, (more in the middle of the boat) as the livewell, it should work. You could simply put the overflow with a screen, near the top of the poly divider, and the drain at the bottom of the divider. The factory drain is at the far left of the box, so your good there.
I think the water inlet could be plumbed into the far right side of the box, but I think it's going to be a little tight. Plus you'll have to shave off some of the insulation.
I made 2 baffles out of 1/4" poly and installed them in tracks, so I could remove them. It worked great, (no more splashing out).
In my opinion, if you split that box by making a divider out of a solid piece of poly, seal the edges, and use the right side of the box, (more in the middle of the boat) as the livewell, it should work. You could simply put the overflow with a screen, near the top of the poly divider, and the drain at the bottom of the divider. The factory drain is at the far left of the box, so your good there.
I think the water inlet could be plumbed into the far right side of the box, but I think it's going to be a little tight. Plus you'll have to shave off some of the insulation.
I've never used a livewell but it's my understanding that if the corners aren't well radiused, your bait will get stuck in the corners and drown. Yes, a fish can drown. 
That being said, the shape of that box itself doesn't facilitate making it into a livewell. You could however fab some pieces to make those corners round.
That being said, the shape of that box itself doesn't facilitate making it into a livewell. You could however fab some pieces to make those corners round.You would need to modify it to be a livewell and it would not be worth it. Most baitfish need rounded corners to swim and stay alive, otherwise they all swim into one wall and crowd themselves and sufficate. You could fiberglass in corners but then you will still have the sloshing issue. You would then need to modify how the tank and top meet. Probably add a beefy seal and a latch that will allow the top to seal. IMHO it would not be worth it unless you plan to keep the boat a very long time and probably invest $750+ into this project unless you did it yourself. You would probably use it as a cooler for your fish and with those dividers you could even use it to store food and drinks, or just use it for dry storage.
catch22 said:
Thanks for your first hand view of how something like this might work. If it could get fashioned more in the middle of the boat, I think the sloshing would be minimized to acceptable levels. Grady also thought that the rear of the boat was a more stabile spot for a live well as this is exactly where they ended up moving the one for the 228. I have 'shaved' off insulation of the port fish box in prior live well setups in order to plumb them correctly so no problem there.
gradyfish22 said:
Gradyfish22 I have always given serious thought to the rounded corners debate and I too feel bait would be better off in a rounded tank.
But on the flip side of the coin, 12 yrs ago I converted and used the port fish box on an older 228 for a live well. It had squarish corners but every year for all 12 years I had that hull, that live well housed thousands of adult bunker with very little loss. I set up the water capacity of that well to be around 22gals and used an 1,100 gal pump to fill it and two 1.5" overflows to keep the water level where it needed to be.
If I overfilled the well w/ more than two dozen bunker I would loose 10% +/- of them. Summertime was more but spring or fall no problem. That being said, some other types of bait would perhaps have survival issues with the not so rounded corners as you mentioned.
Nightides -
I had that same hull and was able to keep adult bunker alive as well with a high output live well pump. Problem was, you can not fill a live well with corners to the same fish capacity that you can with a live well with rounded corners. I would be able to keep about 15 bunker alive in my 22 gal live well and maybe one or two would die. Also, the seafarer had angled edges, not exactly corners so that helps a little bit. This 232 has sharp corners which will act worse then our boats did. At one point I had used a rounded bait well and could put at least one bunker per gal(that should be the rule of thumb for bunker in most live wells). On my 265 I can keep more then 1 per gal, I have kept over 80 bunker alive for 14 hours. You will be able to keep them alive if you have the proper pumps and overflows, but I did notice that the rounded bait well keeps the bunker a bit more lively. The corners definitely slowed the bunker down. I also plan to paint my bait well light blue, I have fished on boats with that and it also did help to calm the bait.
I had that same hull and was able to keep adult bunker alive as well with a high output live well pump. Problem was, you can not fill a live well with corners to the same fish capacity that you can with a live well with rounded corners. I would be able to keep about 15 bunker alive in my 22 gal live well and maybe one or two would die. Also, the seafarer had angled edges, not exactly corners so that helps a little bit. This 232 has sharp corners which will act worse then our boats did. At one point I had used a rounded bait well and could put at least one bunker per gal(that should be the rule of thumb for bunker in most live wells). On my 265 I can keep more then 1 per gal, I have kept over 80 bunker alive for 14 hours. You will be able to keep them alive if you have the proper pumps and overflows, but I did notice that the rounded bait well keeps the bunker a bit more lively. The corners definitely slowed the bunker down. I also plan to paint my bait well light blue, I have fished on boats with that and it also did help to calm the bait.
gradyfish22:
You like the color blue don't you...??
I too generally would use the 1 gal to 1 bunker rule but sometime it was tough not to put a few more in there. As you perhaps know there are those days when every piece of live bait in the well equals a large fish...
In my mind I am comparing the 232 fish box to the newer 228 live well that Grady located in the back over the bilge area. Did you ever see one of those live wells..?? Is it me or can an adult bunker never turn around in one of those wells.. they are rounded yes but are way too narrow in my view..
You like the color blue don't you...??
I too generally would use the 1 gal to 1 bunker rule but sometime it was tough not to put a few more in there. As you perhaps know there are those days when every piece of live bait in the well equals a large fish...
In my mind I am comparing the 232 fish box to the newer 228 live well that Grady located in the back over the bilge area. Did you ever see one of those live wells..?? Is it me or can an adult bunker never turn around in one of those wells.. they are rounded yes but are way too narrow in my view..
NIGHTIDES said:gradyfish22:
You like the color blue don't you...??
I too generally would use the 1 gal to 1 bunker rule but sometime it was tough not to put a few more in there. As you perhaps know there are those days when every piece of live bait in the well equals a large fish...
In my mind I am comparing the 232 fish box to the newer 228 live well that Grady located in the back over the bilge area. Did you ever see one of those live wells..?? Is it me or can an adult bunker never turn around in one of those wells.. they are rounded yes but are way too narrow in my view..
I have seen the new wells and yes bunker can turn in them, but it is very tight. Bunker can turn in tight spaces, but not with a ton packed in a liewell. When they all try to turn at once they will all clog that corner/wall, it is just a matter of time before they become sluggish and die. Now hopefully that isn't an issue and you go through them so quickly that you do not have to worry about them dying :lol: I've seen way too many of those days and boy do I love them!!!
NA2P said:
Some of the Rule seacox mounted pumps went through a redesign and now have two outlets. One that the Rule pumps to and the other that allows you to Tee off to a different pump for example a wash down. Their objective was for a boat owner not to have to cut multiple holes in the bottom of their boats but instead be able to use just one hole.
The Grady set up as you discribed forces an angler to make a decission to either fish or clean up. When the fish are in, I for one would be hard pressed to actually make such a decission
We've got the same hull and thought about putting a bait tank in that spot. You'd have to do some serious retro fitting to make it work however. You may also run into problems with being able to access the bilge. I talked with a local (so cal) fabricator that does incredible tower and bait tank work. Very rough indication was 4-5K to have it done right. We need a big bait tank around here and the port side built in is not adequate. Most guys add a free standing tank in the cockpit but we wanted to avoid taking up so much space.
Here are pictures of what was done to a larger Grady by the guy I'm talking about. There's also a link to his original post on another fishing board with all the pictures. After seeing these pictures I called him and discussed our options. We haven't done anything yet.
http://www.bloodydecks.com/forums/check ... grady.html
Here are pictures of what was done to a larger Grady by the guy I'm talking about. There's also a link to his original post on another fishing board with all the pictures. After seeing these pictures I called him and discussed our options. We haven't done anything yet.
http://www.bloodydecks.com/forums/check ... grady.html