Commander sink option? does anyone have this?

Hello Everyone!

We have commander #155 in san francisco. Our boat does not have the sink option in it. But it seems like a great thing to have.

Does anyone have this option that can tell me a bit about how it works? (water tanks? hoses? constrution of the sink area?)

I would like to try to replicate this very closely and make it for our boat.

If anyone is near san francisco, I would be glad to take you to lunch if I could peek at your original sink and take a few meausements.

Has anyone had any troubles with this upgrade? any disadvatages or extra risk of leaking?

If anyone could post a few photos of your sink it would help me out a ton!

We have the original sink in our commander. We did install a flexible tank under the starboard berth for carrying fresh water. What measurements do you need? I can also take pictures. We will be going to the boat this weekend and I can post them on Monday.
:cool:
Fair Winds!

Thanks for the help! As for measurements: overall hight, lenght and width. Perhaps the size and depth of the sink. And any other demisions you think would be helpful?

For example I have never seen the sink, so I have no idea how it works? are there drawers under the sink? if so it would be great to have measurements of that as well.

for photographs, the more the better, because I will be attemping to replicate it.

top veiw of the sink and under the sink would be great also!!

Do you like having it? do you use it alot? Maybe I dont know what i'm missing.. haha.

Where does the water come from and how does it exit?? That would be great to see also!!

Thanks so much!!! Anytime your in the san franicsco area, lets go for a sail!

Here's a few photos to get you started.

Its a simple affair really. Three pieces of plywood (a top, front and side) covered with mica. Cut outs for the sink, a drawer and a door.

Don't use it that much. The drawer is handy.

With the unit removed you can see a hole is cut in the berth.

Starting at the bottom is a hole cut in the hull with a short fiberglass tube formed around the hole. A piece of hose over the tube, then the float valve (the loose piece pictured), then another piece of hose leading to the sink drain tail piece.

This arrangement could all be improved.

The cruddy green garden hose led from the water tank to the sink drain pump.

Our sink is exactly like the one that Commander Pete has posted pictures of.

We normally do not use the sink when just daysailing or staying overnight at the dock. But when we are cruising and living on the hook it gets it use. Brushing teeth, washing hands, making coffee, water for cooking, rinsing food. We don't wash dishes in there as it is too small, I carry dishpans and do those in the cockpit, using dawn dish detergent, and we toss the "brown" water overboard.
If you need to drill a "new" hole for the draining of the sink, I would put an actual thru-hull on for safety. That way you can close it when not at the boat, sailing, or just because you are not using the sink. I do have a picture of the thru-hull we installed for an intake on the head in the forward v-berth in the gallery.
I thought I had posted pictures in the gallery last year, but that was of the conversion we did installing a head and making the old water tank into a holding tank. I will take a picture of our "new" flexible holding tank and will do any measurements that I can get for you.

Have a great weekend!

thanks for the great picture commander pete.

I may have more questions as we start making the sink. It looks like you epoxed the bunk over the wood? is that true? to make it a smoother finish?

Liz, I look forward to your picts and measurements! It sounds like a usefull addition to the boat!

Can the drain hole drilled in the boat be above the waterline? to minimize risk of sinking?

So is the upper drawer a "drawer'? and the lower drawer a cabinet that opens to under the sink?

Thanks guys!!

The upper drawer is a pull out drawer.

The lower door is a cabinet door.

I don't think you could put the discharge hole above the waterline. The bottom of the sink is only about 4-6 inches above
the resting waterline. When the boat heeled over you would probably get some water gurgling back up the sink.

Here's a picture of the sink unit while I was taking it apart.

I have no idea why I was fairing out the wood under the sink. I must have had some leftover goop.

Here is a pic of the front of our sink. We used this area to install some of our electronics. The width is 15" and the height is 20".

More pics and measurements to follow.

This is the picture of the cabinet door open and what is under our sink.

I didn't get the door measurements.

The drawer measure 7.5"w x 12"l x 4.5"d

Here is a pic of the drawer.

No picture of this as it is the same as Commander Pete's.

The top of the cabintet measures 15"w x 26 5/8" d

The sink measures 11 3/4"w x 9 1/4" d

I have attached the pic of the deck water filler that we installed for filling the flexible water tank.

And this is a picture of the flexible water tank that we installed underneath the starboard qtr. berth.

Thank you so much for sending the pictures of your boats' sinks. They look great, they are a big help and very inspirational.
Commander Pete, I was wondering if you took your sink out of the boat in order to restore it. If you did, can you tell me how you re-attached it?

SailorLiz,

Did you have a tank uner the v=berth? My tank was shot and I have removed it. I am debating with myself about whether to replace it with a bladder or a poly tank and were to put it.

My sink is just like the others. And the undersink area is a catchall for sure.

All Ariels and Commanders have a water tank under the V-berth. As noted in the manual, the early boats came with a galvanized steel tank. Later tanks were Monel (a high grade aircraft aluminum). Several skippers have removed the older tanks and converted the space to storage. In our case, we were able to replace the galvanized with a Monel tank obtained from a skipper who was redesigning his boat's interior. :rolleyes:

Yes, we did and still do have the old water tank under the V-Berth. We converted that to a holding tank last spring for our head that we installed in place of a porta-potty. There are pictures of it in the gallery. I think there might be something here in the technical discussion on it.

I like having a "real" head vs. a porta-potty. It is a nice "luxury" for the boat.

Fair Winds

Arrrgghhhhhh...

My Commander had a fiberglass tank and I pulled it when I realized and looked to confirm that the gelcoat was mush. So now I am tankless and looking in all the wrong places??? There is a song in there somewhere!

The prior owner had installed a bladder under the port V-Berth just forward of the partition, with a Y-valve to the outlet, for the head.

The net result is that my Commander does sit slightly bow high and the water gatherer in the lazerette works better than ever.

BTW, is there a source for the checkvalve on the sink? I have to jiggle the beast with a length of coat hanger every once in a while to prove who is master (if not Commander......heh)