Bailing Bags

Just got an email from Northwater that featured throwbags that can be used as collapsible bailing buckets:

http://northwater.com/collections/safety-kits/products/big-bailer

Anybody have experience using these? Are they a viable alternative to hand pumps (that there never seem to be an ideal place for)?

I’ll pass
I’m trying to imagine bailing using a bag instead of pumping.Usually I only have the need when conditions are difficult. Seems like a bag would compound that.



Plus it has a whistle and who knows what else.

Ideal place for bilge pump…
Inside the kayak under the peak of the front deck.

A good bilge pump…
would be much faster.

Also if you are in the water beside your boat, it would be very difficult with a bag where it is easy with the pump.

Get a good pump with a large discharge , (not the little inch diameter one), and make sure it discharges on both the up and down pumping.



I keep mine under a bungee near the back of the boat, and it is never in the way.



jack L

If you want to bail, …
… use a rigid bailer with a handle on the side, so it works like scoop shovel. As you probably know, people in open boats have been cutting bleach bottles to make bailers for decades.



I can’t imagine any method of bailing that would be more difficult than using a collapsible bag.



For what it’s worth, throw bags should be able to carry water, bucket-style (that’s how you weight the bag for making additional throws if you miss on the first try), but anyone who markets a throw bag as being suitable for bailing is just hoping you don’t already know that and that you will think it sounds handy.

siphoning
might be more difficult (might).



I’m not sure if the bleach jug has ever been improved upon as mechanical bailer. It has a handle, it’s flexible so it conforms to the hull, and it comes free with every purchase of bleach or milk.

Compare…
Subtract the price of a used bleach bottle to the cost ($83.00 + S&H)) of the fancy(hype & BS) bailer they would love for you to buy.



The bleach bottle will work better, and so will a hand pump.



BOB

pail vs. pump
A pump can be inserted between a loosened skirt and you so you still have a reasonable seal to keep water out of the boat while you’re pumping. A pail can’t be used that way.



If you’re getting extra water in the boat and not in conditions that are rough you might just want to buy a skirt.



Bill H.

I was interested in that bailing bag too
Pumping out a lot of water is an incredible drag. So at times I carry along a bleach bottle bailer. But the trouble is, there’s no good place to carry the bailer unless you don’t mind looking like the Beverly Hillbillies in a kayak.(I tied mine to back deck bungees with a slip knot and reachable from my seat.) I thought a collapsible bailer with a stiff rim might be just the ticket – something that would lie flat on the deck under bungees but be ready to go when pulled out. I’m giving that Northwater bailer a look, at least online.