Bait tank

Once the basic cockpit refit had been completed, it was time to install the bait tank.  This was no small job because we had to fabricate the tank first and then integrate it into the transom wall without impacting the ability to fully open the cockpit fish box door and lean it in the open position.

We started with a Moller model 042284 40 gallon bait tank made of poly.  Of course, this is just a plastic tank that is low cost and built for function, not looks. It would be great as is on a smaller boat but needed a lot of work to come up to "fishing yacht" grade.

One of the challenges we knew we would have was to set it as far back into the transom wall as possible because if it jutted too far out the cockpit fish locker door would not open all the way.  We have seen large yachts with transom integrated bait tanks where the hatch only opens up half way and it was just really bad.  So we cut the ribs off both sides of the poly tank and then wrapped it with glass cloth and epoxy resin to make it water tight again.

Once this was done, we glued Coosa board to the top and bottom and then a router was used to trim off the excess:

At the end of the day we only wanted a half oval.  So we glued some temporary wood backing pieces in place per below.

We then then wrapped the front and sides of the unit with some of the thin glass sheet stock that we had been making ourselves for purposes just like this.  To make the sheet we just put down a nice big door and sprayed it with PVA before glassing down multiple layers of #17 cloth.

Using this sheet to bend around the poly tank gave us not only the side contour that we would need for integration, it also made the front of the unit smooth, even and free of dimensional defects that were part of the poly tank.

We then added the plumbing, embedding the overflow tubes carefully into a second layer of coosa on the top side.  You can see the circulation pump on the lower left of the far side of the tank.

Here's a better shot of the circulation pump.

With the bait tank fabrication complete it was time to integrate it into the transom wall. 

The transom cap and inner wall were cut away in order to make room for the tank and its plumbing.  Then we ground the edge of the wood cap at an angle in preparation for epoxy and glass integration with the tank.

But once we had the tank in place, it would not push back far enough to allow the fish box door to open.  So we cut away at the back lower side of the tank little by little until the tank pushed back far enough.  We probably only lost 3-4 gallons of capacity with this move but it pushed right back up against the thick back fiberglass wall of the transom where we knew we could glass it all up watertight and very strong again.

We glassed the back of the tank directly to the glass of the back transom wall for strength.  But then to provide a nice smooth bait friendly finish we used more of our pre-prepared glass sheet to cover the back and create a nice smooth curve back there.  The glass sheet was digitally highlighted in yellow below to make it more visible in the picture.

The inside was then filled and faired with TotalBoat epoxy filler and then gel coated to a nice smooth finish.

With the difficult part done, we glassed the exterior of the unit into place, filled, faired and gel coated in order to achieve the result shown below.  To be honest, it turned out even better than expected.  It looks like an original part of the boat and this might be the only classic commander with a transom integrated bait tank in the world today.  I have searched many pictures and never seen an old commander fitted out like this.  Some have mid deck tanks which look OK but most commander owners are not keen on chopping into their old classic boats and then having to match gel coat, etc.  We are gel coating the entire boat so that was not a big problem for us and we have no problem changing the style or the lines of the boat if it improves the utility of the boat to our purposes.

The little black circle in the shot from the transom side at left is the water jet aeration vent.


















Click here to see how we built built and installed the cockpit console.