How Much Capacity Is Really Needed?

[SoCalEDC]

Originally Posted by dapHBCM

I read somewhere about putting an electric bilge pump into the kayak instead of carrying a hand pump. The logic was that you will get fatigued from the hand pump ---- seems like overkill to me, but are people actually doing this?

I have not seen it. I just carry a big sponge. I did the manual bilge pump for a while but it slides around the inside of the hull to where it was mostly unreachable at times and if could finally reach it, its long and awkward to position it to comfortable pump water from between your legs out over the side. I tried to tie it a few times, and then the line would end up in the way of other stuff I wanted in the hull. The sponge doesn't take up much space and doesn't slide around. I just squeezed it between the bottom of the inside of the hull and the center hatch bucket of the kayak when I was on the wtaer and it never moved and was right where I needed it if I did. It also works great for rinsing stuff off. just dip it in the ocean, and then squeeze it over your legs to get the nasty blood from a flailing fish off.