Live Bait Tank

[Kearnsy]

Hello I am in the process of shopping around looking for a plastic barrel or tank that I can add a pump etc and build my own livie tank . I am looking for something with a minimum of 50 lts going into a 17 foot seafarer . Has anyone found a suitable item that they can share ? I have seen the ones that whitworths sell and they seem pretty good but I like the idea of custom building my own and adding a deck wash function .

Cheers
Kearnsy

[Out-Station]

Kernsy, like you say there are some good commercially made ones out there but all at a price. In my old tinny i built one out of a pal dog biscuits drum (bright yellow plastic number with a screw on lid), about 40 litres and it worked great. An old esky can work well,and being square sometimes wastes less space. Heaps of options out there, i've made a couple and i always ended up with a plastic screw top drum because of the easily sealed lid factor.

Cheer's Scott

[Seahorse]

i made my own with a 25 lit esky.
works well.

[Scott79]

I haven't done it, but if you are considering using an esky take a look at a Willow "Quick Serve". It's 44L and has a separate 'hatch' on the lid, really simple to open and eliminates the need to take the lid off every time you need to get a bait out.

Scott.

[Midnight]

I used to use a 50L eskey, but found that the Slimies would bury their noses into the rounded corner and paddle away until the quickly died. Yakkas weren't a problem, but slimies need to swim a lot more.

I made my new one out of a 60L home brew barrel. The water goes in through the tap fitting in the bottom and out through 2 one inch hose tails about 4 inches from the top. It gets a nice whirlpool going in it and the Slimies can do laps all day.
Much better.

A mate has a 25L barrel (water drum from BCF) with a 800GPH pump running it and he has no problems. It is more about water flow rate and the ability of the baits to keep swimming than the capacity of the tank it seems to me.

Cheers,
Myles

[Horse]

Myles is spot on as to the shape. Round or oval works best. I have used 40l screw top drums successfully. I had both inlet and overflow near the top of the drum and had no problems. A 360l/m or a 500l/m pump will keep everything quite happy. I currently have a built in square setup and it does not keep large Slimies very well as they get stuck in the corners. Small and medium sized ones are fine though along with Yakkas and Pike

[Kearnsy]

Yeah thanks I can get my hands on a 60lt round pvc drum with a screw on lid from a company called Reflex . It looks the goods , I just have to find a way to secure it properly so that it doesn't tip in a swell.

[Midnight]

Gday,
I just use a bit of non slip rubber mat under the base and two 1" wide cam-lock tie down straps top and bottom where the little "step" is in the sides of the drum.

It never moves.

I have seen permanent installations where inch wide aluminium strap was used in the same positions I mentioned.

Cheers,
Myles

[Rainbowrunner]

I use a 70lt drum bought at army surplus shop kipparing, tied down and plumbed as see in my video on my webpage, fed with a bilge pump mounted outside boat.

[Kearnsy]

Hey Pete ,
I tried to look at your vid of the bait tank but couldn't find it , I want to see how it is strapped down mate.
Cheers Brad

[gazza2006au]

ebay has plenty of plastic drums they only cost around $10 and have only been used for food i made a live bait tank out of the smaller 60L drum for my old 5.6m boat worked a treat

[trueblue]

I just put another live bait tank on my boat, used a 40 litre poly ice box with a hinged lid.

I was going to do the round drum thing, but opted for the box as I put it out on the back board to store the para anchor in, but it also doubles as an extra live well as I have plumbed it up

[the baker]

Kearnsy,

Mate I have just made one for the boat, seriously use a round drum the bait does not knock it's self around. I used a 50lt olive drum inlet through the bottom with a non-return valve on it so it won't siphon out. A 40mm outlet at the top, with a 500gph attwood tsunami bait pump.

[Rainbowrunner]

Hey Pete ,
I tried to look at your vid of the bait tank but couldn't find it , I want to see how it is strapped down mate.
Cheers Brad

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U_dLAKPXiA