Air Con Condensate

petem

petem

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Cotswolds / Altea
www.fairlineownersclub.com
I have a horrible feeling that my A/C has been installed with the condensate draining into the bilges. Like all of us I prefer my bilges to be bone dry. A couple of questions...

1) Am I worrying about nothing and the condensation will be so trivial that it's not an issue?
2) What's the right way to drain the condensate? I can't recall if the A/C unit drip tray has a drain plug or whether however the spec of the unit ("Marine Air" Dash Air VLD Low-Profile) states:

* 304-grade stainless-steel drain pan for long service life.
* Stainless-steel condensate drains for excellent water removal.

I assume that the optimum solution is to plumb the condensate drain into the same box as the heads shower / sink?

Thanks.
 
Mine drain into show type collector boxes

The volume of water can be huge.

I had one fail on current boat. 7 full wet vacs to remove. The boat is smaller but the condensate volume will still be large.
 
jrudge said:
Mine drain into show type collector boxes

The volume of water can be huge.

I had one fail on current boat. 7 full wet vacs to remove. The boat is smaller but the condensate volume will still be large.
Click to expand...
Pete, yes drain into a shower type collector dump as jrudge says. And yes the volume is huge in Med summer. There is normally a drain plug in the drip tray of your air con unit that is bsp threaded, and it is meant to be replaced by a brass hose nipple bought from eg ASAP and then you jubilee clip the drain hose to that.
Remember that in all these sump units the Chinesey float switches fail often, e.g. every year. Annoying. Best to have spares.
 
jfm said:
Pete, yes drain into a shower type collector dump as jrudge says. And yes the volume is huge in Med summer. There is normally a drain plug in the drip tray of your air con unit that is bsp threaded, and it is meant to be replaced by a brass hose nipple bought from eg ASAP and then you jubilee clip the drain hose to that.
Remember that in all these sump units the Chinesey float switches fail often, e.g. every year. Annoying. Best to have spares.
Click to expand...

I have had 2 go so far in this boat. How something so simple can go wrong so often and ( given its simplicity ) be effectively non repairable is a mystery. ASAP charge £120 ish. Mallorca e250. Take your pick !
 
jfm said:
There is normally a drain plug in the drip tray of your air con unit that is bsp threaded, and it is meant to be replaced by a brass hose nipple bought from eg ASAP and then you jubilee clip the drain hose to that.
Click to expand...

Thanks JFM. Next time I'm on board I'll check that that the area below the tray is open and will let me access the drain plug (and not on a shelf or something).
 
1) Am I worrying about nothing and the condensation will be so trivial that it's not an issue ?
Hi Pete
A 14000 btu system can produce 2 ltr’s per hour depending on run time and humidity
So a gravity drain from the condensate pan to a suitable outlet is very important mine as others have said discharges into the shower reservoir pump, drain pan connectors are readily available in many sizes and configurations.
 
Has this not just been installed? I seem to remember hull fittings for AC but maybe I am wrong.

If so, can you not just call the installer and then berate them of they have been lazy!

The S65 used to have fresh water in the bilge. Try and try and try no one could find out why - It was under warranty so JR was not going to get his screwdriver out or i could be blamed! It was in my view 95% likely as AC condensate. Most times we went out there was enough water to trigger the blige pump alarm for a few seconds. It triggers post 20 seconds or something so 25 secs of a large bilge pump.

I didnt know 2l ph for 14,000 btu. We we 50,000 btu odd so call it 5l ph x 24 hrs - 120 litre per day - sounds about right.

Think of it this way if you run it at anchor its a cheap but slow water maker!
 
jrudge said:
Has this not just been installed? I seem to remember hull fittings for AC but maybe I am wrong.

If so, can you not just call the installer and then berate them of they have been lazy!

The S65 used to have fresh water in the bilge. Try and try and try no one could find out why - It was under warranty so JR was not going to get his screwdriver out or i could be blamed! It was in my view 95% likely as AC condensate. Most times we went out there was enough water to trigger the blige pump alarm for a few seconds. It triggers post 20 seconds or something so 25 secs of a large bilge pump.

I didnt know 2l ph for 14,000 btu. We we 50,000 btu odd so call it 5l ph x 24 hrs - 120 litre per day - sounds about right.

Think of it this way if you run it at anchor its a cheap but slow water maker!
Click to expand...

Ah .... well, A/C was fitted in the UK and was tested using hoses. I didn't want to pay for a £500 UK lift and block off just to have the thru hulls putting in so this was done when the boat was lifted for the other sea cocks to be replaced (by another contractor in Spain). To be honest, even if the job had been completed in the UK I wouldn't have used the A/C in the winter so may not have noticed the issue then. As usual, the A/C installation company that I used are supposed to be specialists and a form that came highly recommended.

Pete
 
Would not worry about it Pete :)
As long as it actually gets out of the pan .
By which I mean the exit ( usually one corner ) needs to be the lowest spot .
Prob with a small boat , depending on how much and where your cruising clobber is stored there may be a slight list @ the berth .
This means water could pool at the wrong end of the tray and when you start to turn or get some wash it tips to the drain and all of it can,t get out fast enough so spills out on top of what ever it’s situated.

We have 3 air handlers , one discharge s into a shower sump ( Atwood ) .Tbo has been reliable.
The other two into the engine room bilge between the engines .
Here we have two 1000 L/h auto pumps , at each end with those electronic sensor switches.
To test I just dab a wet cloth across the electrodes .They are about €65 each .No moving parts .
One is on a variable adjustable mount. The rear one , that gets it when we start to plane .
There’s a manual switch on the helm along with indicating lights too.
Some times when hosing tge cockpit area down vigorously beacause the area is basically two massive removable hatches
( easy engine removal) there are rubber seals that keep water out .
Inevitably some gets into the ER and in a big beam sea the air vent drains so for me it’s not a biggie adding a bit more water from the air handlers.
Prob with the shower sump route as well as they are flimsy ( JFM allready pointed. Out ) you hear them when they trigger off .Our AC is super silent so we have the luxury of running it when; we sleep the only noise is as mentioned the shower sump -fwd cabin running every say hour or so ,
So for me it’s 6 of one 1/2 dozen of another .
If you adjust ( if the bilge route ) the guard to trigger higher then that’s better , but then on reflection the noise issue for you is probably a none starter if you have std domtec self’s contained units - as you won,t hear the pump anyhow over the racket !
 
It is also worthwhile purchasing a decent AC unit cleaner. The condensate if left to lie builds up what is known in the trade as 'elephant snot', and with good reason. This can block drain pan drain holes and is a place for significant volumes of some very nasty bugs to thrive.

Something like this - not cheap but very effective ...

https://www.kooltech.co.uk/refriger...ineering-condencide-coil-cleaner-5-litre-p480

As an alternative a regular aggressive bleach solution will reduce bacterial build up, but avoid anything that will attack the delicate aluminium finning on the evaporator coils.
 
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