Toilets

[Deleted User YDKXO]

+1 for Tecma. Apart from one failed electric panel, never had a problem on 4 boats fitted with these units. Dont seem to use a lot of water for flushing either. Add a Gianneschi pump for the holding tank discharge and you'll have a pretty bombproof system

 

[jfm]

Happy to accept it is 20s not 40s. My mistake. Seems like an eternity when you're waiting for it

Watermakers: I'm worried by your thinking here Hurricane. They never make the rated output in salty Med. In my first s78 I got the standard option 140lph. It made 100 in the salty med, maybe 110. In my second build I specced a double, 280lph nominal, 200-220 real. Much better. Something like 60lph nominal is a waste of time imho. You need a big one. Run it a couple of hours and you're good for the day. Also if you run out of water (guest leaves tap on, or you just forget), normal service is resumed for everyone (ie WCs flush, and Porto's bottom gets jetwashed) within about 20 minutes, not a couple of hours

They are noisy, which is another reason to get a big one, ie less running time. Mine is in e/room which is well insulated. I definitely wouldn't put it under the floor in forward part of boat imho.

All that means genset power not 24v DC/inverter, obviously

FWIW mine is HRO Seafari and I'm very pleased with it and would spec it again. But there are other good brands too. I have a soft start unit for the big AC motor so as to allow remote one-button start but not shock the membranes on start up.

The water quality is a delight. Much nicer than town mains water.

 

[jrudge]

I know this is drifting the thread but just quickly.
I'm considering a DC water maker - something around 60l per hour - maybe less.
Lots of water to go under the bridge on this subject but it seems that I could run something for 10a to 20a
DC because it would then run under all circumstances - with or without the generator - with or without the solar panels - and under way with the engines powering it.
There is an interesting option of incorporating 2 pumps - one pump 30l per hour (10a) - two pumps 60l per hour (10a)
Using this, the solar panels could power a single pump with the second pump when water was required quicker.
All just a thinking stage at the moment.

Go for ac and the most per hour you can aford. We did 120lph Jfm told me to do 240 lph. No prizes for who was right

 

[vas]

Happy to accept it is 20s not 40s. My mistake. Seems like an eternity when you're waiting for it

Watermakers: I'm worried by your thinking here Hurricane. They never make the rated output in salty Med. In my first s78 I got the standard option 140lph. It made 100 in the salty med, maybe 110. In my second build I specced a double, 280lph nominal, 200-220 real. Much better. Something like 60lph nominal is a waste of time imho. .

John, the salty Med is also hot, so you do get a 10% increase from the normal 25C rating by running at 28C, which seems to compensate for the saltyness. I was slightly confused to get around 32-35lph on my rated 200gpd HRO...

Go for ac and the most per hour you can aford. We did 120lph Jfm told me to do 240 lph. No prizes for who was right

fully agree, being a cheapskate only managed to find on ebay a 30odd lph HRO, now that I established the thing works, I'm trying to find a longer pressure vessel and a new 80lph DOW RO membrane for next year. If I also manage to fit a 80lt 240V freezer I have leftover at home in the lazarette I'll be able to spend over a week in a nice remote anchorage away from ports and still burn 200lt of water a day without problems! (water tank is 500lt...)

V.

 

[MapisM]

All that means genset power not 24v DC/inverter, obviously

J, I fully agree on "the larger the better" principle, but an interesting setup is the one Mr.P retrofitted in his ORY, with two identical watermakers, nominal 350 lph each. Yes, 700 total, not a typo - he loves redundancy!
He told me that he can run one of them with no genset while underway, courtesy of some large inverters and upgraded Balmar alternators. He designed specifically the system that way because he hates to have anything running while anchored - and of course at 10kts or so he spends more hours cruising than you normally would with a P boat.
Not sure about the amps required, but fwiw the machines he installed are built by HP Watermakers.
Just saying - I don't think such setup could run out of solar panels+batteries alone, anyway. Not for any meaningful time, at least.

 

[Hurricane]

Not convinced - yet.
We have a slightly different situation.
On one side of the arguement, we would need water made whilst we are charging batteries (about 3 or 4 hours a day) and that means high capacity water maker.
On the other side of the arguement, I think we could make water from the solar panels at a slower rate.

I also have a nagging issue in my mind that we don't actually need a water maker at all - just like the previous 10 summer seasons - just pop in and collect water when we need it. SWMBO and I, on our own, can easily run for a week and a half on a tank of water.

Anyway, early days in the planning at the moment.
If this idea goes any further, I will start another thread.

 

[jfm]

J, I fully agree on "the larger the better" principle, but an interesting setup is the one Mr.P retrofitted in his ORY, with two identical watermakers, nominal 350 lph each. Yes, 700 total, not a typo - he loves redundancy!
He told me that he can run one of them with no genset while underway, courtesy of some large inverters and upgraded Balmar alternators. He designed specifically the system that way because he hates to have anything running while anchored - and of course at 10kts or so he spends more hours cruising than you normally would with a P boat.
Not sure about the amps required, but fwiw the machines he installed are built by HP Watermakers.
Just saying - I don't think such setup could run out of solar panels+batteries alone, anyway. Not for any meaningful time, at least.

Wow! On a 6-berth boat! I admire Mr P's original thinking but of course some of this is "each to their own" stuff. I wouldn't do as he has done, but respect to the guy for analysing what he wants and doing it.

I'd be interested in his engine vs genset hours. I consider myself a low genset user - I use it every day, but hardly ever overnight, so I don't have the thousands of hours that you see on other boats. I wonder if Mr P is much much lower, as a result of his quest to use batteries only when at rest. I'm 5 seasons, 645 engine hours and 800+1100 hours on my two gensets

 

[rafiki_]

I'm 5 seasons, 645 engine hours and 800+1100 hours on my two gensets

Wow, time for a new build thread then :encouragement:

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

Happy to accept it is 20s not 40s. My mistake. Seems like an eternity when you're waiting for it

Watermakers: I'm worried by your thinking here Hurricane. They never make the rated output in salty Med. In my first s78 I got the standard option 140lph. It made 100 in the salty med, maybe 110. In my second build I specced a double, 280lph nominal, 200-220 real. Much better. Something like 60lph nominal is a waste of time imho.

Agreed. I fitted an Idromar 130lph watermaker in my boat before last season and to be honest I dont think we used it more than twice to make water in the whole season. Its reputedly an excellent unit but with such a limited output it would take 8 hrs of run time to fill my tank. Then of course I need to run my generator to power the watermaker and the unit itself is quite noisy. Apart from that the start up and autoflush process at the end is a faff. It is just easier and a whole lot quicker to fill the water tank in a marina

Having said that, I'm pleased that I have it as an emergency back stop in case I do run out of water but I wish I'd bought a bigger unit to make the whole process quicker and therefore the unit would get a lot more use

 

[MapisM]

Wow! On a 6-berth boat!

Well, actually he specced the finishing of the whole crew area astern (with its two cabins) having in mind to use it also for guests, so I believe they often are a party of 8+ onboard.
Anyway, yeah, the watermaker setup is definitely a bit OTT - also by his own admission, btw...

No idea about his current hours status, neither mains nor gensets. Will ask on the 1st occasion.
Just curious, why the 30% difference between your gensets?
Aren't they of the same power, hence interchangeable?

 

[IDAMAY]

It's at time like this I wish it was possible to 'unread' a post!

My SWMBO said she would like to be able to "unhear" a post too.

 

[silverdee]

+1 FOR TECHMA. First thing we did with Silver E was rip out the Sealand vac 4x and miles of associated junk and fit 4x freshwater Techmas. Only had the vac flush things for delivery trip from Palma but they blocked twice, leaked and stank. No trouble with new ones bar someone putting 10 tampons in 1- yep you have to lift the whole unit up but easy enough. (passenger -re-educated). Gained a load of hold space and a lot less smell. ASAP Supplies were great on price and we took em all out to France in a van. One wouldn`t fit so ASAP kindly took it back and I got another with the smaller bowl and cut- angled- back locally- much more expensive -welcome to S of F .

 

[jfm]

Just curious, why the 30% difference between your gensets?
Aren't they of the same power, hence interchangeable?

My thinking- and I'm happy to hear a better idea- is always to have one say 300 hours ahead of the other. They are identical and from the same build month, so if any part fails on the high hours machine I can fix it AND buy the same part for the low hours one then install it 299 hours later. I'm not saying this is perfect science but it keeps me mildly amused!

 

[MapisM]

LOL, and here I was, wondering if you just didn't care to keep both used about in the same way, as I've always seen done by most folks with twin gensets...
Respect! And nope, no better ideas. :encouragement:

 

[MapisM]

No trouble with new ones bar someone putting 10 tampons in 1

Well, if it took no less than 10 of the things to disable the toilet, maybe what I heard about the more recent Tecma's pumps not being as good as they used to be ain't so true, all considered...

 

[petem]

My thinking- and I'm happy to hear a better idea- is always to have one say 300 hours ahead of the other. They are identical and from the same build month, so if any part fails on the high hours machine I can fix it AND buy the same part for the low hours one then install it 299 hours later. I'm not saying this is perfect science but it keeps me mildly amused!

Brilliant!

 

[vas]

My thinking- and I'm happy to hear a better idea- is always to have one say 300 hours ahead of the other. They are identical and from the same build month, so if any part fails on the high hours machine I can fix it AND buy the same part for the low hours one then install it 299 hours later. I'm not saying this is perfect science but it keeps me mildly amused!

Interesting...

Why don't you apply the same "logic" to your main engines then J.?

 

[Hurricane]

My thinking- and I'm happy to hear a better idea- is always to have one say 300 hours ahead of the other. They are identical and from the same build month, so if any part fails on the high hours machine I can fix it AND buy the same part for the low hours one then install it 299 hours later. I'm not saying this is perfect science but it keeps me mildly amused!

Yea but - in this particular case, that concept doesn't work for the heat exchangers that fail over time - about 8 years.
However, I do like the thinking.

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

My thinking- and I'm happy to hear a better idea- is always to have one say 300 hours ahead of the other. They are identical and from the same build month, so if any part fails on the high hours machine I can fix it AND buy the same part for the low hours one then install it 299 hours later. I'm not saying this is perfect science but it keeps me mildly amused!

I used to have a customer like that. If a part failed on one of his machines he'd buy 2 replacement parts, one to replace the part that had failed and one to keep in stock in case it failed on another machine. Thats how I managed to afford to buy my first boat

 

[silverdee]

I didn`t know i was a customer of yours Mike.