Used Redlyme

[Halo]

I set up a nice little rig to run redlyme solution through the sea water side of my heat exchanger earlier today. It worked great. After 2 hours I drained the redlyme into a container and flushed through.
The question arises about what to do with the redlyme. Two litres were diluted to half strength. I expect that there is plenty of ooomph left in the solution.
1. How long will it keep? It’s supposed to be biodegradable
2. What else to do with it - I had thought of putting it down the head to hopefully clear out some wee residue
Any ideas?
Many thanks

 

[chris-s]

Got any outboards to flush?

 

[westernman]

Probably the way which does the least harm is to chuck it in the sea. It will rapidly dilute.

Other ways of disposal such as flushing it down the marina loos (which may upset the balance of enzymes in the sewage works) or almost anything else are probably more harmful.

 

[vyv_cox]

It is hydrochloric acid. After two hours it may well be completely neutralised but putting it down the toilet will do no harm and may well do good. Add slowly and give it time to do something.
The sea is heavy in chlorides so adding a bit more has no ecological negatives.

 

[Fr J Hackett]

If you wish to neutralise it chuck in some washing soda if you can find it or baking soda if you can't which will be expensive as you may have to use a bit, if you have access to limestone chippings of someones drive they will do perfectly, when it's stopped fizzing it will be neutralised. Alternatively as suggested you can just flush it into the sea where it won't make a jot of difference.

 

[Jon magowan]

Hello Halo, this is my first winter with my Bavaria boat. (Volvo Penta D1-30). I’m really interested to know about how you did this. I have a lot to learn and I haven’t done this before. If you wouldn’t mind could you describe how you set this up please. I would really appreciate it. Thank you !

 

[Halo]

Hello Halo, this is my first winter with my Bavaria boat. (Volvo Penta D1-30). I’m really interested to know about how

 

[Halo]

Hi Jon

First thing is do you need to do it? Today was the first time I have done it after 17 years use and many thousands of miles. Even then it was preventive rather than solving a problem.

I did the treatment on the seawater side of the heat exchanger using a bucket,a £10 12v water pump ( Amazon “

12V Water Pump Submersible Caravan Camper Motorhome High Flow Whale Pump”. )

and some plastic tube fitted to the pump outlet

My boat has a Yanmar 3ym30 so not like yours but the principles are the same. What I did was

1 shut off the sea cock

2 take off the top end of the hose connected from the outlet of the heat exchanger just before it goes into the anti siphon valve ( about the same height as the strainer) Leave the bottom of the hose connected

3 take off the inlet hose at the sea water pump end. ( hope you have shut off the water!) leave the other end

4 hook the inlet hose over the bucket. To make this happen I used the released jubilee clip to attach the blade end of a heavy screwdriver to the end of the hose so the weight of the screwdriver bent over the hose

5 hopefully the bucket is lower than the top of the outlet pipe so that if you pour water into the outlet pipe it goes through the heat exchanger and into the bucket

6 I poured hot water through from the kettle to warm things up a bit

7 half fill the bucket with water and put the pump into the water with the electric water pump outlet pipe going into the inlet hose of the heat exchanger

8 switch on and water should circulate around the system. If this works ok then empty the bucket , put it in place and then add the redlyme and extra water (50/50 mix)

9Switch on and leave running for 2 h

10 empty bucket and flush with water

11 re fix hoses and run engine to be sure system is flushed

12 in my case I was surprised that the redlyme was black when it came out of the container and it bubbled through out the treatment

Hope this helps

 

[Scubadoo]

Hello Halo, this is my first winter with my Bavaria boat. (Volvo Penta D1-30). I’m really interested to know about how you did this. I have a lot to learn and I haven’t done this before. If you wouldn’t mind could you describe how you set this up please. I would really appreciate it. Thank you !

You may find this how to YouTube video a useful guide

 

[Jon magowan]

Thanks Halo and Scubadoo. Very helpful indeed.

 

[Jon magowan]

Quick question though. Is it worth removing the thermostat ?
Presumably since the engine is cold a lot of the circulating water will bypass the heat exchanger since the cold thermostat will be shut and not allowing water to flow through the heat exchanger ?

 

[VicS]

Quick question though. Is it worth removing the thermostat ?
Presumably since the engine is cold a lot of the circulating water will bypass the heat exchanger since the cold thermostat will be shut and not allowing water to flow through the heat exchanger ?

ITYWF the above discussions are about cleaning the seawater side of the cooling system, which is not controlled by the thermostat.

 

[Jon magowan]

Now I feel stupid !
thanks VicS.

 

[oldmanofthehills]

I set up a nice little rig to run redlyme solution through the sea water side of my heat exchanger earlier today. It worked great. After 2 hours I drained the redlyme into a container and flushed through.
The question arises about what to do with the redlyme. Two litres were diluted to half strength. I expect that there is plenty of ooomph left in the solution.
1. How long will it keep? It’s supposed to be biodegradable
2. What else to do with it - I had thought of putting it down the head to hopefully clear out some wee residue
Any ideas?
Many thanks

Seawater contains lots of calcium carbonate, which is how corals and seasnails build their shells, so pouring your acid directly into sea has it rapidly neutralised. Alternatively use the waste to clean sea toilet as the alkali nature of urine causes calcium carbonate from flushing seawater to come out of solution and fur up the pipe. Will keep fine in plastic bottles until needed.