Cleaning the Water Tanks

Aboard JonNe', we are blessed with two 75 gallon st/stl water tanks.  When we purchased the boat in 2005, we installed a new water filtration system for the fresh water consumption aboard.  I had never really thought about the idea before, and Renne' and I had both chosen NOT to drink the water aboard either her Irwin 37 or my CT-41.  If we were moving aboard, however, we felt it was necessary to  have palatable water that we could drink, cook, and bathe with.  So we set out to find a good system.

After searching for a while, our next door neighbors, Al and Sue McDonald, owners the Mountain Valley Spring Water distributorship in Houston, Tx, set us on a research project that included reading up on water safety and health issues in potable (drinkable) water offered from various municipalities.  Al was out working on his water filtration system installed in their townhouse, and he had filled several white, 3-gallon buckets of water:  one was from the tap, one was from the filtered water after I believe three months or so, and one from a freshly changed filter system.  I was astonished when I noticed the differences.  The one from the tap was quite yellow, the freshly changed filtered water was beautifully clear, and the one after a three month period looked as though it needed to be changed, but was no where near the tap water. 

After looking at our budget, we purchase the same system, modified to fit in our boat, was installed under a cabinet in the after stateroom.

This is a bank of three 4" x 10" filters.  A 5 micron Spun Poly/Melt Blown Sediment Filter;

a MatriKX CTO+ Charcoal filter for filtering out chlorine and a bunch of other chemicals, taste and odor;

and a Centaur Carbon Cartridge which contains catalytically charged carbon designed for chloramine and chemical reduction.  This cartridge is for communities which use chloramine rather than chlorine for chemical cleansing of their municipal water systems.

So all of our water is filtered extremely well prior to it getting to us.  I have noticed that the sediment filter has been discolored and had to change the filter every three months or so.  The discoloration was from surface corrosion in the st/stl water tanks and the fact the tanks were installed in Taiwan in 1985, and probably never cleaned.  So this week, I decided to open the water tanks to find out what the issue was.

This is what I found:

I know, I know, it doesn't look real good.  But it is just surface corrosion, and now I know what the issue is.  I didn't really realize how large two 75 gallon tanks are until I realized that on either side of this are two baffles that open up (you can see the jagged holes exposed that the camera is looking through:

 

Those had to be cleaned too.  I went to the Dollar Store and bought a cheapo ($1.00) mop and cut off the handle.  I then proceeded to scrub all of the corrosion off.  Fortunately, it came off with no difficulty. When I finished, the tanks actually looked really good!

 

These aren't the finished, but you get the idea.  For some reason, I didn't bother to get the finished look.  Oh well!  The good news is, although the corrosion was removed by the filters originally, the sediment filter should now last a bit longer than 3 months.

 

I changed the sediment filter when I finished this job.  Now, realize this has got to be 10 times worse than usual, but this is all of the corrosion material that actually came through the tanks while I was cleaning:

 

New One

 

Old One!!

 

So we now have even BETTER water!

 

So we will be out on the sand bar this evening!  Come join us for sundowners - just a photo to give you an idea of where we will be. 

 

 

Ya'll come back now, ya hear!

 

JonNe'

Retirement - Ain't It Grand!!

October 11, 2013

I just can't believe it is October, and it is almost time for FantasyFest here in Key West!!  If you haven't heard of this great adventure in debauchery, Google "Fantasy Fest 2013".

I woke up this morning, realizing again, what a lucky fella I am to be here in retirement with this incredibly beautiful lady!

 With my cup of morning coffee, I climbed into the cockpit and looked around JonNe' and love the site of the other boats here in the marina

 

 

I started this morning working on the electrical system again.  I rerouted all of the connections, by removing them from the battery posts and installing them on separate terminal buss bars. I was excited I had finished them, bu I hadn't installed the covers to the battery connections yet, so that got done today.

 





 

We are pretty much self-sufficient, from the standpoint of converting fresh water from salt water, and we are "Green" as we are using both wind and solar power.  I decided yesterday to begin testing the systems to determine if they actually were working.  In fact, the solar panel is making electricity, but not enough to sustain our usage, so I will be adding another unit probably before we leave.  As far as wind power is concerned, the wind generator is DOA!  Dead On Arrival!!

 

Doggone it!  We just had this repaired about 10 months ago.  If you look in the picture above, of the battery connections, you will see a silver cable running along the top of the picture.  This is the grounding line I added today to ground the solar and wind power tower on the aft of JonNe'.  I also ended up scraping the corrosion off the connectors, one of which was the wind generator that make up the earth ground.  After talking with the folks at www.altestore.com, where I bought both the solar panel and wind generator, it is possible the wind generator may have been the victim of a nearby lightening strike.  Not close enough to affect the boat, but enough to kill the electronics in the generator.  Now I have to pull it down AGAIN and get it repaired!  This will be the second time this has been repaired!  I am thinking I am going to go with another unit!  Perhaps a D-400.

 

Have you ever found something on the internet that is so pervasive that you just have to try it??  I have run across several references to a thread penetrant that is even more invasive and much better than WD-40 and a host of other materials.  So I thought I would try it.  I went out and bought a small spray bottle yesterday at the dollar store, stopped by Home Depot and picked up a quart container of Acetone (which I hate to use), and mixed 50/50 Acetone and Dextron Transmission fluid, which I had left over from my last diesel engine transmission.  As I shook the two chemicals, they wouldn't mix, and I am thinking this was a bust!  Then globs of something began to materialize in the spray bottle!  I said this is "No Good"!  But I had bought the stuff, so I sprayed it on the threads of the propane bottle and regulator that were corroded together from our propane grill.  Got two wrenches out, and voila', they came apart! pretty easily. It actually worked!  Hmmm, maybe the internet has
"Some" things that are worthwhile.  Apparently the Acetone and Transmission Fluid mix well enough they penetrate the threads, then the acetone evaporates and the threads get slippery.  Hmmm!

 

Okay, another interesting thing:  I know everyone reading this has spent hours looking for something, tearing apart all of the known places that it might be, only to find it the last place you look.  Ever wonder what everything you look for is ALWAYS in the last place you look?  That is because you FIND it and stop looking!!!  LOL!

 

Anyway that happened again today!  I tore the boat apart looking for my little container of Lanocote.  This is a product, ideal for boats, and is used when two metals (aluminum and steel) are going to be, let's say, screwed together.  Because of the chemical makeup of the two dissimilar metals, they corrode very quickly in the salt air.  By putting some lanocote on the threads of whatever you are screwing together, there is a barrier between the materials and they don't corrode.  Very Simple!  Except when you can't find the stuff!!  So an hour and a half looking in every nook and cranny, including every box of tools and materials we have aboard, thinking the "Ghost of Christmas Past" was giddy with retaliation, I finally found it at my feet in a tool bag I had already been in twice today!!  I decided at that point it was time for a Yingleung Beer, and I quit working!!

 

Enough for today.  Gotta get ready to take my bride out to dinner.

 

Have a great day, and come on down tomorrow and meet us Sundowners here at the dock!  We will let the guards at the gate know you are coming.

 

Jon and Renne'

abrd s/v JonNe'

Our Incredible AquaMarine Watermaker

We are so blessed to have friends and acquaintances in the cruising arena who are willing to listen and help solve issues that occur on the boat.  It is not as though either Renne' or I had been born with knowledge of how to solve many of these problems.  Renne' and I both owned our own cruising sailboats prior to our meeting, but actually getting ready to cruise, and actually being out on deep, blue water cruising, has given us a perspective of maintenance and repairs well beyond what we possessed previously.

When we returned from our cruise to The Bahamas earlier this year, I let the watermaker sit for three months knowing I should run it every few weeks to make sure the Reverse Osmosis (R/O) membrane didn't get ruined by just sitting and growing bacteria.  In July, I finally decided I needed to run the unit.  After running it for several hours, Renne' smelled an odor originating from our watermaker a/c motor/high pressure pump locker.  Accessing the locker, I discovered high pressure salt water spewing from a crack in the output hose connector from the pump housing to the R/O membrane.

Water was everywhere, and the heat buildup in the locker had evaporated the saltwater on the motor housing, in the housing, and on everything around the motor housing, including most of the electrical connections (ac and dc).  I quickly turned off all of the electricity serving the watermaker and began the cleanup.  But that was Summer.

We had a two week trip to make, and I called the AquaMarine Watermaker Manufacturer, asking him for advice.  Dan suggested pouring a gallon or so of fresh water over the pump and all connections to flush the salt away to ensure minimal corrosion.  I was hesitant, but got a couple of gallons of water and literally drenched the motor, pump, connections, locker, etc., and left on our trip.

In September, I again contacted Dan, at AquaMarine, and arranged for him to send me a new high pressure connector to replace the cracked one. It arrived. I again procrastinated with the repair.  Today is October  9th. I began work on the watermaker again. I called Dan one more time about replacing the connector, and with his guidance, I removed the inner, faulty hose fitting, dipped just the new inner fitting in Glycerin, and reinstalled the connector, hand-tightened the connection, and turned on the motor. Voila', it worked! I did have to tighten the nut with a wrench slightly, per Dan's recommendation, but it was finished. As I added pressure, I did notice a bad water feed hose and replaced it and another hose with a better grade, and turned the motor on again.

We are now making 23 gallons of wonderfully sweet, fresh water an hour and filling the port tank with 75 gallons.  I again am surprised the R/O membrane continues to make fresh water with less than 275 ppm at very near the rated 24 gph that it did when we first installed the unit 3 years ago.   And that with letting it stand unattended for nearly 5 months.  From here on out, we will be filling both tanks as the starboard one empties, and continue making fresh water vs using city water here at the marina.   I am amazed sometimes, that I can do things like this!  Oh, and so is Renne'. LOL!