Water Supply for Boat/Freshwater Filtering?

A few. Please define <...expensive...>?

"Please define <...expensive...>"

Hard to tell, probably not as much as keeping a horse!

As a matter of fact, defining this in $Ar makes no sense: for some reasons far beyond my comprehension and will, filters down here cost 4 or 5 times more than in the US or Europe.

Due to the amount of clay / mud in the water the first filters of the row will get useless / clogged after some few hundreds of gallons.

1 filter per trip. Can't beat that.

One per trip! too expensive!!!!

Investment in more plant will probably fail this test too, then. The problem is therefore constrained beyond the point where a solution can be found.

<unsubscribes>

Going solo is a way to reduce water consumption.

Are you suggesting to throw her overboard?

Go without her.

Just from time to time, as her incessant natter makes her dehydrate, with a rope so you do not lose her...

Well, there is plenty of water overboard.

The human body contains 50 to 75% water by weight, just saying. Good knowledge in a survival situation.

So you are advocating for the good doctor's wife to become a vampire and suck the water out of him?

It reminds me of the salt vampire episode on Star Trek. God, I wish I could un-see that image of a hybrid between a woman and a lamprey!

I'm advocating that the apparent primary water waster learn to be responsible or suffer for her actions.

The same thing we all need to do yet less and less see their problems as being their responsibility to take care of.

I don't know if I would drink river water. I once dropped a camera in the river, and when I fished it out, the film was developed...

Hmmmm. Did it have a fisheye lens?

Ha!

A collapsible bladder tank might work...space is always a problem on a boat....

http://www.turtlepac.com/

http://atlinc.com/custom-fuelocker-marine-fuel-bladders.html

I have also considered this option, I´ll give it a second look!

You might try a small set up using a zeolite filter instead of sand media, but have the filter at least one meter depth, with addition of UV or chlorine upstream of the filter. You can use your pump for back-washing the filter. Once through that filter, I would use a small RO system with carbon filter (to remove chlorine), and the membrane will help further remove any issue with bacterial cysts, viruses, toxic metals, etc.

I heard about zeolite, but have no experience. Will read about this product. Not sure if such filters are available here, also will find out! THANKS

Surely you could import some bags of zeolite.

<...too expensive...> !

compare that to the price of Dengue fever! Malaria, etc. , Cholera, Cryptosporidium infestation. Zeolite is way cheap, and so is bleach.

Right, but fortunately besides some sporadic cases of Dengue Fever, we do not have the other diseases!

Zeolite is a trade mark; I knew (and used) the stuff it under it´s "real" name: Diatom, which is a fine white powder.

Diatomite (diatomaceous earth) is one way to go. What I was referring to is actual mineral zeolite filter media:

this one I have experience with, was able to reduce total copper in cooling tower bleed-off from 150 ppb to 60 ppb with a 2% side-stream filtration for basin volume of 200,000 gallons with a mere 45-50 gpm pump/filter set-up.

You would need something small. This would go on the downstream side of your floc agent/settling tank. Backwash with river water would be OK. Chlorinate upstream, and downstream to be on the safe side.

You can google this and get any number of sources for this material, although DE previously mentioned might work about as well, although at higher back pressure.

Great! I will check if the local providers of chemical stuff have this product in their inventory.

Then compare it to <...too expensive...>.

Perhaps fabrication of a small shallow Davnor-type filter from a plastic housing might work. Could be used 1-2 X and then the fine sand replaced cheaply, but of course sand is heavy. Unfortunately, he may not want to go with a UV or RO finishing system. His main problem appears to be clay [lugging the filters].

Right! Clay is the main issue here. When at anchor precipitation with Al₂(SO₄)₃ works great. I will try to assemble a filter (or small filter battery) with some PU foam or some other cheap material to use them to pre-filter the water in order to get as much clay as possible off.

There are also rinseable/flushable/backwashable filters for sediment.

Having a usable grey water system might provide an inexpensive solution.

A much more rough filtering (cheaper) could be sufficient for nonpotable water use. If you wash clothes or when you wash down decks or clean bilges or flush toilets for example, the water doesn't need to be drinkable.

There might also be time that it is better to collect your grey water. As a counter example, just after a large storm would not be one of those times, if you are trying to extend filter life.

For cleaning and toilet flushing I use raw river water. For washing clothes river water cannot be used cause it get´s stained by the clay in suspension (eventually acquiring a brownish color)

Ah ha! There is the problem. Your clothes are the wrong color!

.

So, can you provide an estimate of potable water use breakdown?

The use of potable water on a boat is quite variable, because it depends on the season of the year and the lenght of the trip. Main use is drinking / cooking / doing the dishes and secondary: showers / laundry. The toilets are flushed with raw river water, and it´s waist gets into a black-water tank.

Hey, all kidding aside. A sediment filter doesn't necessarily brink water up to drinking quality, but the filters are cheap and the water may be good enough to wash clothes and maybe even clean enough for dishes and bathing at that point.

I will get one and give it a try!

The issue I have with my wife is that she does not "get" the idea that there is a limited amount of drinking water. The best demonstration is that she lets the tap running when she does the dishes, and some 40 liters go down the drain just like that!

A small amount of intervention: Make her wash the dishes in her favorite beverage!

I have considered buying one of those new "Eco" dishwashers: only 7 liters consumption x cicle!

Now you are thinking!

Yeah... but it implies to have the genset making noise for one hour or so!

More bigger batteries!

Yes, and the best countermeasure to that is to just let her run out and deal with the consequences of her own actions while keeping enough reserves (bottled water and paper plates) on hand to make sure you don't die of thirst while she learns things the hard way.

Unless you're married to a spoiled idiot (largely and ultimately your own fault) she can learn to deal with the consequences of her own actions.

Believe me I dealt with a former wife that had the mentality that someone else should be reasonable for her actions. It got old and ultimately ended in divorce of which she wanted so I let her have it and that decision of here ended at a near total opposite of what she was expecting.

It turned into damn hard self inflicted punch in the head to her by reality that what she wanted and expected in life was not realistic and that no one was going to hand her anything if she didn't work for and take care of what she had.

examples,

I Need a Low Fuel Alarm for My Wifes Riding Lawn Mower

and

How Do You Get a Person to Realize They Need to Take Their Meds?

Not trying to be rude but in engineering terms the best way to solve a deficiency problem is to look at its source of losses and make adjustments to reducing them first which with people most often requires letting them stew in the less than enjoyable results of their own actions for a while.

You made me laugh!

The problem with my wife is that she is in a completely different wavelenght. If I am FM, she is in SW1 or any other frequency! Short story: for some unexplained reason she used to re-fuel the car every saturday.... but for the last 10 years she buyed the equivalent of let´s say 10 U$.

Due to inflation, over the time she got less and less fuel, meaning that from wednesdays on, she had to look at the fuel gauge (which she also learned to do the hard way) cause of the risk of running out of gas (also knowing I would not go in her rescue any more).

Using some "Reverse Psicology" I convinced her not to change her saturday tanking rutine... but to fill the tank completely: the first time she complained saying it was a lot of gas she had to pay for: 35 liter (Hyunday S10)... but from the next week she got happy because she now only tanks 10 liters a week!

I can relate. However, I just let my Ex do things her way until she drove herself into the ground trying to prove something was what in fact it was not and never would be. She divorced me to make a point that it was all my fault and life would be better without me only to have that totally backfire and prove the problems were in fact far more to do with herself and her expectations of reality than they ever wer of mine.

A person can only do something that ends in failure so many times before it becomes traumatic enough for the action and result to sink in into their long term memory deep enough to actually take root and stay there.

People without shame or embarrassment still understand utter pointless futility no matter how stubborn they are.

Almost sounds like your ex and my ex are related......

They are! They are both females. Not necessarily a bad thing most of the time, however.

I agree!

Soak and scrub in soapy river water, rinse clean in potable?

Come on WAWAUS: Chemistry that is effective, cheap, and simple is no fair; it is cheating, plain and simple. I would give you 10+ good answers for that one (should solve a lot of R&DDOC's problem with his river water). Floc also carries down a lot of organisms with it, thus providing a better kill by subsequent oxidizing biocide.

The idea is great and widely used in the islands of the Parana River basin..... but water must be still for this to work, which is not the case on a boat!

If the floc is in an enclosed tank of specified holding time, and the down-steam of this floc goes to the zeolite filter - much less mass than sand, easy back-wash to restore, then you have a good start to excellent drinking water on your boat. RO as a polisher to remove the viruses, bacteria, even if using chlorine upstream (don't leave out the carbon filter to wipe out chlorine ahead of the RO).

Smooth spherical tank low in the boat....or overboard when anchored could make it much more still. If you avoided extra water use when underway, you could probably get very still water using a large bladder overboard.

When I want to save $ , I spend less $ , to save water I close the main valve to deliver less water. Despite your wife way spending lot water, she will use less as the faucet leave less. It is the way I save water, when we get out of water in our same country , I live at Córdoba city Argentina.

Have good sailing.

Gabriel

feel free to contact me at my user name here at gmail.com

Hi Gabriel! Nice to chat in English with a fellow citizen! "B" plan is only sailing with male friends!

How long are your trips? Have you calc'ed the number of water related chores you have need for (Drinking, cooking, washing etc.) etc.? Then calc the number of times a day, versus the gallons per use, and you can get a good idea of where there is waste. For example, while sailing offshore, we never relied on our watermaker for drinking water. We carried our own 12 oz. sealed individual plastic bottles, which could be shifted around for ballast if necessary, and gave you a good idea of your consumption rate (Just count how many are left.) The same bottles, empty, crush down for recycling and are very light. Deck bladders are also very useful, and when empty, fold flat. A small 12volt pump supplies the pressure. Just run a hose to the tank to be filled. 4 - 25 gallon bladders will double your capacity. Place them where they don't affect your trim. For clothes, bring extras, and wash when you get ashore. Make sure the dirty ones are dry before putting them into breathable mesh bags. Only wash socks and underwear. These are all things we do on long range sailing trips. There are many offshore cruising books that will go into more detail, and are fun to read, also.

For sanitation, replace your existing head (s) with the newer composting toilets, like Nature'sHead. They are now compact enough to fit your existing head's footprint, and you won't need a holding tank (tanks), which could also make more space for fresh water capacity. Put your mind to it, and you'll find more ways. Another thing is to have your wife carry the water to the boat, by hand, and she will get an idea not to waste , real quick . (Just kidding..Maybe not..?) Good luck and keep us in the loop.

Trips are usually not too long: max 15 days, and water is usually available in clubs or marinas, but it implies to move the boat to a "water point" and as my boat is floating in zillions of fresh water, I thought it would be fun to "make my own drinking water" instead of filling my tanks with PVC tasting water.

Sometimes , going to the water , maybe easier than relying on mechanical systems to clean up unusable water, unless you are looking for a challenge.

You have been given lots of options!

You´ve got the point! I am looking for a challenge! Just kidding. As said in my previous comment I am trying to avoid carrying hundreds of galons of water around, or queing for getting water at the waterpoint

The more detail you provide, the more it seems that segregating different water quality makes sense.

You don't like pvc taste, but that is a quality that will only affect drinking and probably eating. It shouldn't matter for clothes washing.

Making river water drinkable and relaibly safe might be an expensive challenge. You might load a water tank in port with pvc tasting water and then use a filter or exchange resin to remove the taste.

Treating water to get rid of sediment without worrying about VOCs, PCBs, dastardly microbes, etc, can be far less expensive than getting water up to drinking quality.

My concern is household water rather drinking water. The latter is no big concern, because I can take some 1 Gallon bottles along for this purpose.

I would look into a centrifuge for the particles then some household filters including carbon charcoal like a RainFresh system (suggestion) then to purify for pathogens either UV or chlorine dioxide look up MMS Miracle Mineral Solution. I use it most all the time. This is very inexpensive.

Except for the centrifugue, the rest seems quite plausible!

The waste vegetable oil to diesel industry has quite a number of small units that work very well and are not expensive. Even the trucking industry has units that keep the engine oil clean like new by removing the soot.

No centrifuge, no ClO2, and certainly no MMS (toxic solution of sodium chlorite that can cause total renal failure. How do they even get away with selling that crap?

Three bad ideas.

Well, I´ts Miracle Solution! Say no more!

Yes, you know why? Because you gonna need miracle, sucka, if you drinky!

The first thing you should find, or make is a container that you can sling around in circles, until centrifugal force pushes the mud to the bottom, and then pour the clearest water off, and then through one of these:

https://lifestraw.eartheasy.com/products/lifestraw

A rapid sand filter makes good sense to me. When the top layer becomes clogged with clay, it can simply be scraped overboard and replaced with fresh sand. Books on municipal water purification will have the right formulas for design. I'm sorry, but my books are currently in storage.

Interesting thread but one thing strikes me about all the potential solutions which refer to the water coming out of the clay suspension.. nobody makes reference to getting rid of the clay from the system after it is separated so access to the tank will be needed or the tank will need a lead off valve so it can be flushed out occasionally.

Re the water saving, there are cheap (4-10 US $ ) faucet add-ons which reduce water consumption see attached web link for ideas.

(https://images.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?p=water+saving+devices+for+taps&fr=yhs-arh-001&hspart=arh&hsimp=yhs-001&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.swissecoline.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2011%2F07%2FTurbulator-02.png#id=10&iurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.swissecoline.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2011%2F07%2FTurbulator-02.png&action=click)

I know nothing about the practicalities of such, but would a centrifugal filter work?

Typically not on colloidal clay suspensions, as it requires flocculation to a larger particle.

That is why I already suggested adding floc agent, and using a back-washable zeolite media filter for best results.

Regarding wife's letting the water run while doing dishes...

Install a spring loaded handle/lever that requires her to physically hold it in the on position to have the water run. Like what would come on an instant hot water tap or RO tap.

Or one like you see in some public restrooms, you press it and it only stays on for 10 seconds or so.

See it

http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/113856?frmtrk=cr4sd#comment1215525

Given as a good solution

Ok, I did not see that you already suggested that.

Will not work: my wife is a dentist and she has a lot of force in both her hands... (she always wins @ thumb wrestling)

The point is that it takes one of her hands out of the dishwashing exercise. Washing dishes one handed (on a rocking boat no less) should be awkward enough that she will willingly let go of the valve to safely scrub and handle the dishes, only using the water when it is necessary.

Regarding the timed valves: they are usually used in restrooms and would likely waste more water for every other potable water task. Just need to dampen a paper towel? Fill a coffee cup?... every press of a timed valve set to 10 seconds at 2GPM is ~43ounces!

Another option is to install a smaller orifice in the faucet aerator, so less comes out when it is running.

The fear is that if you make it too difficult for her, you may be "promoted" to dishwasher!

Just give it up, and put in the filter I told you about, and take in river water, filter, add chlorine, and wash the dishes, etc. For drinking water production, just add a few more small steps, ensure 6-log reduction of all organisms, and it should be good. Usually you don't wash dishes, then turn around and eat again off the wet ones, do you? While drying, the chlorine residue will go away, especially if exposed to sunlight, as the dishes dry. Dry dishes should therefore, be completely safe to use again.

Here is an idea, just use paper plates... no more dirty dishes.

Are you kidding, this is Argentina we are talking about, they are already using paper plated, just washing them.

How did you figure out we are using ECO paper plates ???

Just a wild guess, amigo!

I´ll go for the paper plates!!!!

Hello! Here's a suggestion. Consider using a Lakos Separator, http://www.lakos.com/industrial-products/ejpx-separators, for your first pass filtration. This unit's performance is rated to remove 98% of all solids 44 micron (325 mesh), 2.6 specific gravity, and larger in a single pass (copied from their web page). This one may be too large for your needs but there are many others to chose from. It uses no filter cartridge and instead relies on flow induced centrifugal force for the separation process. Removed solids are passed out a discharge line. Then, use standard filtration cartridges such as a 10 micron and a carbon filter to bring quality up to desired level. Taps can be installed at different points depending upon the use of the water such as bathing, cooking, or drinking. Hope this helps!

We are talking about colloidal clay suspension in river water. Normal media filter without floc will be pointless.

I have checked these products, and they look really great! There are no replaceable parts, and the entire system is affordable. I will give it a try! Thanks!!

They are far far from filter $$ . So much expensive

Vas a poder comprar filtros toda la vida, además llevan una bomba , poderosa