Best watermaker for a Catamaran

[SV THIRD DAY]

Originally Posted by rdomaleski

Can anyone give me some feedback on the noise level of a cruise RO AC Watermaker please?

I need to get a DB sound rating on the pump and motor, but we have ours mounted under our lower salon steps about 2ft from our seats and we are able to watch a video with the water maker running without turning up the TV volume.

Most of the noise would come from vibration being transferred to the mounting surface. So I've heard some installations where it sounds like a snare drum where it amplified the vibration, when mounted on a loose piece of plywood with a few wood screws screwed into the stringers. For the quietest installations you want to mount the pump and motor on a very solid base that doesn't vibrate and then I would recommend putting a piece of rubber gasket between the motor mounting feet and your platform to cut down transfer of vibration and Noise. But the pump and motor itself is fairly quiet, the unit we have running on the granite countertop of our test facility you can carry on a normal conversation with the unit running without difficulty and it's not loud enough to drive you out of the room.

Cheers

[rdomaleski]

That's great information SV thank you Rob

[rescher]

Another point to consider is the charge and discharge cycle that hits your batteries with a 12 VDC watermaker; lithium excepted.

We have 1.1 KW solar but I still have to run the gen to recharge the batteries after making water with our Spectra Newport 400. Each day of making water effectively uses up one charge/discharge cycle of my battery's life. I will have to replace batteries sooner, which is a cost factor to consider.

I pretty much always have to run my gen to top-up my batteries when I make water a CruiseRO AC system, as Dave852, says, makes sense.

The max I tend to see from our solar is ~60A at 12VDC, but I don't see that often or get it for long. Most often I see 30-40A from the solar. The Spectra draws ~20A, which generally means there is only 10-20A available from solar during the day to charge batteries. Refrigeration draws ~10A 24 hours per day so there goes all my power, which is why I have to run my gen. If I'm having to run my gen, then why have a 12 DVC watermaker that wears out my batteries. On days that I don't run the watermaker I am generally able to keep the batteries charged to absorption using slar.

We live on our boat with kids and have been living this regime for 18+ months.