Unpickling Long Disused Watermaker

[Dockhead]

We are getting ready for our Transat, and will set off on the first leg, Gib-Canaries, on Tuesday. We are only 3 on board for this leg so the water tankage is plenty for such a passage, but on the way I am going to try to get the watermaker going.


It has been pickled for years, and I don't have great hope that the membranes are still any good, but I want to at least give them a chance. I have a new set of membranes and prefilters on board.


Any tips on the best way to do this? Should I take out the membranes and scrub them first, or something? I've sailed on boats with watermakers but never owned one, so I'm not too experienced.


The watermaker is a SeaFresh H206A.

[Dockhead]

This one

[skipmac]

No personal experience but there was a member active for a while that was a former tech or advisor to Pur who suggested that properly pickled membranes, even well past stated the expiration of the process had a good chance of working properly.

I think he recommended just following the standard instructions for recommissioning a pickled machine.

You might want to read the post from Tellie in this recent thread that covered a similar question. If further questions I would PM Tellie since he's the resident expert on watermakers.

https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...er-256909.html

[jt11791]

I bought my boat with a watermaker that was pickled for five years. When the time came, I just followed the flush procedure in the manual, which was very simple. Surprisingly, the membrane was in good shape and made excellent water. If yours was pickled well, you may get similar good results. I did have a few issues not related to the membrane, small leaks, stuck valves, etc. but these were also fairly easy to sort out. Personally, I would prefer to unpickle and sort problems at anchor just to avoid headaches from bouncing around. Be sure that you have the chems available to re-pickle it when you need to.


One additional thought, you might want disconnecting the pump(s) from the membrane to test run them and verify that they are functioning well before you flush the pickling solution out of the membrane.

[mvmojo]

The watermaker on MOJO was pickled for 10 years. Like the OP, I had little hope that the membranes would still be good. But I decided to give them a try before replacing them. To my surprise, the watermaker made excellent water! I ran it in bypass mode with the product water going overboard for an hour before testing. It tested at 110 ppm. Used it all summer then pickled it again.

[akopac]

My spectra 200 was pickled for 12 years in glycol. I unpicked flushed it and it ran perfect.

[Marathon1150]

Our boat was stuck in Tahiti for 2.5 years and the watermaker was pickled when we left it, assuming that we would be back in 6 months. We used SC1 rather than Glycol.

The thread below is a discussion of what to do, with expert advice from Tellie. I followed his instructions when we got back on the boat in October and it is now producing excellent water.

https://www.cruisersforum.com/forums...er-256909.html

Many thanks again to Tellie and others, including Spectra and RO Watermakers for their helpful advice.

[poiu]

I’ve got the exact same one. Membranes are 12 years old and it has spent most of that time intermittently pickled. Going for several years on occasion. I have been running it for the last few months and the water is OK. Yours is in excellent visual condition and will most probably make perfect water. Just follow the manual. It’s pretty easy.

The manual doesn’t call for a fresh water flush on re-commissioning and in regular use, so the advice on the other thread may be confusing. A sea water flush for an hour to clear out the sodium metabisulphate, then until the sensor says salinity is good works well.

[Dockhead]

So I got the unit working. Unfortunately the pressure gauge doesn't work -- I guess it's clogged with sediment. So I had to guess at the pressure.

I flushed it for a long time then let it rip. It works.

But I'm getting TDS which seems rather high to me -- 750 or so. The water tastes good but slightly salty.


The automatic diverter works perfectly, both pumps run well.



Is the TDS too high? I have spare membranes so could swap out, but I like the idea of using the old ones and keeping the new ones in spares.

Could the high TDS be the result of wrong pressure? I don't know whether I guessed the pressure right or not.

[jt11791]

I don't think TDS and pressure are related. 750 TDS is higher than I would use, I would replace the membrane.

[donradcliffe]

TDS 750 is too high. If the pressure gauge is not operating, do you have a product flow meter to adjust the pressure with?

[poiu]

Mine is on 410. It is generally considered that for drinking 500 is max. For showers it is fine of course.

Let it run a few hours. The TDS should improve somewhat. Don’t run in a location with possible oil in the water. A less than clean marina for example.

You may have one bad membrane. If you wanted to test for that you can re-plumb the three cylinders to isolate each one in turn using the fittings you have.

If you had really cranked up the pressure you could damage the membrane.

You can look at the AC ammeter as an rough indicator of pressure until you get a new gauge. All 230v:

0.8A just feed pump (yours will probably be more).
5.3A main pump no pressure
7.5A 500psi
9.6A 850psi making water
10.3A 1000psi ditto

[Dockhead]

Hmm, ok. Maybe better just to swap out the membranes since we have them on board. Then I won't need to do the acid wash. Just replace the pressure gauge.

[Marathon1150]

The Spectra Ventura manual indicates that anything under 750 PPM is acceptable (see link below). The WHO recommends 300 PPM or better. We have a Ventura and it normally produces 200 PPM or better but did not when first commissioned. It was usually above 300 but an email exchange with Spectra indicated that we should keep using the machine and that water quality would improve and it did.

There are certainly many parts of the world where water is made by not well maintained watermakers for public consumption. It usually tastes salty and those who can afford it, buy bottled water rather than use tap water which is questionable for other reasons as well.

Spectra manual: https://www.spectrawatermakers.com/d...l-ae042616.pdf

[contrail]

Low pressure will affect quality and PPM. Guessing the pressure is an interesting notion! Based on what?