Bottom Paint and Water Maker...Poision?

[boatsail]

Just had a thought pop into my head and figured the expertise here would have some sort of sensible answer.

Bottom paint as I understand retards the growth of crusties based on the fact that it is toxic. A watermaker gets rid of the salt so people can drink water that would have been salty.

So...How is it that bottom paint does not "taint" the water that goes through the watermaker that we would ingest?

[hummingway]

Reverse osmosis isn't specifically removing salt, it's removing particles down to a certain size, in the sub-micron range. It removes metal ions as well as salt and other contaminants.

[boatsail]

That makes a heck of a lot of sense. Thanks for the insight!

[zeehag]

fwiw--i drank water made form the bay water in sd in convair cove when they were addressing the pcb problem on the sea floor---i am still alive and not too sickly.....might die tomorrow but i am still fine now.....

[Dulcesuenos]

Kind of related to this thread but how can you tell where is safe to pull water for tour watermaker? Any clear looking spot away from lots of ship traffic and foamy stuff or where?

[hummingway]

Originally Posted by Dulcesuenos

Kind of related to this thread but how can you tell where is safe to pull water for tour watermaker? Any clear looking spot away from lots of ship traffic and foamy stuff or where?

I don't like it to run if there's a lot of algea or silt in the water because of the filter. Otherwise I just make sure there's not petrochemicals floating on the surface but as someone on this forum once pointed out the oily stuff floats on the surface we pull from below the surface. I have a low powered one, a Katadyn 80e which I can run off my solar panels. The downside is I run the watermaker a lot so I try to run it on an incoming tide; we have fairly large tides here.

[daddle]

For the watermaker's health you want to avoid oily and scummy water. While watermaker's do easily remove chemical contaminates there are always small leaks that let one in a million molecules thru. For toxins a few is probably not a health issue. But for viruses and some bacteria it only takes one particle to infect you. It is always a good idea to disinfect the product water with chlorine or whatever.

[bobconnie]

If it's not Blue and clear, we don't use it ! Not even if I have to go to short rations on the water useage! saves everything, filters, membraines, ect ! Just our 2 cents

[daddle]

Originally Posted by bobconnie

If it's not Blue and clear, we don't use it ! Not even if I have to go to short rations on the water useage! saves everything, filters, membraines, ect ! Just our 2 cents

Blue and clear is meaningless from a health perspective. None of the dangerous pathogens and chemicals cloud the water. Most cloudy water that cruisers encounter is simply full of algae or sediment. Both harmless and easily handled by the watermaker.

[capn_billl]

Copper forms salts like copper chloride in sea water, not very toxic to humans and easily removed by watermaker. The LD50 for copper sulphate isn't Parts per billion, or parts per million, it is around 1 liter of saturated, (99%) solution. Other bottom paints I'm not sure about. So don't drink bottom paint.

The algea and other nasties in closed harbors, it's not the algea that worries me, it is the sewage, and phosphate detergents that it feeds on.