Potable Water Filtration for Your Boat

Tank water—ugh. Taste aside, some water is full of contaminants and is downright unsafe to drink. So, installation and servicing of a potable water filtration system should be near the top of your haul-out project list this spring.

Beyond the Brita and the dedicated under-sink filters, you may need the assistance of a boatyard to install and/or service water filtration systems.

Why filter?

Filters improve the taste, odor, and clarity of tank and local water sources. Some systems can do even more by removing 99.99 percent of common waterborne bacteria and parasitic cysts. The simplest is the inline system, and it’s great if you want filtered water for more than just drinking (washing produce, for example) due to a faster flow rate than a separate or dedicated system.

Inline filter brands

Yacht-Mate, Shurflow and General Ecology’s Seagull systems are excellent for inline filtration. The Seagull IV protects against chemical and aesthetic contaminants, including herbicides, pesticides, chlorine and foul tastes, and odors, and it can work with your existing faucet so there are no new holes to cut.

3M’s AP902/AP903 single cartridge water filtration system helps provide consistent high-quality water for whole boat filtration at flow rates of up to 20 gallons per minute (gpm). That means you can brush your teeth or wash your hair in filtered water.

What else will help water purity aboard?

A dockside pre-filtration system will help with city water that’s already potable but, perhaps, not of the best quality. General Ecology’s system, for example, removes particulates like sand, dirt, scale, and chlorine and will help prevent corrosion of aluminum water tanks and extend the life of inline purifier cartridges already
installed. It doesn’t remove viruses or bacteria, but it may help minimize water spots, which makes the boat easier to keep clean.

Reverse osmosis or watermaker water is perhaps the purest you can imbibe. That will depend on the quality of the source water and the shape of your system. Hence, why it’s important to have the yard service your system at least annually.

Full-size, high-quality watermakers, such as those from Blue Water Desalination, Dometic, FCI, HRO, Sea Recovery, Village Marine, or Watermakers, Inc. may require an upgrade in the vessel’s power capacity (battery banks or genset). Their worth will become evident, however, once you’re offshore or in the Caribbean where the alternative is poor quality
water piped through a local hose or jerry cans lugged in the dinghy.

Inline water filtration and reverse osmosis considerations:

Expense: Filtration isn’t cheap. A small Seagull system can initially cost $500 with cartridges running $100 (good for 1,000 gallons or so). Also, boatyard labor may be
required for installation and servicing of inline filters as well as watermakers.
Availability: Not all filters and cartridges are available everywhere, so if you’re cruising, bring spares.
Installation and maintenance: Some inline filters need to be fairly close to the faucet or mounted vertically. This may be a problem in space-constricted areas. Make sure you can access the filter to service it and choose a clear casing so you can inspect it visually without opening it.

Work with the yard

Watermakers can take up significant space, so work with the yard on which brands are modular and can be installed in multiple locations aboard. Have a boatyard technician walk you through the care and maintenance of the watermaker, and never make
water near a muddy or industrial waterfront—you’ll destroy those filters in an afternoon.

Any water you make or clean will remain only as good as the tanks and plumbing through which it moves. Be sure to have the boatyard inspect every part of the path and polish those water tanks just like the fuel ones. Growth inside tanks, especially plastic ones, will provide a taste that’s best avoided in that cup of tea.

By Zuzana Prochazka, Southern Boating March 2018

See more from the Annual Haul Out Guide

FCI Watermakers’ Dockside Treatment System

Make dock water potable with FCI Watermakers’ Dockside Treatment System.

Three different models remove bacteria, viruses and dissolved solids and make up to 3,000 gallons of fresh water daily for drinking, cooking, cleaning, and bathing. All are highly efficient, vibration-free andcome in a compact framed or space-saving modular design.

MSRP starts at $2,300

fciwatermakers.com

Soft Water Solutions

Prevent damage to your boat’s fit and finish with a portable water softening system.

While cruising long distances or making extended voyages, it can be difficult to maintain consistent access to soft water. Instead, you may find that dockages only have access to hard water, which often contains a large quantity of certain dissolved minerals. While minerals such as calcium and magnesium aren’t harmful to your health, they can lead to inefficiencies and even damage your boat. Luckily for cruisers, portable water softeners can safely and effectively transform hard water through softening methods, saving you both time and money.

Although portable water softening systems operate by transforming hard water to soft water, hard water isn’t inherently undesirable. It isn’t harmful to human health, and it can even be beneficial due to its rich mineral content. It also can reduce the solubility of potentially toxic metal ions like those from copper and lead. However, hard water is incompatible with soap, will dry out your skin and hair, and can also damage pipes and plumbing fixtures. Using soft water instead of hard water will prevent scale build-up and residue during a washdown of your boat, preserving both the fit and finish.

Hardness in water is usually caused by the presence of calcium and magnesium or other dissolved minerals that become trapped. Certain geographical areas are notorious for hard water issues: the upper Midwest (Minnesota, Iowa and North Dakota), the south-central U.S. (Texas, New Mexico and California) and Florida. Areas with a large amount of limestone combined with well water systems will also experience water hardness.

What’s the best way to determine whether your water supply is delivering hard or soft water? One of the easiest ways to determine water hardness is to look at the formation of suds. Hard water produces noticeably less lather when it interacts with soap than does soft water. Furthermore, a white precipitate (usually soap scum) is produced. Another way to measure water hardness is to figure out how many grains per gallon are present in the water by using a pre-packaged kit. WET SPOT (softwetspot.com) offers one that’s exceptionally sensitive and accurate. Keep in mind, however, that due to variances in mineral presence, pH and water temperature, there isn’t a single-number scale used to determine what differentiates hard and soft water. A good rule of thumb to follow is that 3 or fewer grains per gallon is considered slightly hard water, while more than 14 grains per gallon is considered extremely hard water.

So now that you’ve confirmed the presence of hard water, what can you do? The first step is to choose a portable water softener. Many portable models are perfect for cruisers due to their ease of installation and slimmer profile. They also work equally as well as commercial or residential water softener systems, with the added bonus of manual recharging, meaning that no electrical hook-ups are required. This makes a portable softener a great addition to your travel kit before leaving the dock.

For portable water softeners to work during normal conditioning, the raw, untreated water must enter the system through an inlet at the top of a resin tank. The resin contains sodium, which is used to dilute the concentration of magnesium, calcium and other minerals. The water then seeps down through the resin bed. Scale and hardness are then collected on the ion exchange sites of the resin. The result is quality, conditioned water that leaves your boat spot-free after rinsing by preventing iron staining, scale build-up, soap film, and water spots.

While there are many portable water softening systems on the market, choosing the best one for your vessel and your needs depends on a few factors. The capacity of a portable system is determined by how many grains it can filter. Larger boats will obviously require larger-capacity systems than smaller ones. As an example, WET SPOT builds its models in three varieties: the plus, the heavy duty and the super. Each are built for varying degrees of water hardness and usage rates.

Keep in mind that there are some portable water softeners on the market that use table salt instead of the product-specific water softening salt. There are a few advantages built into being able to use table salt tablets for water softening. Because table salt is readily available, it’s easy to acquire at any time. Furthermore, two salt tablets will be able to process around 1,000 gallons of hard water.

Make your travels easier and preserve the life of your boat’s finish. Your water will taste and smell better while also improving the lifespan of your appliances and utilities. Don’t get caught away from the dock without this essential cruiser resource, and be ready to enjoy soft water and a spot-free shine every single time.

By Susanna Botkin, Southern Boating May 2017