Water tanks

[2tocruise]

We go the cheap vodka route when winterizing, although this year Avanti is getting a whole new water system, so our tanks and lines have been completely drained for removal. I'm not sure the "cheap" Vodka everyone else is using, but the stuff we find (about $6 a liter) is a lot closer to rubbing alcohol than Stoli. Not sure I'd want a tonic with that one for fear of going blind.

If you use the vodka in your tanks pump it through your system until you taste it out of the faucet, that way the water lines won't freeze or grow anything over the winter.

As far as drinking the water in the tanks, if it's been sterilized (ie bleach) it should be fine. You can get tank sweeteners for boats and RVs that will kill the taste. I've used them a couple times and find they work pretty well.

[Ben Thomas]

I would use a spray nozzle to jet water into the tanks and pump out, did a good job. Used non-tox in tanks and pump through lines till it came out faucet. In spring I would flush tanks & lines through with a least 10-15 gallons of water.
I have an in-line filter for the cold water only under sink, works well to remove any bad taste and such.

But every spring when I would fill the tanks again, that first fill, on inspecting water level would reveal a mess of nasty looking crude floating in the first tank filled, the second tank not so much.
It was the filler hoses, those ribbed hoses from deck fill would grow all kinds of stuff that ended up in my clean tanks.

I stopped using them and direct fill right into the tanks at inspection port.
I have yet to replace the hoses as they wind thru tight places. At some point I may replace them with smooth walled hose, but for now I am used to filling at tank.
Not sure what is best procedure for flushing them out, something to break the crude up, and flush under pressure.
Anyone else had problems with this?
Have a great holiday!
Ben

[MarcMcCarron]

I vote for Gin. Better for taste control.

How would you scrub inside?

[Carter Brey]

Peggy Hall is the author of "Get Rid of Boat Odors," and a regular contributor to the Sabre mailing list. Marine heads and fresh water systems are her area of expertise. Here is what she wrote recently in reply to a question about winterizing the water system:

No need to replace the hoses...you just need to recommission the system.
It should be done annually as preventive maintenance. The instructions
from General Ecology that Pete posted are very similar to those that are
the standard in both the marine and RV industry that I've included in my
book:

"The following recommendations conform to section 10.8 in the A-1 192
code covering electrical, plumbing, and heating of recreational
vehicles. The solution is approved and recommended by competent health
officials. It may be used in a new system a used one that has not been
used for a period of time, or one that may have been contaminated.

Before beginning, turn off hot water heater at the breaker; do not turn
it on again until the entire recommissioning is complete. Remove any
filters in the system.

Icemakers should be left running to allow cleaning out of the water feed
line; however the first two buckets of ice—the bucket generated during
recommissioning and the first bucketful afterward--should be discarded.

1. Use a solution of 1 quart Clorox or Purex household bleach (5% sodium
Hypochlorite solution ) to 50 gal water, With tank empty, pour chlorine
solution into tank.

2. Complete filling of tank with fresh water. Open each faucet and drain
cock and let the water run until what's coming out smells strongly of
bleach. Turn off all the faucets, but do not turn off the water pump; it
must remain on to keep the system pressurized and the solution in the
lines.

3. Allow to stand for at least three hours, but no longer than 24 hours.

4 Drain through every faucet on the boat (and if you haven't done this
in a while, it's a good idea to remove any diffusion screens from the
faucets, because what's likely to come out will clog them). Fill the
tank again with fresh water only, drain again through every faucet on
the boat.

5. To remove excess chlorine taste or odor which might remain, prepare a
solution of one quart white vinegar to five gallons water and allow this
solution to agitate in tank for several days.

6. Drain tank again through every faucet, and flush the lines again by
fill the tank 1/4-1/2 full and again flushing with potable water.


I disagree with GE's recommendation to add bleach to each fill, for
several reasons: To have any real effect, you'd have to use enough to
make the water taste and smell like an over-chlorinated swimming pool.
Chlorine is corrosive and destructive to the rubber parts in the water
pump....any purifying properties in chlorine evaporate within about 24
hours, leaving only the corrosive properties.

An annual or semi-annual recommissioning should be all that's needed to
keep the water smelling and tasting as good as any that comes out of a
faucet on land...if you need to improve on that, use a filter. Just
remember that a filter is not a substitute for system maintenance, it's
an addition to it...and that filters require maintenance too.

-- Peggie ---------- Peggie Hall Specializing in marine sanitation since 1987 Author "Get Rid of Boat Odors - A Guide To Marine Sanitation Systems and Other Sources of Aggravation and Odor" http://shop.sailboatowners.com/boat_odors/

[Evergreen]

I also agree that you have to be very cautious with the addition of bleach. We added bleach to our house water system and it ruined all the metal in the system (such as faucets, bolts in toilets, etc), and ruined all the plastic parts in the system (such as all the plastic toilet parts, etc.). Its effects were disastrous. Personally, I will never again add bleach to anything that I care about. Be careful.

[David VanDenburgh]

Aboard Ariel, we don't drink the tank water. It doesn't taste good enough. Instead we have a "scuttlebutt" in the form of a picnic jug that is filled with filtered water and then bungee-corded into its place in the galley. The water is sweet and cool even on a hot day. We fill this jug with the best water we can find, but always run it through a filter - a $9.95 refrigerator ice-maker filter with a garden hose fitting on one end and a small-diameter plastic tube on the other. The filter does a great job of making marina garden hose water taste good.

[tartansailor]

In a previous post, the lady recommended a 5% solution of bleach in water. That would then be 1 quart per 5 gallons of water, not 50.

In practice we stow gallon jugs of drinking water, and use the tank water for washing.

Dick

[Al Levesque]

She is describing the strength of the quart as being 5%. When the 5% quart is mixed with 50 gallons of water it will be much more dilute. Her recommendations are always valuable and accurate.

[tartansailor]

1 gallon of water weighs 8.3454 lbs.
1 quart of water then weighs 1/4th or 2.086 lbs.

You say 5% hypochlorite in a quart to 50 gallons of water;
then
5% of 2.086 = 0.1043 lbs of hypochlorite in a quart.
then
50 gallons then weighs 50 X 8.3454 lbs. or 417.27 lbs.

Therefore according to your reasoning the concentration of hypochlorite in 50 gallons of water would be:

0.1043 divided by 417.27 times 100 =0.025%

I doubt if you could sense a trace of chlorine in a 2&1/2 hundredths %.

I am presently employed as a consultant to SPI Pharmaceutical Co. in Lewes DE. Their SOP for sterilizing tanks is 5% sodium hypochlorite in deionized water, followed by a 35% hydrogen peroxide rinse.

The above post is off by (1) order of magnitude.

Cheers

Dick

[David VanDenburgh]

I don't have any credentials whatsoever, but I think the recommendation is to start with a 5% sodium hypochlorite solution (in water), which is the usual concentration of household bleach that one buys in the grocery store, take one quart of that solution and mix it with 50 gallons of water.

I would guess that the pharmaceutical company would use a much more concentrated solution for cleaning their tanks than any sailor would want to use.

I'm going to bet on the accuracy of Peggy Hall's recommendation. Like Carter, I have found her reliable.

[Phil Shedd]

A good level of clorine is 2 to 3 ppm ( parts per million).

liters x ppm = Cl in ml

ex 50 liters of water x 3 ppm = .150 ml cl2

Clorex is 5% cl

therefore ? x .05 = 150

? = 150/.05
? = 3 ml or 3 cc

Phil

[Neil Gordon]

A good level of clorine is 2 to 3 ppm ( parts per million).

liters x ppm = Cl in ml

ex 50 liters of water x 3 ppm = 150 ml cl2

Clorex is 5% cl

therefore ? x .05 = 150

? = 150/.05
? = 3000 ml or 3 cc

Phil

In other words, just pour a capfull or so in with the fillup.

[Al Levesque]

The level of concentration to use depends on the materials used in the system. I don't know which materials withstand the corrosive and oxidizing effect of the sodium hypochlorite and I don't even know which or how many different materials are included in my domestic water system. Neil's capful seems like a reasonable level and Peggie's 0.025% is the strongest I would dare use.

[tartansailor]

I just question what happened between the manuscript in the printing process.

Here is documentation of my position. You do what you think best.

Sodium Hypochlorite (The Practical Application of Disinfectant and Sterilization in Health Care Facilities, Chapter 5, pp 41-45, Cokendolpher and Haukos. AHA 1996).

Is a very good general disinfectant available to many facilities are household bleach (5.25% sodium hypochlorite).
However, bleach is not a miracle disinfectant. Bleach has a long proven history, having been used as an antiseptic and disinfectant since 1846 (Ware, 1989). Concentrations of bleach that are stronger than the dilution recommended for nonporous surfaces (1:100 bleach/water) are corrosive to most metals.
Bleach is effective against the following:
• A broad spectrum of bacteria
• Lipid and nonlipid virus
• Fungi
• Slime-forming algae
• Protozoa
• Nematodes
Because OSHA recognizes household bleach as an effective tuberculocidal disinfectant, may professionals wishing to comply with the Bloodborne Pathogen Standard have used bleach solutions for disinfections of sites contaminated with blood or other body fluids. Clorox bleach is the only household bleach solutions that is currently registered with the EPA as an effective against M. tuberculosis (see Antimicrobial Chemical/Registration Number Indexes
http://www.epa.gov/oppad001/chemregindex.htm)

Guide for Use
As a Tuberculocide
Some guidelines for the use of household bleach (5.25%) sodium hypochlorite) as tuberculocidal disinfectant have been developed by infection control experts:

1. A 1:10 (1 part bleach in 10 parts water, or about 1/2 cups of bleach in 1 gallon of water) dilution (=5,000 ppm available chlorine) is appropriate for porous surfaces (wood, cloth, concrete, etc.) that cannot effectively be pre-cleaned of organic matter. The 1:10 dilution is typically considered too corrosive for may surfaces.
2. A 1:100 (1 part bleach to 100 parts water, or approximately 1/4 cup of bleach in 1 gallon of water) dilution supplies 500 ppm available chlorine and can be used on smooth pre-cleaned surfaces (glass, plastic, metal, etc.) The object to be disinfected should be thoroughly moistened with the solution (spray or sponged) and left to air dry..
“To disinfectant hard nonporous surfaces, clean surface by removing gross filth (loose dirt, debris, food material, etc.). Prepare a dilution of 1 part Clorox to 10 parts water (13 oz/gallon). (5,000 ppm available chlorine). Thoroughly wet surfaces with the solution and allow it to remain in contact with the surface for 10 minutes. Rinse with clean water and dry.” Be aware that the Clorox label instructs the users to use a bleach dilution on a nonporous surface that is much higher than that recommended by infection control experts. One could expect to experience metal corrosion with the use of 5,00 0 ppm, available chorine.

• Then follow the steps above the use of a bleach dilution (1:100 or an appropriate proprietary product.
As a Sanitizer
Bleach is also frequently used as a sanitizer; as a rinse on food-service and surfaces such as dishes and cooking utensils, and on equipment and utensils found in dairies, food-processing plants, and eating and drinking establishments. Sanitizers also include laundry additives and toilets bowl sanitizers (U.S. EPA, 1991b). The chemical must be able to reduce contamination in the inanimate environment to levels considered as safe as determined by Public Health Ordinance, or reduce the bacterial population by significant numbers when public health requirements have not been established. When bleach is used as a sanitizer, it must have at least 200 ppm of available chorine, this equates to a bleach and water mixture of 1 tablespoon of bleach to 1 gallon of water.
List

[John Vigor]

1. A 1:10 (1 part bleach in 10 parts water, or about 1/2 cups of bleach in 1 gallon of water) dilution (=5,000 ppm available chlorine) is appropriate for porous surfaces (wood, cloth, concrete, etc.) that cannot effectively be pre-cleaned of organic matter. The 1:10 dilution is typically considered too corrosive for may surfaces.
2. A 1:100 (1 part bleach to 100 parts water, or approximately 1/4 cup of bleach in 1 gallon of water) dilution supplies 500 ppm available chlorine and can be used on smooth pre-cleaned surfaces (glass, plastic, metal, etc.)

Am I missing something here?

If a half cup of bleach in one gallon of water equals a concentration of 1:10, why isn't a quarter cup of bleach in one gallon a concentration of 1:20? It's given here as 1:100.

I have always advocated adding one teaspoonful of 5.25 percent bleach to every 15 gallons of water for sterilization. This is more than the amount you'll find in public drinking water, which contains about one part of chlorine per million parts of water.

For cleaning and flushing tanks, a cupful of 5.25 percent bleach for every 50 gallons will do a good job without doing damage to pipes, faucets or seals.

John Vigor