On Mon, 11 Jul 2005 19:01:15 -0400,
Larry wrote:
Jim Richardson wrote in news:8qu8q2-
:

How much power does it take to make a gallon of fresh water from
seawater with your distillers?


25c at 8c/kWH from South Carolina Electric and Gouge.


what do you do about the scale buildup in the distiller?


Not that it matters much I suppose, since 3KW/h isn't exactly going to
work on a sailboat not tied up to the dock, (and to shore power)

What I can't figure out is why marine engine builders can't build a good
distiller right into the engine heads. The coolant in there is BOILING,
already! In yachts with dry stacks, a simple heat exchanger right in the
exhaust stack would provide an amazing amount of distilled seawater in
motor yachts, just like an evaporator does on a steamship. It isn't rocket
science, like RO is. You need a seawater pump, already mounted on the
engine that's pumping cooling water into it at some pressure, a float-
regulated tank to maintain the seawater in the heat exchanger tubes perking
away in the exhaust stack, and a seawater condenser using the same seawater
pump on the engine to cool the steam back into distilled water. Feed that
through a carbon pile filter to take out distillables like benzenes and
what comes out is the freshest water in the world...no toxins, no
chemicals, no bacteria leaking through tiny holes in million-dollar
membranes. It would run 24/7 in a motor yacht until you ran out of tankage
to store it. A backflush timer would dump the salt and residues every few
hours overboard or you would have an overflow at some level to constantly
lose some of the huge energy in the stack dumping it over continuously
cleaning it. It's just salt and bugs and seaweed crap left over. Make it
out of stainless tubes so it doesn't corrode with a zinc in it, if
necessary.

Distillers are FAR less complex than RO science projects....really simple
devices. The boat would probably be overrun with fresh water in a yacht
with twin dry-stack diesel beasts burning up 20 gallons an hour, most
energy going right up that stack.

yeah, and distillers make sense on big power boats, like fish
processors, and lux yachts, can't see them working that way for a 35'
sailboat though...



--
Jim Richardson http://www.eskimo.com/~warlock
I came; I saw; I ****ed up