TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands on board Water Maker

Do all (or most) charter Cats & Mono's here have water makers on board?

Never been on one that had one...yet.

A few do, most do not.

ok...thanks
but - any reason for not having them?
is it the cost of installing
or, maintenance, and finnickiness of the equipment?

Yes. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Grin.gif" alt="" />

I think Maintenance is a big reason not to have them. It's simply an unnecessary item on a charter boat.

$$ and more gear to break. If I had a boat in charter I'd put a water maker on it to reduce the number of times charter guests had to hit the water dock.

The amenities on charter vessels are in a bit of an arms race with gen/ac pretty much the standard for all but smaller monohulls. Water makers are creeping in. The amount of gear you can load on a boat doesn't seem to have much limit. I'm pretty happy with a safe boat and cold beer.

Cheers, RickG

All of the above but primarily maintenance and finnickiness I think.

FYI - I think the entire MarineMax fleet has water makers along with some of the newer Voyage boats. I'm sure others will follow that direction.

We have a water maker but water is so readily available in the BVI we hardly ever bother to use it there unless we have a lot of people & they're (Ok, WE'RE) all taking long showers. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Blush.gif" alt="" />

Just one more thing to go wrong on a charter boat.

Some of the larger/newer Voyage yachts have water makers, which can come in handy. However, the "learning curve" can get in the way. With up to four tanks on board, shutoff valves on each, water maker fills one of the four ... makes my head spin. I usually get if figured out by the end of the week.

several CYOA boats have water makers, general maintenance is not too bad.

Great when they work. A lot less hassle then they once were. At the end of the day the water maker is another electric motor trying to survive in a harsh marine environment. As more boat builders create a cool space that is mostly free from salt water we will see more of them. Two redundant water makers with smaller tanks would lighten up many of these boats with smaller tanks and even more space for condo like living. 200 gallons of filled water tanks is over 2,000 lbs.

Interesting if you think of the source of that "watermaker".

What with all of those dumped holding tanks.

I am going to put my two cents in here. We CYOA now have or will have by the start of next season 11 boats with water makers. I have personally installed several of them and over see the maintenance of all of them.

For the purists that want a simple boat, an oil lamp and an ice box you can skip what I am about to say.

Water makers are the new air conditioning. Remember the first time you rented a boat with a generator and air conditioning? Everyone of our repeat customers that have been on board a boat with one want their next charter to have one.

No more docking unless you want to. No more itinerary based on where can we get water. These boats transform the Spanish Virgin Islands experience. Cruise with the knowledge that you have the water and in most cases the ice maker on board.

Other benefits no more smelly heads. We use fresh water flush on our water maker equipped boats. Less maintenance for the boat owners and a better experience for everyone. Oh yeah and you can take showers as well. Real showers. You are on a luxury boat you shouldn't have to go to bed smelling like your camping. Your spouse will thank you for that one.

As for the comment above about the source of that water and the quality of it. All of our water maker equipped boats also have a drinking water standard filter system on the whole boat that includes a UV light. No more plastic trash to get rid of. As well as drinking water at every tap in the boat. The water coming out of these units is better than your tap water at home.

For a boat owner the reduced number of times that their boat comes in contact with a hard dock over five years and the wear and tear associated with that is likely worth the initial capital costs. Add to that the value of the water maker at resell time. Or the value as you cruise into the sunset post charter of having a critical piece of cruising gear already aboard and it becomes a no brainer.

Jay

"200 gallons of filled water tanks is over 2,000 lbs."

If my 6th grade science is correct a gallon is 8 lbs, so 800 lbs would be 1600 lbs.

Water to be exact weights 8.34 lbs per gallon or 1 gram per 1 cubic centimeter. What is missing in your equation is the weight of the tanks themselves and all the infrastructure to support and secure those sloshing tanks that crash down off the waves with the healing boat at sea. One argument against the water maker used to be weight. Today watermakers are lighter, take up less space than the once did but water stayed the same size and weight while the tanks keep getting bigger and bigger. As long as the correct location and the power considerations are taken care of there is no reason beyond $5,000 to $10,000 in upfront cost to not put watermakers on the boats.

We have chartered many times with Voyage and LOVE having a water maker! We use the transom showers a lot and always have guests, so it's nice not to be the "water police" nagging about water conservation in the middle of the ocean. Like Jay said, not thinking about where to fill tanks adds to our freedom. However, while the water is totally safe for drinking, it tastes pretty awful. We still buy gallons for refilling water bottles. We would run the water maker almost every evening while we were cooking to make sure we had plenty for showers and dishes the following day.

I'd gladly pay a little extra for a water maker over A/C!! We are chartering with CYOA this time and don't have a water maker but did prefer thie boat we chose from their fleet because it had a larger fresh water tank.

Just 9 more days!....

Cheers!

The boat we are chartering this year has a water maker, our first. It will be interesting to see if we use it or not.

Smully - looks like we will be down at the same time, maybe we will cross paths! If you see a Bali 4.5 from Dream Yacht Charters, stop by and say hello.

In places where it is difficult to get water, I could see a water maker being very nice to have. In the BVI, it seems we're always passing a place that we can get water. Never really been an issue for us, although we also rarely have a full boat.

Long ago with full boats and kids we planned to get water in the BVI everyday whether we needed it or not just to make water not and issue. We have also gone 14 days off Belize and other places with the water and ice we left the charter dock with. Once we started using watermakers the stress and hassles that came with worrying about water went away. Just the knowledge we can make 20 gallons of water in a couple of hours made life more pleasant. No two boats are the same and some installations are better than others. That is why a good briefing is so important. In my world now if we are charging batteries we are probably making water. If everyone starts moving towards the showers and the galley. The watermaker gets flipped on at the same time making water while we are using water. Before you leave the dock understand your set up and when you have the power available to use the watermaker.

One way to control water use. Make sure everyone starting with the suspected largest water user gets to hold the hose to fill the tank. In most cases one turn holding the hose turns the high user into the water police.

Hey Colleen,

We arrive in STT on Saturday the 30th and set sail to Jost or Soper's on the 1st. We will be on CYOA's "Island Sister." Hopefully we cross paths for a cocktail! We have no itinerary!

Cheers!
Jeff and J

We arrive in St Thomas on April 30th at 12:30. Take a private water taxi to Tortola, head out on the boat on May 1st. We don't have an itinerary either, wherever the wind takes us. We turn the boat in on May 15th.

I like this idea !!!

You mean I can't just stick the hose into the hole & sit on the swim platform with my iPad until water comes out the overflow vent? <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Yikes.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Grin.gif" alt="" />

We don't hold the hose the whole time either, both our water gauges work just fine.

We have chartered several CYOA boats with watermakers.....LOVE it..we had no issues at all and the water tasted fine

You tell the newbies they HAVE to hold it so the hose does slip out <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/jester.gif" alt="" />

We chartered a Helia 44, Big Papa Lulu, with watermaker and icemaker from CYOA last summer. We took her to the SVI which has no convenient place to get water or fuel unless you go to Del Rey in Fajardo, PR.

It was REALLY nice.

To be freed from the constant planning for where we're gonna get our next ice, walking long distances to get ice, rushing back to the dingy and carrying wet bags of ice in our laps, as well as standing for one-two hours in the sun filling the water tanks was really nice. It probably saved us half a day or more of fiddling about. Trading Diesel for water and ice is very economical.

I live aboard my boat, I leave the dock and don't touch another dock for 6 months at a time because of the watermaker; it frees one from having to make frequent calls to shoreside facilities. The watermaker is reliable and energy efficient and makes extended cruising a real pleasure.

and so....
what makes are better than others and why ?

The definition of what makes a "better" watermaker varies by cruiser. Some makes are energy efficient, some produce large amounts of water in a short time, some are very quiet (I once had one that sounded like a jet engine about to take off).
All current models are reliable assuming they are treated correctly. Watermaker membranes are common across all models and they are very susceptible to chemical contamination so one needs to be careful not to run it in water with oil or other chemicals. Chlorine (found in many municipal water supplies) will ruin a membrane in short order; and watermakers backflush at the end of a cycle. Bacterial and other growth starts quickly in a membrane, so they like to be used frequently.
The prefilters will clog up quickly if run in the type of water often seen in anchorages. I've had to replace both filters on my watermaker within an hour while running it off Prickly Pear - the sediments whirled up by the current make that water pretty bad. At sea (even in the Sir Francis Drake Passage) or in water that one can see items on the bottom in 20 feet is clear enough to keep the filters running for a long time.
I have a Spectra - it is efficient, quiet, produces 150ppm water but only makes about 15 gallons per hour; enough for me but probably not big enough for a charter cat with 8+ people aboard.

I have to echo Captain Jay's comments on the watermaker benefits. The top 3 upgrades we made to our Saba 50 Cuvée were the installation of a watermaker, water filtration system, and conversion to freshwater flush toilets.

CYOA installed a Blue Water Desalination unit that produces 25 gph. It operates on 220v AC so we simply turn it on (as needed) while we run the generator in the late afternoon to charge the house battery and to power the A/C. The incremental diesel fuel burn is trivial. In addition to the usual seawater pre-filters (10 micron & 5 micron sediment cartridges), CYOA also installed an upstream diatomaceous earth media filter (think pool filter) that filters down to 30 microns and has its own backwash system. This has really extended the lifetime of the two cartridge filters. I ran the system in the opaque Chesapeake Bay last summer and the cartridge filters stayed very clean. The watermaker automatically performs a carbon-filtered freshwater backflush after each use.

The product water goes through a carbon block filter before it goes to the water tank. CYOA also installed a PURA three-pass water filtration system for the freshwater system. All water from the freshwater tanks (regardless of source) goes through a 5 micron sediment filter, a carbon block filter, and then the UV filter before it's sent to the taps, icemaker, freshwater flush heads, and showers. The filters are changed regularly.

The water has no odor or off-taste, and it saves lugging and then disposing of dozens of plastic bottles.

There are also none of the usual marine plumbing odors associated with seawater flush toilets.

We've only had two minor maintenance items with the watermaker - the boost pump impeller was damaged when it sucked up a plastic bag into the sea strainer and ran dry, and the salinity meter had to be recalibrated (a quick fix) when it starting rejecting all the product water.

First - a thank-you to all comments

Second - for the charter fleets - I can see it being a maintenance nuisance - and cost - especially if the RO membranes need regular use to stay "fresh"

any further comments ?
to me this is quite techno-curious