We are slowly making progress on the watermaker. All of the large pieces have been purchased, now it’s a matter of finding a place to permanently mount everything so we know how to wire and plumb it. We are ordering all the small fittings that will enable us to connect the high pressure pump to the filters (membranes), then to the control panel and eventually into the water tanks.
Today I made a mock up of the control panel. The pressure gauge in the middle will let us operate the watermaker at the proper pressure for the water we are in. The flow meters in either side will tell us total system water flow. Once we begin producing water, the meter on the right will tell us how much fresh water we are producing per hour. The valve on the lower left is the controlling valve or needle valve. The more you close the valve the more sea water is forced through the filters (membranes) thus producing more fresh water…in theory. We still need to add an on/off switch and divert valve to the panel. Before adding water to the tanks it must be tested first. A divert valve will divert the fresh water to a sink where we can test it for purity, if it tests “good” then we switch the divert valve to route the water into the water tanks.
Mock up of the control panel:
