Sailing VesselNellie
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Systems & Procedures

Watermaker

AquaPrime 150 L/hr — startup and shutdown.

Auto-synced from the crew's Google Doc — last checked Oct 15, 2026. Edit the doc and this page updates within a day.

Watermaker Procedure - Nellie

Key Points

  • Water Tanks - 2X 250 L = 500L
  • We always want > 200 L in tanks - so one tank 80% or 40% in each tank minimum
  • At minimums - Run watermaker - to get back to 500L.

Startup

  1. Make sure sea water is open
  2. Make sure air con is OFF if genset is OFF
  3. Make sure output sea water is open (it usually is)
  4. Turn on Low pressure pump
  5. Wait for pressure to reach and settle just over 3 bar
  6. Turn on high pressure pump
  7. SLOWLY turn valve to raise pressure - SLOWLY to 56 BAR - NEVER OVER 58. Careful as pressure goes up slowly after you close valve just a bit…. We will practice
  8. Select Port or Starboard (middle valve)
  9. Wait two / three minutes - see that pressure is stable at 56 BAR
  10. Test if you like…(bottom valve)
  11. Direct flow (top valve) from TEST to TANKS
  12. Set timer - 40% to 100% takes about 35 minutes - monitor overflow over starboard diesel fill hatch
  13. Can change Tanks when one is full - middle valve - while going - SET TIMER so we don’t leave watermaker running overflow

Shutdown

  1. Direct Flow - top valve - TANKS to TEST
  2. Lower pressure from 56 BAR to none
  3. Turn off HI pressure pump
  4. Leave Lo pressure pump for 2 minutes - it is hot under there
  5. Turn off low pressure pump
  6. Do a 2 minute fresh water flush

Long Term Storage - Pickle

  1. Do a fresh water flush
  2. Close sea chest manifold valve to watermaker
  3. Close watermaker brine discharge
  4. Insure watermaker valves - Direct Flow - top valve - to TEST (not TANKS)
  5. Prepare Pickle solution - one jar + water to fill 20 L bucket
  6. Put Low pressure pump inlet into bucket
  7. Put brine discharge to bucket (open valve by seacock on starboard wall)
  8. Turn on low pressure pump - let circulate for 20 minutes
  9. Run high pressure pump with no back pressure also for 5 minutes
  10. Turn off all pumps
  11. Close all valves
  12. To UN_Pickle - fresh water flush and then make water to TEST for 4 minutes - then proceed as normal operation