Abandon ship - Can Waterlog be used in the liferaft ?
Yes. It may one day save your life.
Image courtesy Moxie Media Inc.
Note the Waterlog yellow lanyard leading overboard
Moving the liferaft watermaker handle is not difficult and is designed for use by an tired or incapacitated person. Using one stroke of the handle every second, the Waterlog will deliver, directly to the mouth, approximately one mouth of water every twenty seconds. This may one day save your life. The biggest danger in a liferaft has been shown to be dehydration, not weather. A person can survive for weeks without food, but only a few days without fresh water.
There are two desalinators in the world which have been specifically designed as liferaft watermakers. One is the Pur06 which can produce 0.2 gallons per hour and is held in the hand inside (aboard) the liferaft. The other is the Waterlog 200 which does not come aboard and can produce 0.6 gallon per hour in manual operation. It is also used as a yacht watermaker when it is water driven by being towed behind the yacht when it can produce up to 50 gallons per day.
A Waterlog in manual liferaft watermaker configuration
The same Waterlog in yacht watermaker configuration
There is another manual watermaker which can be pumped by hand, however, it is unsuited to a liferaft as it is too large and heavy - this is a danger to occupants of the liferaft in heavy weather and poses the risk of puncturing the floor or buoyancy chambers of the raft. As far as we are aware, the only liferaft watermakers suitable for a four or six person raft are the Pur06 and the Waterlog.
To find oneself in a liferaft is not necessarily the ultimate crises if properly prepared - however, great care must be exercised to ensure that there is minimal exposure to further damage or injury and a reliable source of fresh water for drinking and washing the skin to prevent salt sores.
In emergency, the Waterlog is clipped to the liferaft interior grab handle on a lanyard and placed in the water alongside the liferaft flotation chamber for use. When not being used to make drinking water, the Waterlog is lowered below the sea surface so it will not take up any of the precious space inside the raft and will not chafe the buoyancy chambers in heavy weather. It is not necessary for Waterlog to come aboard the raft for storage or use. It is not desirable to have any hard or metal items larger than a flare or folding penknife inside a liferaft due to the possibility of injury to the occupants or puncturing the raft in rough weather.
To make water, the Waterlog is raised alongside the raft and the emergency operating handle is used to deliver drinking water aboard via its small flexible drinking tube.
To convert the Waterlog to hand operation from normal yacht use:
There are three spring loaded pins protruding through the body of the watermaker, at the end nearest to the drive shaft & impellor. These are pushed in until the whole drive shaft, black bearing block, and its associated drive components pop out of the body under spring pressure. The impeller, drive train, and bearing block assembly of the Waterlog are discarded (After your rescue, you can readily obtain these, on-line, from the factory) and are replaced by the spring loaded emergency handle as it snaps into position.
There are also three spring loaded pins on the handle assembly, same as the bearing block. These are depressed and the manual handle mechanism is slipped into position, allowing the three pins to engage in the three vacant holes (which have been vacated by the removal of the drive system) in the body of the watermaker. The conversion to a manual watermaker operation requires no tools other than a pointed object such as the liferaft pen knife, fishing hook, or the corner of a bailer, etc. It is instantly ready for use. Making water by hand requires some little effort, however, this is a small price to pay for saving ones life.
Output:
Stroking the manual handle approximately one cycle per second will typically deliver a mouth of water every 20 seconds. This means that human body hydration can be maintained indefinitely in an emergency, in return for perhaps 15 minutes pumping per person per day. Output depends on the stroke rate, temperature, operator, and other factors. The output may be delivered directly to the mouth.
The output tube is sufficiently long to pass around to the occupants of a small liferaft, thus allowing another person to make the water, should this be desirable or necessary due to incapacitation of the recipient of the drinking water.
Note:
As the watermaker is kept suspended below the liferaft on its lanyard when not in use, it is likely that there will be sea water in the drinking water output tube. It may take some minutes pumping to start making water, and perhaps further pumping may be needed to flush through any salt water residue in the output system. Should you be unfortunate enough to be forced to use the watermaker by hand when new, without ever having being towed behind the vessel, it may take a half hour pumping to flush out the factory preservative put in after testing and before shipping. The preservative is no threat to health but it has an unpleasant taste until flushed through.
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Liferaft watermaker