Technical Guide: Pickling Your Watermaker System
Pickling your watermaker is a quick and simple maintenance process that takes about 5 minutes. If you plan to leave your system idle for more than two weeks, pickling is essential to prevent bacteria and biological growth from ruining your membranes.
Once pickled, your system can be safely left in storage for up to 6 months. If the system remains laid up longer than this, you will need to flush the system and repeat the process.
Important: You must only use pure, chlorine-free product water for this process. Using chlorinated water (such as standard tap water from a marina or a treated ship's tank) will permanently damage the reverse osmosis membrane.
Once pickled, your system can be safely left in storage for up to 6 months. If the system remains laid up longer than this, you will need to flush the system and repeat the process.
Important: You must only use pure, chlorine-free product water for this process. Using chlorinated water (such as standard tap water from a marina or a treated ship's tank) will permanently damage the reverse osmosis membrane.
Step-by-Step Pickling Procedure
- Prepare the solution: Fill a large bucket with 10 to 12 litres of unchlorinated product water (drawn directly from your sample faucet). Add 5 tablespoons (75ml) of pickling powder (sodium metabisulphite) and mix thoroughly until completely dissolved.
- Normal shutdown: Shut down the system using your normal procedure, including the standard fresh water flush. Ensure your Sample/Tank Valve is set to the Sample position.
- Deploy the pickling hose: Place the pickling hose (attached to the charcoal filter assembly) all the way into the bucket of pickling solution.
- Configure the valve: Turn the Pickling Valve on the charcoal filter to the vertical position.
- Run the solution through: Turn on the high-pressure pump. Do not dial in any pressure. The pump will automatically draw the pickling solution out of the bucket and circulate it through the system. As soon as the bucket is empty, immediately shut off the high-pressure pump to prevent it from running dry.
- Reset the valve: Turn the Pickling Valve back to the horizontal position.
