Making a Katadyn Power Survivor 40e Portable

[Grith]

I purchased a secondhand Katadyn Power Survivor 40e for potentially a one off 3/4 month very remote area cruise with no availability of returning to civilisation for resupply and potentially uncertain and at times difficult to dangerous to reach wild fresh water sources.
As my yacht is a relatively small 28 foot trailerable cruising equiped power sailer used in coastal and inland waters with 200litres plus of freshwater carrying capacity a reverse osmosis water maker is not usually required.
After examining potential fixed locations in my yacht and the weight of the unit and maintenance availability of these locations I have decided to make it a portable unit in a pelican style case.
So far so good with needing just a couple of right angle take offs on the slotted bolts removable prefilter and an Anderson plug electrical plug and switch to complete the unit.
I had to cut out a hole in the bottom to allow the motor to protrude a little but it still stands on its end case like not touching the motor protrusion and this hole also fits the inlet, output and wastes brine hoses as well.
The case will sit on my stern platform tied to a Bimini support by its handle with the inlet and waste brine lines from the stern and the product water going to a 15 litre water container that also doubles as my rain water collection storage.
Does anyone have experience with if the output line on these will push water up about 0.5 metre to a collection tank? I can place this on the swim platform as well but it would be more convenient to leave it in the out of the way cockpit seat corner that the rear cockpit seat covers when opened.
I have several locations that that unit will actually store in the yacht when not in use the best being in my rear generator box accessed from my swim platform along with my Honda eu10 which replaced the larger and unnecessary Honda eu 2.2 the box was designed for by the manufacturer Imexus Yachts.
It will also fit in a cavernous cockpit locker ( currently very full ) or internally under my dinette seats in storage compartments there but necessitating some internal rearrangement of storage to access to use and a bit of a carry. (It weighs just under 20kgs in the case with prefilter and charged with water)
Once I have fully tested the completed unit I will come back here and report the outcome.
By making it portable I feel it will both be able to be normally left behind, used in our other touring platforms when anticipating salt water environment’s and fresh water constraints or possibly just easily sold if proving not used after this planned trip. 🙂

[bergius]

Originally Posted by Grith

Does anyone have experience with if the output line on these will push water up about 0.5 metre to a collection tank?

It does. We have ours mounted in the cabinet under the galley sink, and both brine and freshwater output hoses initially are hoisted from there to the sink, until we’ve measured the output and lead it to canister.

This picture is when we’re already running the output to a canister, but in the beginning (and end) of each run the output hose gets routed next to the brine hose into the sink, and doesn’t seem to have problems with that:


That’s a great idea to make the 40E portable, BTW!

[Grith]

Thanks I hoped it wouldn’t be a problem as the 15litre water container sits neatly in a back corner of the cockpit often unusable anyway if we have the swim platform access seat raised. The other rear corner is also fairly unusable as there is nowhere to really put your legs when sitting in those corners and sitting there also interferes with the space for the helmsman at the wheel.
We have 4 of these 15 litre containers for drinking water as my partner can still taste a taint in our primary tank water despite how much I have cleaned, dried and scrubbed.
We are very space constrained doing multi month cruising on a 28 foot trailer sailer as can be seen by how stuffed one of our two cockpit lockers is here!
Just about every spare space has been used for something including cutting some hatches into otherwise in accessible areas or spaces requiring moving lots of stuff to get to.
Making the Katadyn portable was in part as there was just no easy to fit accessible spots left in the whole yacht! 🙂
I have rigged our water ballast system to be able to collect clean open ocean seawater and store this to use and process through the watermaker when we are in high silt movement zones as our planned trip is in an area of 10 metre tides (and prehistoric style monster crocodiles!).

[Grith]

I have made a few other enhancements to the portable cases Katadyn power survivor 40e project now.
The case now has vibration absorbing feet fitted salvaged from a now died after long service Honda eu10 suitcase generator.
I have also relocated the prefilter so the cartridge can be changed out without removing the prefilter body from the case as was required previously.
It now requires the two way inlet valve to be screwed onto the case externally for use but whilst this is slightly inconvenient it does allow greater ease and flexibility if attaching the raw water pick up source.
A hole in the case allows it still to open and close fully with just the threaded inlet tube protruding when closed and this is protected when not in use by a rubber stopper.
The protruding motor body just out of the bottom of the case is now also protected by two inspection port surrounds back to back and screwed to the case. I need to modify the screw in hatch slightly as its indented finger grips preclude the threads for the closure plate engaging at present.
The case now has an external power switch and below this a 90degree to the case Anderson plug internally and accepting of a plugin external connection.
I have an Anderson plug attached to a cigarette lighter plug by short cable which plugs into my swim platform 12v outlet to provide power for the watermaker.
With foam padding on both outsides of the case and a further foam insert between these with cutouts for the unit and spares it will be interesting how much of the annoying watermaker noise is still audible when in use with it sitting on my swim platform at the very rear of my yacht.
Next comes the big test of will it all work but with the nearest seawater over an hours drive away and even Aquarium artificial seawater supplies 30 minutes away this will have to wait until later in the week.