A/C drain pan water

[Roc]

Howdy,
I'm finishing up the installation of an A/C unit.  I mounted it under the sink in the head.  It's a Marine Air, 16,000 BTU unit.  Here's my problem.  What to do with the condensate water??  Most installations just have a hose that leads from the pan to the bilge.  But in my case, I have a nice dry, sweet smelling bilge via my dripless packing seal.  So the last thing I want to do is have stagnant water sit in my bilge!  One thought is to put one of those flexible water jugs I've seen in B/US in the bilge and lead the hose into it.  This way I can dump it out when it's full.  Another thought is this, I've seen on the Mermaid Air website that they have a gizmo called the 'condensator'.  I attaches to the discharge drain hose just before the thru-hull.  It basically siphons the water out of the pan by the suction created by the moving water out of the drain hose.  Does anyone have one of these that they can comment about??

Any other ideas on what to do with the condensation water will be greatly appreciated.  

Thanks!!
Roc-

[Ken Juul]

Siphon pumps are very common in aviation fuel systems.  Simple, effective, no moving parts to break.  I don't know if will self prime or pull very far up hill so routing of the drain hose may be the critical part of the installation.  Personally, Luna Loca has so many little leaks, condensate in the bilge is of little concern.  At least I know the bilge pump gets tested regularly.   :cool:

[Mike Smith]

Cruisaire recommends running the drain hose(s) to a thru hull fitting installed just above the AC discharge thru hull fitting.  When I have the bottom done this fall, I'll have the AC drain thru hull installed and connect it as recommended (Of course, the original owner neglected to do this!)  My AC unit is installed in the hanging locker under the nav table so the condensate drips down and into a small tunnel and then into the bilge - I regularly put a little chlorine bleach tablet in there to (1) keep organic crud from blocking up the tunnel and (2) kill any legionella bacteria in the AC condensate (remember where Legionairres Disease comes from?)

[sailor2mon]

I used to have my condensation line "T" into the sink drain above the water line. I now "collect" the water and use it as it is distilled water and I "recycle" it for use in the head instead of salt water...it cuts down on the "head" smell and promotes less growth in the holding tank.