Raritan Marine Elegance vs SeaEra QC Conversion Kit

[max_sailing]

Hi C310 friends!

I'm planning to replace the manual Jabsco head on my C310 with an electric model. I'd also like to switch to fresh water flush. Most of my sailing is 1 or 2 day trips and there's plenty of water. I will happily trade a few gallons of water for a reduction in odor. It's also one less seacock to open/close on every quick evening sail out. I figure if I do get a long trip in one day, I could always flush with a bucket of seawater as a backup. It also seems that a remote pump could be added in the future should I regret the fresh water choice.

After searching many pages on this forum, and all the recommendations from Peggy, I'm sold on Raritan - particularly when I discovered that the retail prices from distributors are way less than the list prices on their site.

I see two options:

Marine Elegance, freshwater, standard height with the angled back for $734, perhaps with the smart panel upgrade for $855:

Raritan Marine Elegance Toilet - Raritan 2 - Marine Heads and Portable Toilet Parts - Plumbing/Ventilation - Boatersland Marine

Sea Era Conversion QC Kit, freshwater, reusing my bowl and seat for $540.

Raritan 162L SeaEra Conversion Kit - Raritan 162L - Marine Heads and Portable Toilet Parts - Plumbing/Ventilation - Boatersland Marine

I'll take some more exact measurements next time I'm at the boat, but from what I've seen on the forums either should fit.

The Elegance marketing discusses powerful vacuum flushing, which sounds like a worthy upgrade.

Does anyone have experience with both the Elegance and Sea Era QC and have feedback on if the Elegance upgrade is worth it?

Anyone done either install on a 310 specially and have and lessons learned?

Thanks!

Max

 

[jssailem]

Hey Max, are your sailing adventures taking you beyond the Columbia River?

Your decision to enhance your head has an impact beyond the choice of toilets. Both of these are electric-powered conveniences. Are you modifying the Electrical systems to accommodate this increase in power consumption? You speak of freshwater availability. Is this additional tankage, or will you dip a bucket in the river?
How will you address the issue of TP? Aboard a charter a couple of years ago, I learned that TP in their electrically powered heads was the most often clog failure issue.

With the sailing plan you describe, you might want to consider a composting toilet.

The stink you mention appears to be a cause for this new direction. While it may be due to the head, it is more likely due to a poor "design" of the plumbing, poor choice of the hoses used, and lack of adequate tank ventilation. Check out the book my @Peggie Hall HeadMistress here in the SBO shop. It is my go-to textbook for no-stink sewage management on my boat.

 

[dlochner]

Electricity consumption on the electric toilets is pretty insignificant. The Raritan Elegance draws 28 amps when flushing for less than 30 seconds. Assuming a 30 second flush, it would consume .23 ah. At 10 flushes per day, that's less than 3ah. The few electric toilets I have used don't flush for 30 seconds, more like 15 seconds. So unless you have a very very small battery bank, the electric cost is trivial.

 

[max_sailing]

I have Peggie's book on order! I am excited to study up on oder reduction, realizing that it is unlikely just the river water in the head.

While I have less than a season on it, I converted my Catalina 25 from manual flush to a (very low cost) Johnson Pump Aquat and have been super pleased with it. My partner very much appreciate the upgrade and has asked for the same on the 310!

Regarding the sailing plan, I am planning for some pacific coastal sailing over the next couple of years (Portland to Puget Sound, and then Portland to San Francisco). But, in the meantime I just sail the river one evening or one weekend at a time every chance I get.

As Dave mentioned, I'm not worried about the power consumption, particularly given the fresh 400ah of AGM storage I just put on the boat. I do worry about increasing the consumption of the 55 gallons of onboard water, perhaps the more expense dual water source upgrade from Raritan could be an option.

 

[max_sailing]

I hadn't considered a composting toilet. I've now started reading up on those too...

 

[colemj]

We have had 4 Raritan Marine Elegance heads over the past 12yrs. There is no vacuum flush on them - they use macerators, so don't know why they mention vacuum. We use toilet paper at will and have never had an issue. I think they will flush tennis balls. The smart control panel can program the amount of water used with flushing, so you have the option of using bare minimal amounts of water while out for a day or two, with a couple of good full flushes to clear the lines when you return. The electrical use isn't worth concern. The 28A spec is worse case, and ours use ~20A for the couple of seconds they are flushing. About 0.03Ah/flush for #1, and 0.09Ah/flush for #2. So depending on amount of Taco Bell and Indian food, it takes 10-30 flushes to reach 1Ah of battery use.

Mark

 

[Cat 310 #1 in GA]

I have never been interested in the complexities of an electric head or fresh water flush. If odor is the concern just use Noflex Digestor which works extremely well and is what Peggy recommends.

 

[Peggie Hall HeadMistress]

How will you address the issue of TP? Aboard a charter a couple of years ago, I learned that TP in their electrically powered heads was the most often clog failure issue.

Electric toilets on most charter boats can handle reasonable amounts of marine/RV tp, but an overload of it or the softer premium TP that charter customers often bring with them--or worse yet, wet wipes--will choke any toilet, manual or electric. What most of 'em--most boat owners too--don't realize is that at least 90% of clogs not including wet wipes will dissolve on their own in about an hour. So they panic and call the charter company to unclog them.

--Peggie

 

[Peggie Hall HeadMistress]

I do worry about increasing the consumption of the 55 gallons of onboard water, perhaps the more expense dual water source upgrade from Raritan could be an option.

If your only reason for considering an electric toilet is the ability to flush using fresh water, there may be a better solution that'll let you do that using a sea water electric toilet:

Sink drain thru-hulls are below the waterline on almost all sailboats. So disconnect the toilet intake hose from the thru-hull (close the seacock first!) and re-route it to tee or wye it into the sink drain line as close to the seacock as possible because the connection must be below waterline to work. You'll be left with an unused thru-hull that you can repurpose to use for a washdown pump and probably be able to shorten the intake line.

This will allow you to flush normally with sea water. To flush using fresh water, close the sink drain thru-hull and fill the sink with clean fresh water..flush the toilet. Because the seacock is closed, the toilet will draw the water out of the sink, not only allowing you to flush with fresh water but also rinsing the sea water out of the entire system—intake line, pump, channel in the rim of the bowl and the discharge line,(Water poured into the bowl only rinses out the toilet discharge line). If your toilet is electric, be careful not to let it run dry…doing so can burn out the intake impeller. Or you can keep the sink drain seacock closed except when it's needed to drain the sink and flush with fresh water down the sink all the time...your choice.
It may also be necessary to keep the sink plugged except when in use, with a rubber sink plug Otherwise the toilet may pull air through the sink when you try to flush, preventing the pump from priming.

--Peggie

 

[Peggie Hall HeadMistress]

If odor is the concern just use Noflex Digestor which works extremely well and is what Peggy recommends.[/QUOTE
But only for odor out the TANK vent. It can't do a thing to prevent odor from the toilet when flushed that's due to micro- and not-so-micro sea life that's died and decayed in the intake line, pump and channel in the rim of the bowl. I've just posted a cure for that...

--Peggie

 

[LD_C310]

I installed a Raritan Marine Elegance with fresh water flush on my 310, 2 years ago. This is a very good product that I highly recommend. It was straightforward to install, easy to use and has worked well. It sits a bit high, especially for my wife, but overall we like the upgrade from the manual seawater flush.

 

[max_sailing]

I installed a Raritan Marine Elegance with fresh water flush on my 310, 2 years ago. This is a very good product that I highly recommend. It was straightforward to install, easy to use and has worked well. It sits a bit high, especially for my wife, but overall we like the upgrade from the manual seawater flush.

Glad to hear I won’t be the first! Since there’s such easy access to the intake seacock and where a pump would do under the aft berth, I’m thinking that seawater vs fresh water would be easy to change in the future.

 

[max_sailing]

Peggy, thanks for the great idea on Ting off of the sink drain. This is how the intake on my electric head on my Catalina 25 is plumbed, I now realized that I can use fresh water for the final flush before leaving the boat simply by closing the seacock and putting water in the sink. Brilliant!

 

[Peggie Hall HeadMistress]

You DO know that yu can switch to "sink" water (only clean fresh, never gray water) any time you find yourself in waters that are too skanky to want to use to flush the toilet, which coastal or marina waters often are? Switch back to sea water after you're in "clean" water again.

I got that idea from a Tartan owner in the mid-'90s...Tartan used to plumb their toilet fush water intakes that way. I thought it was such a great idea that I've been recommending it ever since.

--Peggie

 

[max_sailing]

Thanks Peggy. Do you have any input on the overall performance of the Elegance vs SeaEra QC?

 

[colemj]

I installed a Raritan Marine Elegance with fresh water flush on my 310, 2 years ago. This is a very good product that I highly recommend. It was straightforward to install, easy to use and has worked well. It sits a bit high, especially for my wife, but overall we like the upgrade from the manual seawater flush.

They make a tall and short version. We have one of each (short is on a pedestal and tall is on the floor), and the difference in height is noticeable.

Mark

 

[colemj]

Electric toilets on most charter boats can handle reasonable amounts of marine/RV tp, but an overload of it or the softer premium TP that charter customers often bring with them--or worse yet, wet wipes--will choke any toilet, manual or electric.

I agree with the wet wipes (what a horrible mess they make), but we have been freely flushing quality/thick TP for 12yrs through 4 Marine Elegances and have never had a single problem. We just couldn't stand the membrane-thin dissolve in your hand marine/RV TP.

This is born out in observation, as we boat where direct discharge is the only option. Upon discharge, all that comes out is a cloud of TP particles - nothing recognizable as pieces of TP at all.

I swear the Marine Elegance will flush a tennis ball. I often start to push the flush button thinking "yeah, that's not going down", but never fails...

Mark

 

[LD_C310]

Glad to hear I won’t be the first! Since there’s such easy access to the intake seacock and where a pump would do under the aft berth, I’m thinking that seawater vs fresh water would be easy to change in the future.

I picked up the fresh water supply from a T under the vanity. I eliminated direct overboard flush and only go to the holding tank.

 

[Peggie Hall HeadMistress]

Thanks Peggy. Do you have any input on the overall performance of the Elegance vs SeaEra QC?

The Elegance discharge pump is a lot more powerful than the SeaEra...the Elegance can shoot bowl contents up to a 100 linear feet, up to 30' vertical. The Elegance is also much quieter.

Fwiw, I have a personal bias against the 4 option "Smart Flush" panel because it has a circuit board...it's the only part of it that ever seems to fail. My only experience with them was a refrigerator at home with circuit boards that failed regularly. Fortunately I'd bought the extended warranty, so the need to replace them one at a time was only a major PITA and some lost perishable food, but I recommend the 3-option flush panel instead of the 4 option for that reason and also because the Smart Flush "Full" 4th flush is actually 2 or 3 FULL flushes you don't need that can fill up a holding tank in a hurry. You don't have to use it, but the 3 option flush is also less expensive.
That's just my $.02 worth...your mileage can vary.

--Peggie

 

[colemj]

Fwiw, I have a personal bias against the 4 option "Smart Flush" panel because it has a circuit board

It has been my concern as well, and I carry a spare, but in 12yrs and 4 toilets we have never had one fail (knock on wood). This includes 3 nearby lightning strikes that took out other electronics on the boat. I think the control panel itself is only mechanical buttons with simple analog electronics to transfer the button pushes to the separate main electronic controller. This separate main controller is used regardless of which control panel one chooses.

I'm convinced the designers of Raritan's flush controllers are either not human, or have never used a human interface device before. Their controllers are terrible to use. They are actually anti-human, and among the rarified few interfaces I've encountered that can be considered complete failures on all levels. For instance, the electronic panels are completely flush with no tactile feedback on where the buttons are or how much they need to be pushed. It is like randomly pushing on a plate of glass hoping you get the exact position and pressure correct. Operating one at night or in low light is impossible.

We originally got the "3-position" mechanical controller, but the design at the time was so horrible that we sent it back and got the full electronic controller (which is horrible for different reasons). The mechanical switch consisted of two separate switches, one on top of the other, with one switch emptying and the other filling. To flush, one needed to push in the gap between the two switches to activate them both at the same time. It was a horrible interface in that pushing on the gap was like pushing two switches off center, so the feel was terrible and uncertain, and the gap widened as you pushed, so the finger naturally fell down to only one switch and defeated the flush. I just looked, and this design has now been changed to three separate switches, which is much better.

The electronic controller doesn't really do 3 full flushes as a normal flush. Well, it does so on surface level, and could be programmed to do so, but is not really how it operates in practice. In practice, it does 3 separate small flushes, where the first flush moves the contents into the line and is followed by an air gap behind it, and this is followed by 2 more flushes of water and air gaps to push everything through. When programmed correctly, the amount of water is exactly the amount needed to move the bowl contents out of the line and into the tank and leave the line with mostly air in it - and no more than that. It is the same amount as a single flush, just broken into separate flushes. Personally, I think it is a better way to flush, and it makes having guests who don't understand these intricacies easier - just tell them to push that button, rather than explaining you want them to hold it for so many seconds and then follow with an empty bowl flush, then add a bit of water before leaving.

Mark