While viewing the more than 800 new boats on display at the February Seattle Boat Show, attendees may have missed the launch of a new Bellingham-based business that debuted a product to solve a problem nearly every boaters dreads: Controlling the stink of their head’s holding tanks.
Nautilus Filters, which recently opened a web-only business at the start of this year, is a manufacturer, developer, and designer of odor control products for the marine industry. Their first device is a filter that uses activated carbon and a foot-long, patent-pending, cylindrical device that intensifies the odor-absorbing effects of the carbon medium.
“With most other filters, the air passes over the carbon too quickly, so less odors get the chance to be absorbed,” said Nautilus’ founder, Joe Koreis. “Our filter uses a five-chambered helix that provides more resistance, so the air has six times the residence time of other filters, allowing the odors to be more-efficiently removed.”
The Nautilus system, he added, is also refillable, so the whole unit doesn’t have to be thrown out once the carbon is used up, thus greatly prolonging the life of the filter. The company’s website, nautliusfilter.com, also sells packages of specially designed blends of carbon refills that attract and neutralize the foul-smelling hydrogen sulfide fumes that plague every kind of holding tank.
In addition, the filter units come with a built-in bypass valve that forces excess air to return to the holding tank in case negative pressures build up, which prevents the possibility of having the tank collapse on itself as air is drawn through the filter.
“We’ve done a lot of flush and sniff tests,” Koreis said. “You can put your nose right up to the venting hose and not smell a thing. Anyone who’s gotten a whiff of a holding tank knows how amazing it is to have no smell at all coming out the back end.”
