After much thinking and planning I believe a DIY is probably the best way to go...(being a student sucks!) So this may need to be moved into the DIY area.
I believe I have solved most of the issues I was worried about with this current setup.
Last night I tee'd off the output of my RO unit so I now have one running to a brute can with a john guest "quick connect" valve on the end of it. The other end going straight to the faucet for drinking water. While messing around with it last night I noticed that when the valve was open it pulled water from the tube going to the brute. This could possibly contaminate my drinking water with salt ect. For this reason I do not want this end to even touch the brute. This means the cheap float valves are out of the question here.
Heres what I have planned for the top up brute sitting by my ro unit.
I plan on using these floats
http://www.aquahub.com/store/ifloatfloatswitch.html along with solenoids
http://autotopoff.com/products/solenoid/index.htm like this (without the cord attatched in this way)
One float switch sitting in the brute. One end to the solenoid and the other end to an extension cord. The solenoids other end will go to the other side of the extension cord completing the circuit.
When the float falls the circuit will be completed opening the solinoid and water from the ro unit will come out.
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Here is a diagram of the potential designs. (for the sump top off)
-The pink boxes are the floats (enclosed in some sort of contraption i will build so snails dont mess with them)
-The green box is a solenoid coming from my brute container to m sum
So the water level will drop causing the floats to drop (Turning them on) this will complete the circuit and activate the solenoid (open). This will let the water come from my brute container to the sump raising the water pusing the floats to the top(off) and closing the solenoid.
The only difference in these two is the placement of the floats in the sump. One has them on the same level and one has them at the same level.
With the first design the top float will be down(ON) and if the first switch fails and stays down the water lvl will rise and push this float up turning it off.
With the second design the floats will be at the same level and they will both have to drop for the pumps to turn on.
Both of these are desinged to avoid an over flow... is one better than the other or does it matter?
In design one, since the top float will not touch the water unless the bottom float fails will this get covered in salt creep over time and get stuck making it useless if the bottom float fails.
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Basically it will be the same design for both but only one float switch on the brute because I dont really care if it overflows in my furnace room and down the drain. plus there will be little salt creep (from mixing water change water in the brute) and no snails ect.
Ne 1 know where I can get 1/4 solenoids locally? Ill prolly just ebay the float valves unless someone knows where to get them locally.
Thoughts? Comments? Concerns?