Over doing the RO/DI

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by gregzz4

Basile, what's your tapwater TDS ?

Yes, this & what's your water pressure? You may not need a booster pump. Why complicate matters? For less than $20 you should be able to score a water pressure gauge & handheld TDS meters are also available these days for about $10, usually in the recreational vehicle department of WalMerde or Crappy Tire. Do a little research on your source water before you buy & you can save money, keep things simple. More automation is not necessarily better. Keep in mind that every time you flush your membrane, water is still flowing through your carbon stage, so its chlorine removing capacity is being depleted at a faster rate. I'm still on my original membrane after over 4 years using a manual flush of a minute or so before & after production. Not a big chore.

Something I forgot to mention in my earlier post is that I've noticed after every flush cycle, the TDS out of the membrane creeps up several points until it settles in again. So frequent auto flushes are going to be hard on your DI stage.

[gregzz4]

Originally Posted by mike31154

WalMerde

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by MarieH

Tds is 000 after 7 stages. I don't mind shelling out for the resins once a year. I just find all the cartridges piled up together a bit of a bulky bother but the water is good and I think if there's more stages you can go longer between resins?

While it does seem logical that more stages are better, it really depends on each user's source water. You need to consider TDS, pressure, temperature and other contaminants, that is 'non dissolved solids', or sediment. TDS means 'dissolved solids' and the only thing in your system that will remove them is the RO membrane. Adding a bunch more sediment stages before your carbon block & membrane will do nothing but add bulk (which you find a bother) to your set up. It will also reduce the pressure at the RO membrane resulting in slower pure water production.

If you're on a well with low water pressure & a pile of iron & other sediment, then yeah, get a booster pump & maybe add a sediment stage. Alternatively, simply change out the sediment stage more often, it's the cheapest component to buy and with a clear filter housing you'll have a good visual when it starts getting real funky.

If you're on city water treated with chlorine, TDS below 200 & water pressure of 60 psi or better, you can easily get by with a 4 stage unit. 1 sediment, 1 carbon block, RO membrane & DI stage. If money is no object, knock yourself out . Changing DI more often is not going to break the bank, but I've only done it once & it was a fiddly affair.

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by gregzz4

He, yeah I can't take credit for that one. One of my dear Quebec friends blurted that out years ago. I cracked up too. Very apropos, however, I do find myself shopping there from time to time.

[Basile]

GRRRRRRRRR i whish i'd known these little details before comitting, the price of learning , but the deed is done. I belong to a club and we meet regulary and they all had one so i signed up for one we're all in the same city and these guys know more about this than me. I'm not new to the hobby , but part of it is chineese to me . Anything revolving around plumbing is off my scanner, now i know the price of it. I've been out of the hobby to long too and things are happening very fast now, the tanks are arriving in 3 weeks from Concept Aquariums. Thanks guys for the info i'll munch on that for a while . I thought this was going to be an easy buy it appears not, LOL food for thoughts.....their's was no answer yesterday anywhere to find out about TDS and to my other questions.

[Evilweevil]

You will be really happy with that puratek system it works really well and it's plug and play nice and simple

[Spyd]

I agree. Puratek are nice units and they have everything you need all ready installed. I run 5 stages on my unit as I have added an extra di just because I had it kicking around. Can't beat the 1:1 good water to waste water ratio either.

I find my filters last for a good 6 months. I installed a chlorine / chloramine whole home filter and it is awesome!! No chlorine or chloramines in any of my household water and it lasts 6 - 7 years before I need to get the media replaced. It helps out my RO/DI unit big time as it has a lot less work to do and saves a lot of money in exhausting filters and membranes as well. Worth every penny!!!!

[mike31154]

Originally Posted by Basile

GRRRRRRRRR i whish i'd known these little details before comitting, the price of learning , but the deed is done. I belong to a club and we meet regulary and they all had one so i signed up for one we're all in the same city and these guys know more about this than me. I'm not new to the hobby , but part of it is chineese to me . Anything revolving around plumbing is off my scanner, now i know the price of it. I've been out of the hobby to long too and things are happening very fast now, the tanks are arriving in 3 weeks from Concept Aquariums. Thanks guys for the info i'll munch on that for a while . I thought this was going to be an easy buy it appears not, LOL food for thoughts.....their's was no answer yesterday anywhere to find out about TDS and to my other questions.

Don't sweat it, you'll get a very good system & can omit any parts not required once you get the feel for it. Generally you can't go wrong with advice provided by a local club. I checked the Ville de Gatineau site & was unable to find any water quality reports either. All I could come up with is that they subscribe to the Programme d'excellence en eau potable (program for excellence in drinking water), which surpasses the provincial standards required under the Regulation respecting the quality of drinking water. This doesn't help when you're looking for TDS numbers or what's still in it.

http://www.gatineau.ca/page.asp?p=en...te_eau_potable

In Vernon, I have access to Annual Water Reports which have all the good info on TDS etc. There are also monthly reports available.

http://www.rdno.ca/docs/2013_wq_north_kal.pdf

[Basile]

Thanks guys your a great bunch.