Ro/di suggestions please!? Cheap!

Pick a fight? no no, never occured to me.
I was asking for your opinion-and an educated one it is.
I do use the system foor all our drinking/cooking water.
I use the DI side for my DT.

After I get a TDS meter, I'm sure I'll get back to you on the best way to upgrade my system. On a positive note, it did come with an inline pressure meter! My system is aobut 52PSI. I looked into booster pumps, and they are expensive! When I called the company in Cali I think, not much help but they said it is best at 40-80PSI?

Thanks for yout advice on my system. I know I got what I paid for, it was sitll better than my first 4-5 months using tap water for my SW mix!

;-)

 

Found my answer......NM

 

Az-

I"m sure you saw what they say about their fiters. They did mention which memebrane they use. And I afgree, they Don''t mention the carbon filters. There is also another carbon filter on the top horizontally before the RO/DI.

Here's what the ebay ad says- it also states it is made in the USA- I'm sure you are pretty familiar whith it:


1st stage: high capacity, 5 micron sediment filter, to remove sediment, rust, sand, (replace every 6 to 12 months)

2nd stage: high capacity carbon filter, coconut shell carbon block filter removes chlorine, taste, & odor (replace every 12 months)

3rd stage: high capacity carbon filter, coconut shell carbon block filter further removing chlorine to ensure 100% removal of chlorine (replace every 12 months)

4th stage: TFC-100 Premium membrane we have done extensive testing among different brands of membrane, and we recently have switched to a higher rejection membrane filter, by US MEMBRANE, MADE IN USA. It removes 95% to 98% of all chemical, dissolved solids in tap water. (replace every 2-3 years) Look at data below. We also have TFC-75 membrane available upon request.

5th stage: DI filter (de-ionized, de-mineralize filter), Nuclear grade, color changing DI filter with refillable clear housing. The DI filter removes remaining of dissolved solids after RO system. A ball valve is included for dispensing DI water into open containers or to open tank. GOOD for reef, aquarium, hydroponics applications.

6th stage: high capacity final stage inline carbon filter, granular activated carbon, to improve taste of water. (replace every 12 months)

* The advantages with using clear, refillable DI filter: REFILLABLE means that you can partially refill your DI filter and eliminate the effect of channeling, and increase the usable life of the DI resin 3 times and filters out 3 times more water.

All DI filters inline type or cartridge type suffers from channeling effect. DI resin would shrink in size when they are been used. Then some water will pass through the resin without been filtered. Also water will find the easiest way to go through the filter, and that is the channeling effect.

This is evident that when you have a new DI filter, it is compact, and it is able to remove lots of mineral, but it gradually looses its performance. This is also evident that after you use the DI filter for a while, you can hear the resin becoming loose when shaking the filter. So the channeling effect of the water and shrinking of the DI resin causes the DI filter to be prematurely tossed away. There are still about 30% good DI resin been toss away. Also the DI filter looses its capability over time.

NOW we have a solution to solve this problem by using the clear-refillable DI filter. You can now get constant performance of DI filter, and refill just partially to keep the resin compact inside the housing. Also you are able to re-use the DI resin by re-mixing it. Thus eliminate the channeling effect. Therefore you are able to achieve optimum performance, save 30% of the resin, increase the usable life of the resin, and filter out 3 times more water. All these will translate to more saving of money. The best of all, you can see all this in action in our clear housing.

No harmful chemical added: Our resin does not contain chemical that will be harmful to skin, to fish, to reef, to live rock. It will not put any additional chemical into the purified water.

Designing consideration for inline DI filter. The ideal shape for the inline DI filter is long and thin like our 2" x 10" clear housing. What's important is to increase the contact time and minimize channeling, and maximize the usage of resin. Larger diameter inline filter like 2.5" wastes more resin and has more channeling problem. Resin that is near the outer diameter are not been used much, and there are more places that will form channeling effects. So the IDEAL and efficient design will be to use two smaller diameter inline filter in series, to achieve contact distance of 20 inches.

 

Will do tonight! I'll just take 2 big measuring cups and see where they are once the waste gets to four cups!

Here's a question! What are some good uses for the waste water? Hate seeing it just dump! Between this unit my house ro system and water softener I waste a ton of water a month! Maybe I need to look into a container and figure out how to use it for my washer!??

 

I've never heard of US Membrane and a search does not bring anything up either.
At one time they were using the Dow Filmtec 100 GPD 90% rejection rate nano filter not a 75 GPD 98% rejection rate RO filter which is very different. I have also seen them with no name Chinese clones installed. You never know what you are going to get and probably the reason they don't tell you.

Their advertising is a bunch of contradicting hog wash. It is solely designed to sell the uninformed buyer a RO system and make a quick buck. Look at every vendors website I have suggested and others I don't normally recommend but still sell a decent product. None supplies a small horizontal DI on their reef systems for a reason. None uses a 5 micron sediment filter or two carbon blocks, again there are reasons. All use brand name, proven, high quality RO membranes which they proudly tell you the name and model number of. None make make crazy statements like partially filling your DI cartridge for better efficiency, thats counterproductive. Why not pack it tightly and rotate it vertical so it works better?

I believe they have been reading some of the various threads, pointing out their shortcomings and scrambling to gain sales in spite of that.

Take a look at some of the FAQ here and compare both the wording and the data provided to make up your own mind as to who is blowing smoke and who is providing the real deal:
FAQ FOR REVERSE OSMOSIS

or some of the owners manuals found here compared to theirs:
SPECTRAPURE MANUALS

or possible hook up diagrams found here:
HOOK UP DIAGRAMS

or the troubleshooting guide found here:
http://www.spectrapure.com/manuals/ELIM_TroubleShooting.pdf

or the Sponsors Forums found here:
SpectraPure - 3reef Forums
SpectraPure - Reef Central Online Community


Or Buckeye Field Supplies site here:
http://www.buckeyefieldsupply.com/FAQ.asp

and Sponsors Forum here:
Buckeye Field Supply - Reef Central Online Community

 

AZ,

I hope you understand, that I totally agree with what you post and am not even atempting to contradict you.

This system is very similar to mine, it has a sediment filter, and only one carbon before the membrane, mine has a sediment and two carbons, (and yes, I understand mine are inferior specs):
http://www.spectrapure.com/huds/4-STAGE-DWK-RODI-AG.pdf

I think I'll try and make my DI cannister vertical for now.

As I said, when I get around to getting a TDS meter, then I'll get with you about the easiest way to upgrade my system.

Thanks again

 

No problem and no misunderstanding at all. My point is take their claims with a grain of salt, they don't hold much water and are not based on fact or science, they are just unsubstantiated claims. Ebay doesn't enforce any truth in advertising standards so a seller can claim whatever they want with no reprisal. When legitimate vendors advertise in printed media or other means then their claims must be true or they open themselves up for liability and truth in advertising claims.
Be glad to help out amytime.

 

ok just did the test on the AquaFX about 4 to .85! Pretty close!

 

Pretty close. Check it again as the seasons change and your water temperature warms up, you want to keep it close to 4:1 all the time and water temp changes will change the ratio due to the viscosity of the water.

 

Dz Rat, et. al.,

I bought a digital TDS today.

My tap 137
My ro 0-1
my DI 0

All with my cheepo Ebay RO/DI

I'm happy with that, and will upgrade my fiters on my first filter change and mount my DI vertically also. It's still horizontal for now.