ro/di questions

i have a cistern water system... the question is, am i able to feed the water waste back into the cistern? the reason i ask because if it dose not rain we dont get water. and if i was to just drain the water i would be draining money. another question is there a better brand/type of ro/di system that works better with a cistern system? also when i do deside to buy one am i able to hook the system onto a hose faucet?

thanks in advace.

 

I am afraid I dont know what a cistern system is, or I would try to help

 

i dont see wh yyou cant send the waste back into the cistern, . its not like its bad water. ands you can hook the system onto a hose faucet. anything that gets it water is good.

 

Yes, you can do that. The only thing to remember is the TDS will be 20 to 25% higher on that returned water since it now contains the TDS from the good water that was treated. Shouldn't be a big deal.

 

Thank you guys. have another question. I have been researching and trying to find a good ro/di or just an RO unit. While looking I came acrossed this blog/video......... so the question is this a good idea and or has anyone tryed the same method.

 

Are you asking if its a good idea to return the waste to your cistern?
It should not make much of a difference since cisterns often trap rain and runoff which will contain copious amounts of dust, suspendeds and TDS, you probably won't notice a difference.
Watts Premier even makes a RO unit that they promote as "Zero Waste" which isn't really zero waste but returns the waste to your hot water heater via a pressure pump. That I don't recommend since heaters get enough crud in the bottom anyway from clean water, why add more. Plus they are also limited to about 15 GPD due to the way they work.

 

My fail proof sump evaporation auto top-off. « Ray’s Reef and Saltwater Aquarium with a Refugium Sump.

YouTube - Refugium reef auto top-off

is this a good idea and or has anyone tried it? also looking like this set up the only think i would add would be a heater in the water container, and the reject water would go right back in to the cistern. and the container wouldnt be clear or see thru, because of the algae. any inputs?

 

anyone<>?<

 

I am not a fan of float valves, I much prefer float switches for several reasons. One is the allow a much longer RO/DI run reducing the effects of TDS creep. A float valve only drops a fraction of an inch before it starts then quickly stops when the float is raised. Float switches can be set any distance apart to allow the RO/DI to run longer thus minimizing the effects of high TDS on startup.
Float valves fail more often. Use your toilet float, pppl levellingfloat or evap cooler float as examples. Good float switches are 100% sealed and all the contain is a magnet which makes or breaks a circuit. Not much to go wrong. You feed the switches with a solenoid like he pictured so that part remains the same. For fail safe or redundancy you add a third float switch as a high level emergency cutoff or you can even use a float valve for this purpose.
Switches are what I use in my storage container, its a 23 gallon Rubermaid recycling can and set so it drops 11 gallons before the RO/DI comes on to refill so I get nice long filter runs.
In the tank I use a Spectrapure UPLC II but a Tunze Osmolator is very similar. They use an air or optical sensor which again can be adjusted so you get whatever drop you want before it comes on reducing the starts and stops. The pump is the same peristaltic as in the LiterMeter so its bulletproof and been around for years.