Copper Test?

[Gordonious]

I was just curious if anyone near by has equipment or reliable test kits that we could use to check the water in the place I just moved into. I am living in a basement and outside of my room there is a washer and drier. I have my RO unit hooked up to the same spot the washer is using hose Ts. I used two Ts. so that the washer and RO unit could run and I could just get water for my fresh tanks if I wanted.

Last time I had it running the prefilter was shot in a very short time and I'm wondering what crud is coming out of the piping in this old house. It's bad enough I'm in Newark, but it looks like there is old copper piping around.

I have a copper test kit from Red Sea, but it is hard to tell if it is or possibly at on tenth ppm. I am pretty sure that after my RO unit the water is pretty good and I plan on attaching my add on DI... possibly tonight. We'll see if I have time. But if I am going to go through prefilters really quickly and my membranes are going to fill up really fast it may be worth a look at going back to distilled water. Distilled can have traces of copper in it sometimes, but the stuff I have been using from Walmart comes up with 0ppm with my TDS meter, so it can't be too bad.

Any insight, tips, advice? Or does anyone have some equipment which we could use to test my water?

 

[Gordonious]

Ok this sucks! I just opened my brand new, never used DI add on and the cartridge is brown! I think I had opened it before to look for any instructions, but it has never seen any water and stayed in the box. :-( I hope I don't have to replace it already because I am not ready to spend more money.

How can I tell if I need to replace it? I expect my TDS to be down to 0 or 1 already, so I can't measure it that way.

Btw I purchased it months ago to use when I got settled, no chance of a return or exchange.

 

[wds21921]

Most of the color changing DI resins will turn black when there expended. I'm not sure if this holds true for all of them?
Do you know if it's the color changing type or not?
I recently got some that wasn't and it's a golden brown type color.

 

[kaptken]

the tap water purifier mixed bed DI i first used was kinda green and gray beads mixed together that turned black when expended. the amber ones could be color indicating or not. which means you need to test your filtered water every few weeks for a rise in TDS to indicate it is spent, that is if you dont see any color change. if it changes colors, well, then you know.

airwaterice has color changing resin that looks brown in their picture. is yours like this. ?
http://www.airwaterice.com/c=9U84S6RXJbMg6pmFpPNDDCKi4/category/11/

be wild and crazy!! EXPERIMENT!! hook it up, and turn it on, and see what happens over time. if the membrane is real good, should be, it's new, the resin will take a long time to change. or deplete. im sure the resin is good if its coming right out of the box..

the important thing is to protect the membrane by changing the sediment and carbon filters per schedule. a little chlorine getting through a spent carbon block will eat the membrane. you will know, because of the increased flow of RO water coming out. and by then you will be going through DI resin like mad.

of course, if you lose all hope and and give up on your new RODI, I'll by that for a dollar, and you can go to my original back up plan of buying distilled water at THE WATER STILL, behind the Bear post office next to fox run plaza. bring your own bottle and fill from the tap.. pretty cheap.

but your RODI is ok.
have some fun.