RODI Filter Array Reccomendation based on water report please?

pblogic

pblogic

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Here is a run down on my current system along with my cities water report below. I was hoping for a good recommendation on a array because my water seems to eat through media really fast.



this is how it goes, tap --> 10µm Carbon block -> Catalytic GAC -> 5µm inline sediment filter --> Membrane --- Membrane splits --> RO side --> goes through inline GAC for taste and oder and then into the drinking water jug.

DI side, comes from membrane and goes into mixed bed DI -- > Second mixed bed DI --> water reservoir.

The permeate pump is in there somewhere.. Don't know my water pressure, I need gauge and will be buying one with new filters.

So,

Water quality:

I live in Michigan. Hard water. Unless it's beneficial I don't want my water softened, I hate the way that feels but if it would help on the DI side for the reef that's fine.

Coming in the TDS meter from the tap is getting anywhere from 180-230 TDS... really high I think. The pre-filter (whether it's a Carbon block or just a poly filter I've tried both) Eventually turns bright orange. I'm guessing rust?


I'm thinking that I need a better pre-filter and maxcap DI and perhaps dual membranes.. however better pre-filtration. One of my main concerns is that Air water ice, whom I've bought the system from seems convinced that small micron filters as pre-filters are a bad idea because of clogging, however I am very open to new ideas and there's are not working the best right now. Spectrapure seems to sell pre filters that are very small ratings down to .2 microns

Please let me know what you think I should add, or how to configure this system.
Thanks so much! Below is the water quality report from my city





TREATED WATER QUALITY CHART
Listed below are the detected water quality parameters for City of Muskegon's drinking water during the reporting period of 2010. All are BELOW
allowed levels. Not listed are the hundreds of other parameters for which we tested that were NOT detected.
SUBSTANCE HIGHEST LEVEL HIGHEST LEVEL IDEAL GOAL SOURCE OF Violation
ALLOWED DETECTED (EPA'S MCLG'S) CONTAMINANT yes/no
(EPA'S MCL'S)
Regulated at the Treatment Plant
NITRATE 10 PPM .5 PPM 0 EROSION OF no
NATURAL DEPOSITS
TOC TT *2.02 PPM N/A NATURALLY
PRESENT no
Turbidity .30 NTU **.08 NTU N/A LAKE SEDIMENT no
FLUORIDE 4.0 PPM .90 PPM 4.0 PPM ADDITIVE no
Selenium 50 PPB 1 PPB 50 PPB Natural Deposit
Erosion NO
Barium 2 PPM .02 PPM 2 PPM Natural Deposit
Erosion NO
* TOC or total organic carbon is measured quarterly. Because we remove 25% of the TOC from our source water, we are in
compliance.
**Turbidity is a measure of the cloudiness of the water. We monitor turbidity because it is a good indicator of water quality.
Lowest monthly percent of samples meeting limits is 100%.
Regulated in the Distribution System
MAXIMUM RESIDUAL 4PPM 1.02 PPM N/A DISINFECTANT no
DISINFECTANT LEVEL RAA (CHLORINE)
TOTAL 80 PPB (AVG) 37 PPB N/A DISINFECTION no
TRIHALOMETHANES RAA BY-PRODUCT
HALOACETIC ACID 60 PPB 23 PPB N/A DISINFECTION no
RAA BY-PRODUCT
Detection range: Total Trihalomethanes 17 PPB to 39 PPB, Haloacetic Acids 12 PPB to 30 PPB
MRDL .86 PPM to 1.13 PPM
Unregulated Contaminants
SODIUM NOT 11 PPM N/A NATURALLY
REGULATED OCCURRING MINERAL
Unregulated contaminants are those for which EPA has not established standards. The purpose of monitoring is to assist the EPA
in determining occurrence and whether future regulation is warranted.
Regulated at the Customer's Tap
LEAD 15 PPB (AL) 9 PPB 90%=3 0 PLUMBING
COPPER 1300 PPB (AL) 520 PPB 90%=44 1300 PPB PLUMBING
Zero of the 35 sites tested exceeded the action level (AL) for lead. Zero of the 35 sites exceeded the action level (AL) for copper. Tested 9/2008.
If present, elevated levels of lead can cause serious health problems, especially for pregnant women and young children. Lead in drinking water
is primarily from materials and components associated with service lines and home plumbing. The water filtration plant staff is responsible for
providing high quality drinking water, but cannot control the variety of materials used in plumbing components. When your water has been sitting
for several hours, you can minimize the potential for lead exposure by flushing your tap for 30 seconds to 2 minutes before using water for drinking
or cooking. If you are concerned about lead in your water, you may wish to have your water tested. Information on lead in drinking water, testing
methods, and steps you can take to minimize exposure is available from the Safe Drinking Water Hotline at 800-426-4791 or at http://www.epa.gov/
safewater/lead.
Definitions
Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) "“ The highest level of a contaminant that is allowed in drinking water. MCL's are set as close to the MCLG as feasible
using the best available treatment technology.
Maximum Contaminant Level Goal (MCLG) "“ The level of a contaminant in drinking water below which there is no known or expected risk to health.
MLCLG's are set by the U.S. EPA, and allow for a margin of safety.
PPM (mg/l) "“ One part per million.
PPB "“ One part per billion.
Action Level (AL) "“ The concentration of a contaminant that triggers treatment or other requirement that a water system must follow. Action Levels are
reported at the 90th percentile for homes at greatest risk.
NTU "“ Nephelometric Turbidity Units.
TT - Treatment Technique - A required process intended to reduce the level of a contaminant.
RAA - Running Annual Average.
Maximum Residual Disinfectant Level (MRDL) - The highest level of a disinfectant allowed in drinking water. There is continuing evidence that addition of a
disinfectant is necessary for the control of microbial contaminants.
Maximum Residual Disinfectant Goal (MRDLG) - The level of a drinking water disinfectant below which there is no known or expected health risk.
MRDLG does not reflect the benefits of the use of disinfectants to control microbial contaminents.
Sources of drinking water: The sources of drinking water (both tap water and bottled water) include rivers, lakes, ponds, reservoirs, springs and wells. Our water comes
from Lake Michigan. As water travels over the surface of the land and through the ground, it dissolves naturally-occurring minerals and, in some cases, radioactive
material, and can pick up substances from the presences of animals or from human activity.
Contaminants that may be present in source water include:
"¢ Microbial contaminants, such as viruses and bacteria, which may come from sewage treatment plants, septic systems, agricultural livestock operations and
wildlife.
"¢ Inorganic contaminants, such as salts as metals, which can be naturally-occurring or result from urban stormwater runofff, industrial or domestic wastewater
discharges, oil and gas production, mining or farming.
"¢ Pesticides and herbicides, which may come from a variety of sources such as agriculture and residential uses.
"¢ Radioactive contaminants, which are naturally occurring or be the result of oil and gas production and mining activities.
"¢ Organic chemical contaminants, including synthetic and volatile organic chemicals, which are by-products of industrial processes and petroleum production,
and can also come from gas stations, urban stormwater runoff, and septic systems.
In order to ensure that tap water is safe to drink, EPA prescribes regulations that limit the amount of certain contaminants in water provided by public water systems.
Food and Drug Administration regulations establish limits for contaminants in bottled water which provide the same protection for public health.
 
I'd be tempted to add a smaller size prefilter, but it might need to be replaced fairly frequently. You might want to ask one of the filter specialists. SpectraPure makes good filters, as far as I can tell. I'd probably ditch one of the carbon phases for a finer sediment filter. 273 ppm is fairly high. How long do the DI cartridges last? What's the TDS out of the RO?
 
shouldnt the sediment filter be the first thing inline and be placed before the carbon block? ideally the sediment filter would catch some of the gunk before the water hits the carbon block. sediment filters are much cheaper to replace than carbon blocks.

softened water will be much easier for the RO membrane to filter. the water softener removes some of the hardening elements from the water but replaces them with sodium which is much easier for an RO membrane to deal with, plus will help reduce some of the calcification that can build up on a membrane from hard water and effect it's performance. you wouldnt necessarily have to soften the water in the whole house if you prefer not to use it personally, you could get a small unit which could feed the RODI system separately.

the orange you see on the filters is likely oxidized iron, yes. it is likely to come through a bacterial process occuring in the earth. (does the orange stuff get gooey and or chunky?) to have any success against the bacteria-oxidized iron stuff, i had to use a greensand filter before the RODI system. they can be fairly expensive and require flushing near daily which consumes/wastes large amount of water, plus my prefilters still turned orange even using the greensand, just not as dark orange and the gooey chunks were gone.

there is nothing wrong with using smaller micron prefilters. i personally use a 1 micron sediment prefilter, then a 0.5 micron carbon block.

when i was living in a smaller town supplied by a town well with no actual water plant, i was in the 650 - 740 range for tap water TDS. that was where i invested in that greensand filter. now i live in a town with an actual treatment plant and still have tap water in the 350 - 360 range. you aint doing so bad lol.

as for the water report, i do not have the knowledge to address what would serve you best, but i have had more than one very knowledgeable personn tell me that "if you can't get it out with RODI, you can't get it out".
 
I'm not sure what the TDS is right off the membrane. I have it at the tap and after the di. I can change it though to see. I'm guessing the water is killing my membrane. The rust doesn't look gooey, and I DID have a sediment filter where the carbon block is before. I just tried the block in its place :) To see if I got different results.

I think there are softener cartridges.. I'd have to check spectra pure but I'm thinking I'll need to put one of their specialized prefilters in place to start out
 
A few comments for you:

Your feedwater TDS @ ~200 ppm is pretty ordinary/not unusual. That said, we have customers with feedwater TDS readings below 40 ppm, and over 1200 ppm.

The first filters to touch the feedwater should be a sediment filter(s). These filters are about one-third the cost (or less) of a carbon block.

I didn't see evidence in your water quality report of chloramines - so no need for the Cat GAC stage.

Yes - it sounds like you have iron in your water. RO membranes don't deal with iron well. A water softener is a good way to remove low levels of iron. There are other ways to treat the iron - none of them are especially inexpensive. Although we carry them, softening cartridges are intended for different applications and won't be a parctical solution for you.

You didn't mention having a pressurized RO water storage tank. Without it, the permeate pump is useless.

If you do have a pressurized storage tank, make sure you have the system plumbed such that water from the tank never makes its way to the DI resin.

Russ
 
Yep I do have a pressurized tank, and it's plumbed so the water doesn't touch the di. I looked at some home softeners. Way out of my price range. I don't have any desire to soften the whole house. Any suggestions to deal with the problem beyond better sediment filtration?
 
thinking back to when i had such an iron problem...
as i recall, i was told that the (dissolved) iron can't be removed unless/until it is oxidized into rust. there were a few people who suggested to me that i could set up a resevoir to collect tap water with a pump that would spray the water through the air which would accelerate the oxidation process. then the rust cold settle to the bottom of the resevoir.. hook up the permeate pump to feed from the middle to upper area of the resevoir. i never tried it and didnt really investigate the hypothesis much either.
another suggestion i received was to use a resevoir and some sort of colloids (???)... cant remember exactly the term but they are materials which can be synthesized and mixed into the tap water and are supposed to bind to specific other contents and cause them to settle out of suspension. i never investigated this idea either.
about all i can think of at the moment.
 
Wow that's intense. Is there a way to test how much of this stuff is in my water? Also is there a smaller water softener? Not whole house to take this out? Think it comes from the copper piping, the iron pipes from the city? Or is it just in henwater supply?
 
You could get a small softener but it won't be significantly cheaper, because all you're doing is shrinking the size of the tank.

Russ
 
I'd guess that the iron comes from the water source. I don't know enough about treating water to help much more. You could have the water tested at a lab or buy a kit online, but I don't know how much it'd help you.
 
i would agree. the iron probably comes from deep within the ground where the source of the water is, having been picked up as water drains down through the earth to where the bottom of the well is. at some point, it becomes oxidized, either by the bacterial processes i spoke of or by being exposed to oxygen.
i think if your town still has iron pipes as a delivery system, there could be rust in them. i would think you would see more evidence of rusty pipes such as frequent clogging of the little screens in your home faucets and sediments in your tap water.
surely there would be a company out there who makes small softeners. likely some research could be done to investigate this avenue to see if this is a viable path for you.
this isnt a problem isolated to your water supply. even in my current location with an actual treatment plant, my prefilters still turn orange just like they did after i installed that greensand filter in my previous location, i just dont get the gooey chunky stuff anymore lol.
i have resigned myself to changing prefilters frequently and accepting the fact that i will have to replace RO membranes more often than than advertised, which is kind of like saying i will get less mpg in my vehicle than advertised :) i use a separate bed kati-ani for the DI, so i recharge them when the kati changes it's color past the halfway point of the column.
i would say you have about as good of a filtration system as you can get with the RO and two DI cartridges. a softener would make it a little easier on the membrane, but what is the cost trade-off of buying a softener plus continually buying and carrying bags of salt plus the electricity plus the brine runoff waste-water as the system recharges compared to the cost of buying a new RO membrane every 3 years as opposed to every 5 years?
 
Well, I contacted my city and my water is pretty hard. about 8GPG.... This is however under the amount allowed for the softener cartridge air water ice sells, so I will try this. The water comes from a water filtration plan about one half mile from my house and is drawn directly from lake Michigan, so there is no well. It's lake water..... So I'm thinking with going with a the air water ice softener cartridge, followed by a spectraputer micropleat .35 micron (washable and re-usable) sediment filter then to a spectrapure zeta zorb .2 micron sediment filter, then to a carbon block (.5 micron?) then to my RO membrane then on the RO side to an inline taste/order and on to my pressurized drinking water jug. On the DI side an inline carbon block right after the RO then spectrapure MAXCAP DI, followed by SPECTRAPURE Silicabuster mixed bed DI.

How does this sound? Is that .5 micron carbon block enough in front of the RO membrane or should I go.35 micron washable pre filter to .2 micron zetazorb sediment filter, to 5 or 1 micron carbon block to ,5 micron carbon block to RO? How many carbon stages before the RO are necessary in this instance?
 
even with lake water, there can be a lot of minerals from land run-off and leaching through rock layers. did you find out if there were iron pipes your city uses? i have found that many cities that use iron ppipes also introduce phosphate-based rust inhibitors, not that you needed another thing to worry about :/ but if the water is simply dragging some rust out of the pipes, it would be more effectively trapped by your sediment filter(s) than if it was dissolved iron in your water.
your getting over my head as far as the zeta zorb and silica busters.
i do think it would be ok to use two sediment filters in front of the carbon block. from my experience, the micron rating should get smaller for the second sediment then smaller again for the carbon. (example, if you first have a 1 micron sediment, use a 0.5 micron as a second sediment, then a 0.25 micron carbon). maybe the buckeye guy can step in and speak better to the ratings you are proposing and the zeta zorb. my main goal in using a sediment filter is to prolong the life of the carbon block. this is simply a method to avoid replacing the more expensive carbon blocks as frequently.
personally, i cant see that a carbon block would have any benefit after the RO and before the DI as far as going into a reef, but intended for drinking water and a person had a preference for a certain taste, sure i could see that side of it.
 
from my experience, the micron rating should get smaller for the second sediment then smaller again for the carbon. (example, if you first have a 1 micron sediment, use a 0.5 micron as a second sediment, then a 0.25 micron carbon). maybe the buckeye guy can step in and speak better to the ratings you are proposing
Click to expand...

The idea of decreasing pore sizes in successive filters is a good approach, but applies only to sediment filters.

The pore size on your carbon blocks should be about the same as, or bigger than the smallest pore size on the sediment filter array.

So 5 mic sed -> 1 mic sed -> 0.5 mic carbon is good, but we would not support something like 10 mic sed-> 5 mic sed -> 0.5 mic carbon.

Russ
 
BuckeyeFS said:
The idea of decreasing pore sizes in successive filters is a good approach, but applies only to sediment filters.

The pore size on your carbon blocks should be about the same as, or bigger than the smallest pore size on the sediment filter array.

So 5 mic sed -> 1 mic sed -> 0.5 mic carbon is good, but we would not support something like 10 mic sed-> 5 mic sed -> 0.5 mic carbon.

Russ
Click to expand...

Right, I have no idea if the zeta zorb and (.2) and sediment pre filter (.35) are good filters or not. All I have to go on is specrapure marketing. I've never tried spectra pure before

But, that's why I was thinking of something like the their washable .35m then their zetazorb (which is a really expensive sediment filter) .2m then a carbon block of (What size?) this is where I would be stuck.


If you look at the water report, they don't mention iron at all which makes me think this is sediment from the pipes, not dissolved in the lake water. They mention copper and lead so I don't know why they wouldn't report iron? Correct me if I'm wrong

I contacted the city and they said that the hardness is an average of 8.5 GPG based on calcium carbonate which they like to measure as something per litre

Here is what they said (This comes from the water treatment plant supervisor around the corner from me)

"Hardness is measured in mg/l as calcium carbonate; our average is around 140 or 8.5 gpg."


I asked him about the pipes and about the phosphate treatment just now and told him why so I don't sound like a nut :P So, I'll post that when he replies.


So,

If the iron is just from pipes this is my idea:

Stage 1 Cheap 5 or 10µm sediment filter Stage 2. Vertical (or inline) softener cartridge. 3. MicroPleat 0.35 micron rating, clean and reuse 4. Zeta Zorb .2 Micron sediment 5. 1micron carbon block 6. .5micron carbon block 7. RO Membrane

Drinking water side after membrane 1. Taste/Odor filter (in line polisher) to my pressurized water jug

DI side 2 Stage DI MaxCap System



I know spectrapure only by word of mouth and ratings on shopping sites. I'm not stuck on them, I just got the impression it was good stuff but I'm very willing to hear opinions and suggestions as their stuff is super expensive. If it works, great. If it's just marketing, not great.


That's what I've come up with so far and appreciate any suggestions. I'm going to definitely get a second TDS meter so I can measure TDS out of the membrane as well. I also will be getting a few pressure guages to watch for drops and check pressure along the way. I like the idea of that first stage .35 micron washable filter, it seems like it should help protect things (after a softener) Or should I put the softener cartridge after that?


I've linked to products that I'm familiar with, in case it isn't clear what I'm talking about with the zetazorb and stuff. I noticed that buckeye has a very similar .35 micron kit to spectrapure and it's more affordable but I'm not sure it's washable?

Buckeye, you've been great in giving advice and I perused your page because of that but the only place I saw a softener was air water ice. They've always been good to me as well and my system came from them originally.... a dual home reef linked here to make sense of the current system as it started and show the permeate pump and how it's setup. The only CURRENT difference to this system is I have a carbon block housed in a vertical housing before it as a sediment/carbon filter (as just sediment before and before that nothing) and I have a second stage DI I added on. Is there any reason to get a vertical softener over the inline? the inline is slightly more but I wouldn't have to buy another housing right now... though I'm more tempted to buy housings with pressure guages on each side. Do the guages themselves cause a pressure drop? Does vertical or inline cause more of a pressure drop.

All feedback welcome

I just want the purist water possible... I'm downsizing from a 75gDisplay +30G sump system to an ELOS MINI system .. linked again though I'm sure you're all familiar.

So I'll be making FAR less water than I was before.

Which brings me to 1 more question.

I don't trust these brut trash cans. I dunno why, they just don't smell right. I'm using the grey one everyone else does but it's a huge 32 gallon and I'd like to go down to two smaller.. one for pure RO and one for mixing. I can handle something smaller. Like 10 gallon each would be fine. Is there something that is (Reasonably priced) That's meant to hold drinking water and won't leach that I could use instead?

And thanks again for jumping in buckeye. It lead to me visiting your site, it's really nice to see that kind of proactive viewing of the forums. Speaks highly of your establishment to me....
 
Last edited:
I think people have been successful with the Brute trash cans, but a food-grade container of about any sort should be acceptable. I just used the 5g containers that the LFS sold or from a water supply company.
 
Yeah the cans seem to be very popular.. I'm just being a perfectionist.... So... what about like the big water cooler jugs? would those be better? I'll google some water supply stuff

Also bertoni, do you think this thread would be better off in filtration etc.? Maybe I shouldn't have posted it in chemistry? I don't want to double post would it be a good Idea to move the thread maybe?


Thanks!
 
pb - a 10" x 2.5" softening cartridge won't help in your situation. There is a reason we don't carry a product like that. You'll burn through it in no time - as in about 50 gallons of processed water. If you are at a 4:1 ratio of waste to purified water, that means about 10 gallons of purified water.

Softeners are expensive because they hold a lot of cation resin, and because they automatically and frequently recharge the resin.

Russ
 
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