Husky man gave me a great deal on this spectrapure unit but it's a little different from what I remember. This one has two DI filters and the replacement kit I bought has only one. Can I still use the normal kits with this unit that has sediment, two micron filters and one DI. Thanks in advance for input, Todd.
Quick RO/DI question
- Thread starter reef dummy
- Start date
When you say "two micron filters? are you referring to the carbon blocks or sediment as those both have micron ratings?
I used to have that very same unit. IMO you should run a 1-5 micron sediment filter then a .5-1 micron carbon block followed by two standard DI filters. The first DI should be the "worker" the second acts as a "polisher". When the worker becomes exhausted swap the polisher into the position that the worker was in and replace the polisher and repeat as necessary.
The above recommendation is if you are on a regular municipal water system. If you are on well water of have a water softener installed I would recommend a different configuration. Also if you are on a municipal water system I would go to their website and see if chloramines are used in the water. Sometime city water reports refer to chloramine as CL2 disinfectant to try to hide the fact that chloramine is used.
If chloramines are present you will want to buy an additional add on filter to add a second carbon block. Not completely necessary but will act as a safe guard and help preserve the more expensive DI cartridges for much longer.
I used to have that very same unit. IMO you should run a 1-5 micron sediment filter then a .5-1 micron carbon block followed by two standard DI filters. The first DI should be the "worker" the second acts as a "polisher". When the worker becomes exhausted swap the polisher into the position that the worker was in and replace the polisher and repeat as necessary.
The above recommendation is if you are on a regular municipal water system. If you are on well water of have a water softener installed I would recommend a different configuration. Also if you are on a municipal water system I would go to their website and see if chloramines are used in the water. Sometime city water reports refer to chloramine as CL2 disinfectant to try to hide the fact that chloramine is used.
If chloramines are present you will want to buy an additional add on filter to add a second carbon block. Not completely necessary but will act as a safe guard and help preserve the more expensive DI cartridges for much longer.
Just on a side note. If you want a crude baseline to determine if chloramine is present and getting past the carbon block/RO stages you can go to Walmart and purchase the Jungle brand ammonia test strips. Take a sample of the waste side of the of the RO membrane. If you are still reading high levels of ammonia it is very likely you have chloamine in the water.
As stated this is not a perfect test but is a cheap and easy way to help determine how your the first three stages are holding up against the water you are feeding it and whether or not more research is needed on your water supply and how long you can expect the DI cartridges to last before needing to replace them and or what measurs need to be taken upstream to help protect them and ultimately same more money in DI.
As stated this is not a perfect test but is a cheap and easy way to help determine how your the first three stages are holding up against the water you are feeding it and whether or not more research is needed on your water supply and how long you can expect the DI cartridges to last before needing to replace them and or what measurs need to be taken upstream to help protect them and ultimately same more money in DI.
No worries! I really hate the idea of standard filter kits. Not all water sources are the same and just throwing on a standard kit may or may not be the right thing to do. You should really understand whats in your water first then buy a kit that meets your needs or customize as appropriate. Customized kits are not necessarily more expensive and sometime can be cheaper.
Buying standard RO/DI kits without knowing whats in the water IMO is a lot like treating Fish for diseases that have not been identified or possibly even present and just using a Paragaurd dip as a catch all. Sure its better than nothing but its not going to be effective for most diseases. I realize this is not a perfect analogy, my point is know your enemy and be concise and deliberate with your attack!
Buying standard RO/DI kits without knowing whats in the water IMO is a lot like treating Fish for diseases that have not been identified or possibly even present and just using a Paragaurd dip as a catch all. Sure its better than nothing but its not going to be effective for most diseases. I realize this is not a perfect analogy, my point is know your enemy and be concise and deliberate with your attack!
I took the liberty of googling SouthEast Aurora water report and could only find the 2014 report below which wasnt easy to find and dont see a recent report.
https://www.auroragov.org/cs/groups/public/documents/document/015314.pdf
I hate reports like this. It is clear they are making it deliberately difficult to read and understand which in my mind suggests they are trying to hide something from the general population that isn't looking too closely.
I see that in 2014 they listed no violation of chloramine or chlorine dioxide which suggests that they are adding both chloramine and chlorine in some form to the water supply. Also the fact that they list no violation of trihalomethanes (TTHM) which is the main reason public municipal water systems switch from Chlorine to Chloramine. Chlorine disinfectants create TTHM carcinogenic byproducts by reacting to organics in the water supply. This is why municipal water systems are all switching over to chloramine which is essentially chlorine combined with ammonia to stabilize the chlorine and prevent TTHM byproducts. Its all done for overall health reasons but chloramine is much more difficult to remove than chlorine and not good for our reef friends or kind to the longevity of DI resin.
Assuming I grabbed the right report from which you are actually getting your water I would suggest the same setup I recommended up top but I would most definitely add an addition carbon block in place of the sediment filter and get a a sixth stage to mount seperatly for the sediment filter. I might recommend this carbon block for the chloramine pre-filter.
http://spectrapure.com/FILTERS-MEMB...hloramine-Removal-Carbon-Block-Filter-10-inch
https://www.auroragov.org/cs/groups/public/documents/document/015314.pdf
I hate reports like this. It is clear they are making it deliberately difficult to read and understand which in my mind suggests they are trying to hide something from the general population that isn't looking too closely.
I see that in 2014 they listed no violation of chloramine or chlorine dioxide which suggests that they are adding both chloramine and chlorine in some form to the water supply. Also the fact that they list no violation of trihalomethanes (TTHM) which is the main reason public municipal water systems switch from Chlorine to Chloramine. Chlorine disinfectants create TTHM carcinogenic byproducts by reacting to organics in the water supply. This is why municipal water systems are all switching over to chloramine which is essentially chlorine combined with ammonia to stabilize the chlorine and prevent TTHM byproducts. Its all done for overall health reasons but chloramine is much more difficult to remove than chlorine and not good for our reef friends or kind to the longevity of DI resin.
Assuming I grabbed the right report from which you are actually getting your water I would suggest the same setup I recommended up top but I would most definitely add an addition carbon block in place of the sediment filter and get a a sixth stage to mount seperatly for the sediment filter. I might recommend this carbon block for the chloramine pre-filter.
http://spectrapure.com/FILTERS-MEMB...hloramine-Removal-Carbon-Block-Filter-10-inch
reef dummy;369101 said:
My tds is reading 000 out and this is the chlorine from the waste water.
That is a chlorine test strip which will do nothing for telling you is chloramine is present. If chloramine is present the crabon block is striping the chlorine bond from the ammonia leaving the ammonia cat ion behind and hense will read low or zero in this case. You actually want an ammonia test strip as the ammonia will be whats left behind after traveling through the carbon block. This is the indicator that chloamine is being used. In this case the Jungle brand test strips recommended has been suggested by people such as RHF as one of the best for this particular test situation. Dont try using an API ammonia test kit its not the same thing.
By the way I do see that test kit you have reads for free and total chlorine which is great and all as it would detect if chloramine was present but in this case you would get a more beneficial reading from that test kit by testing the straight tap water not the waste side of the RO membrane.
The reason you would use the ammonia strip at the RO waste output is to determine at what level chloramine may be present. A regular carbon block will strip the chlorine from the ammonia for a time but will get exhausted quickly. The remaining ammonia cat ion will be easily stripped by the DI resin but once the carbon block is exhausted which is much faster than you might realize the DI will be doing all the work and be exhausted very fast and if your not careful at that point you will be putting chlormine into your tank.
By the way the presents of the ammonia is what tells you that chloramine is likely present.
As I said before all the extra filters are not necessarily needed but if chlormine is present you will want to replace your filters much more frequently and of course will be spending more money on filters that could otherwise be spent on fish and coral.
This is just my 2 cents. Take it or leave it.
The reason you would use the ammonia strip at the RO waste output is to determine at what level chloramine may be present. A regular carbon block will strip the chlorine from the ammonia for a time but will get exhausted quickly. The remaining ammonia cat ion will be easily stripped by the DI resin but once the carbon block is exhausted which is much faster than you might realize the DI will be doing all the work and be exhausted very fast and if your not careful at that point you will be putting chlormine into your tank.
By the way the presents of the ammonia is what tells you that chloramine is likely present.
As I said before all the extra filters are not necessarily needed but if chlormine is present you will want to replace your filters much more frequently and of course will be spending more money on filters that could otherwise be spent on fish and coral.
This is just my 2 cents. Take it or leave it.