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Which tds meter?


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Hi folks

Which tds meter are you using, was it a good buy and would you recommend?.

After my recent purchase of an ro unit I'm itching to compare some readings !.

I've seen meter's for around £5 on fleabay but I'd like something fairly accurate so would happily pay a bit extra.

Many thanks

Chris

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This one seems to be a bog standard one. I got one 3 years ago and it still works fine

Yes you can get this model cheaper from other sellers, but I went with some one I have dealt with before....and, if it didn't work, had a better chance of returning than if I had bought it cheaply from Hong Kong !!!

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I bought the older version on ebay shown by Phantom above about 3yrs ago and it packed up; possibly because I kept it in the greenhouse which was not really sensible with the heat. The LCD display lost a few segments so I had to start guessing.

I bought the new one (as shown by Phantom) recently from ebay. For £7 or whatever, 3yrs life is ok for me. For CPs, you don't need much accuracy.

Edited by jimfoxy
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This one seems to be a bog standard one. I got one 3 years ago and it still works fine

Yes you can get this model cheaper from other sellers, but I went with some one I have dealt with before....and, if it didn't work, had a better chance of returning than if I had bought it cheaply from Hong Kong !!!

yep, got the same one.

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I use the same one, but without the temperature function.

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Thanks all,

I got the tds-3 meter as it seemed to be used by most.

I measured my tap water at 350 ppm, my rainwater at 75ppm and my new 4 stage ro units water at 0 ppm!.

I also tried my fish tank water which came in at 600 ppm !, time for a water change there I think !.

I gotta say how impressed I am with the £50 ro unit though, I didn't expect it to remove 100%.

So what is considered the safe amount of tds for most cp's ?, mine have done ok up till now on 75ppm rainwater, I only got the ro unit as I'd run out.

Should I be using the 0 ro water from now, if my plans thrived more I' d wear the expense, I'm thinking of a 50/50 rain/ ro mix, that should be around 35ppm.

What's your opinions or advice please?

Many thanks

Chris

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Oh and boiled tap water at 350 ppm, exact same as before so showing as said here many times boiling does nothing to remove the mineral content, it may remove a bit of chlorine but will still kill your plants.

Oh what to stick my thing in now I wonder ...........

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So what is considered the safe amount of tds for most cp's ?, mine have done ok up till now on 75ppm rainwater, I only got the ro unit as I'd run out.

Should I be using the 0 ro water from now, if my plans thrived more I' d wear the expense, I'm thinking of a 50/50 rain/ ro mix, that should be around 35ppm.

What's your opinions or advice please?

Many thanks

Chris

Your rainwater at 75ppm should be OK, that's about the same as mine. For RO water I consistently get 4ppm, but only use it when running short of rainwater. Water butts all full after today!

Anything under 100ppm will be fine.

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Nice one Martin.

I expected there to be some reading with the ro units water but it's brand new so I guess it will begin creeping up as the filters and membranes get used.

Rainwater restocked here too overnight so I'm just doing some more ro for my fish tank clean then can pack it away for a while !.

Last nights weather filled a 220 litre waterbutt connected from my down pipe from roof overnight ;-)

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Cheers mobile, I wasn't aware of this.

Take it out and bag it up or just plug the ends of the pipe work on unit?

I've fitted shut off ball valves to the tubing. The tubing on mine is 6mm (1/4") and suitable push-fit valves are available on ebay. I just shut off the valves when I've finished using the unit.

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Oh what to stick my thing in now I wonder ...........

I tested the local canal and it actually had a lower reading than my tap water. :shock:

I would imagine that even though the tap water has a higher reading, the solids dissolved in it are going to be different from whatever is dissolved in the canal, (Dead fish, cats, faecal matter etc.) I certainly wouldn't try drinking it! :bad:

I found tap water to be reading 289, while rainwater was 007 and the de-ionised water I bought was 002. I measured the water in my trays recently and the one which showed a high reading was my S. Psittacina, which has some cheap peat in the mix, reading over 400.

It would be interesting to see what sort of reading an actual peat bog would give, I would imagine that the acids (tannins?) in the peat would cause the tds reading to go up.

Regards,

Ian.

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I'm confused about the tds ppm figures everyone's quoting. I've just gone to http://www.dwrcymru....er-quality.aspx and entered my post code, and the water hardiness results are :

31 CaC03 mg/l

12 Ca mg/l

2.15 Degrees Clarke

3.08 Degrees French

1.72 Degrees German

Can someone please explain to me how these figures convert to the ppm figures that tds meters give?

Edited by Welshy
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I'm confused about the tds ppm figures everyone's quoting. I've just gone to http://www.dwrcymru....er-quality.aspx and entered my post code, and the water hardiness results are :

31 CaC03 mg/l

12 Ca mg/l

2.15 Degrees Clarke

3.08 Degrees French

1.72 Degrees German

Can someone please explain to me how these figures convert to the ppm figures that tds meters give?

http://www.lenntech.com/calculators/hardness/hardness.htm

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i think what i meant to ask was what reading TDS meters gave out ? Would it be the same as the CaCO3 result on Dwr Cymru ?

i.e. if someone came round here with a TDS meter and measured my tap water, it should read about the same as 31 ? I think my confusion comes from that figure being lower than Blocky71's rainwater results in this thread !

Edited by Welshy
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Those figures are only quoting calcium /calcium carbonate content, which is different from the total dissolved solids (tds), which would include stuff like chlorine, flouride etc.

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Ah thanks Ian, now this is what i was trying to get across in my initial post. So is there anyway of converting my CaCO3 of 31 (or any of the 5 other figures given to me by Welsh Water) into a TDS equivalent, just so i have an idea of how my tap water compares to folk on here posting their TDS readings ?

Ian Salter has told me that our tap water is okish for my windowsill plants in my flat, but i'd just like to know how it compares to actual rain water out of curiosity.

Edited by Welshy
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