Jump to content

Where's my rain?


Recommended Posts

I'm feeling sorry for those of you that this hasn't been straight forward for.. I literally bought mine, connected it to my hose, ran it for 5 mins, tested output and got 0ppm.

This was pretty much what I was expecting,  I'd be screwing if I had no rainwater and a brand new ro unit that wasn't working properly!.  Hope you guys get sorted!  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just a little warning for those buying RO water at there local aquatics store ,i picked some up yesterday and and checked that this was pure RO ,without salt which they said it was ,when i got it home i nearly tipped it straight into my water but but thought i would check it ,it was reading 3300 on the meter ,yep it had salt in ! 

Luckily enough no harm done,changed it today so no problem , but could of killed my plants !

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, Rob-Rah said:

My new RO unit was run and now tested the output with a TDS meter..... 150 ppm. That's no use.

The last few litres of rainwater I have is at 50 ppm.

I don't have much time left to sort this **** out!

Any way you could buy one from somewhere else and return this one? Mine from collinswaterproducts turned up the next day by ukmail if you need to replace it and they responded to me both times within a couple of hours if you need quick help.

Im sure someone here must live driving distance from you and can give you some RO water

edit: are you sure its all connected properly? I know some filters come in plastic and you have to unwrap them first. I watched this video twice before ordering mine and even he made that error and annotated it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPdzLJWb4R8

 

Edited by Zerbirus
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Zerbirus said:

Any way you could buy one from somewhere else and return this one? Mine from collinswaterproducts turned up the next day by ukmail if you need to replace it and they responded to me both times within a couple of hours if you need quick help.

Im sure someone here must live driving distance from you and can give you some RO water

edit: are you sure its all connected properly? I know some filters come in plastic and you have to unwrap them first. I watched this video twice before ordering mine and even he made that error and annotated it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPdzLJWb4R8

 

It's being returned. Flow rate is all spot on and nothing is going wrong in terms of the mechanics, the unit is simply not filtering. I'll buy another one. This is very annoying. Thank god I bought a TDS meter......

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My update, my pressure gauge came checked the pressure just now and

its at 30 psi direct from the outside tap, so now put on order a booster pump

as my system must run at a minimum of 50 psi this is costing me a fortune lol

well you will do anything for the plants,,,,,,

am I right in thinking the pressure gauge should go just before Di filter if not

please correct me or confirm thanks

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Deltatango301 said:

My update, my pressure gauge came checked the pressure just now and

its at 30 psi direct from the outside tap, so now put on order a booster pump

as my system must run at a minimum of 50 psi this is costing me a fortune lol

well you will do anything for the plants,,,,,,

am I right in thinking the pressure gauge should go just before Di filter if not

please correct me or confirm thanks

ok so with the tap, there are universal tap connectors if you want to try in the kitchen or bathroom etc, you just need a  1/4" male bsp to 12mm barbed connector for the ro connector to the hosepipe, if the pressure there is better

the pressure gauge can go in a couple of places: if you want to check the tap water pressure = after the tap, if youre confident of what it is then before the membrane which will tell you the pressure going into the membrane and if your filters need replacing 

to check if the di filter is working properly you check the tds of the ro water, when it rises from 0 (around 6 months) then it needs replacing, dont need to check pressure there

Edited by Zerbirus
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, Rob-Rah said:

I did look into just purchasing 1000 L deionised water industrially in a big tank - a few hundred quid (but you get to sell the tank which is worth quite a bit).

i brought 25l in a plastic jerry can since it was only £8 more than the can itself just in case the ro unit was late, turns out on the 5th day the water still hasnt arrived

Yes but do you need that much/price vs ro water after youve got it all sorted?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On the purity issue.... I'm not sold on ultra pure on a regular basis. The plants cope with rotting vegetation around them in the wild and some degree of dissolved salts in the  surface water. Surely *some* minerals are essential for the plants. It's only certain chemicals they have no tolerance to. However, we're not usually growing in inorganic media so maybe it's OK.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 hours ago, Deltatango301 said:

Interesting question if you are producing RO water at 0-5 TDS and you measure 

your rainwater at 20 TDS what one would you use.

I use rain for my temperate greenhouse, drosera and utricularia. I paper filter the rainwater for my nepenthes and now i'd use use RO water for seeds (vs boiling the rain water) and use RO whenever the rain water is getting very low, or non existent like now. Better to recycle what you can get yourself before sucking up the mains water reservoir. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On going saga of my RO unit, got my booster pump installed and working

correctly getting over 90psi so let it run for 30 mins producing RO water

it only got me down to From 60 TDS to 32 TDS got on the phone to 

east midland water co that supplied RO unit not st all happy with them

but now again waiting for a phone call from them think my filters are messed up ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 7/1/2018 at 8:31 AM, Deltatango301 said:

kept the RO going all night and notice that the TDS is 60 in the night and now in warmer

Temp back up to 70 

 The TDS of our tap water only measures 47 straight from the tap 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We've got 42 tds straight from the tap but don't trust it so bought a distiller as we're on a water meter, of which that comes out at 0. I was going to buy another tds meter as i can't believe we get a tds reading that low here in Lancashire but from the 2 posts above maybe it is right.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

21 hours ago, Deltatango301 said:

Got my booster pump installed and working correctly getting over 90psi so let it run for 30 mins

Is that the one you linked to previously? If so, make sure you take note of the warning; "should not be used for periods longer than 60 minutes at a time, a 120 minute cooldown period between uses must be allowed"

If you run it extensively without following that advice it'll burn out quickly. A simple timer socket will allow you to set intervals if necessary. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, pirks said:

We've got 42 tds straight from the tap but don't trust it so bought a distiller as we're on a water meter, of which that comes out at 0. I was going to buy another tds meter as i can't believe we get a tds reading that low here in Lancashire but from the 2 posts above maybe it is right.

Quite feasible, as I know a few people not far way who are in Lancashire and have similar TDS levels.  We never have to de-scale any appliances either.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ok new update, got in touch again with the company this time got the General Manager 

to ring me back after telling them wanted to talk to the MD, anyway when I bought this

unit a 4 stage I asummed the the 4th stage was a Di filter it turns out it was a RO filter

i have now bought a 5th stage Di filter they are sending the brackets and connection

free and postage free next day so should be producing 0 TDS by Thursday 

another £30 don't tell the wife.......

btw using booster pump 1 on 2 hours off

Edited by Deltatango301
Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 hours ago, Picavorus said:

Quite feasible, as I know a few people not far way who are in Lancashire and have similar TDS levels.  We never have to de-scale any appliances either.  

If you look at a geology map of the Peaks you will see 2 main rock types; the Dark Peak is made of Millstone Grit- this is sandstone and shales with virtually no carbonate or other solubles in them, so runoff into the reservoirs with be low TDS and probably rather acidic. In the White Peak you have Carboniferous Limestone, a totally different beast made of soluble calcium carbonate so runoff and aquifers there will have a really high TDS and probably be alkaline. All those caves are the result of water dissolving this limestone, so as caves are made the material goes into the water.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Chimaera said:

If you look at a geology map of the Peaks you will see 2 main rock types; the Dark Peak is made of Millstone Grit- this is sandstone and shales with virtually no carbonate or other solubles in them, so runoff into the reservoirs with be low TDS and probably rather acidic. In the White Peak you have Carboniferous Limestone, a totally different beast made of soluble calcium carbonate so runoff and aquifers there will have a really high TDS and probably be alkaline. All those caves are the result of water dissolving this limestone, so as caves are made the material goes into the water.

We’re Dark Peak, so that explains why it’s so low for us.  A total godsend in this dry weather :yes:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...