First RODI Unit -- Wish Me Luck

[EricR]

My wife/kids bought me a BRS 6-stage RODI (75 GPD "Plus") unit for my birthday.
Up until now, I've just been buying bulk RO/DI water from my LFS at 25 cents / gallon so this will be my first foray into filtering my own water.

Install looks pretty straight-forward so I'm mostly worried about the normal use of it, which I have no experience with:
***tons of info so I just need to go back and read more
-- First use, do I run for a long time and dump (since filters are brand new)?
-- Normal use, I think I'm supposed to flush the RO membrane for some amount of time before and after each cycle, right?

*spent a couple of hours just trying to clear out space in the garage where I want it so didn't get too far:

Never used a uniseal before so have it "testing" out in the dirt for now but, after a couple of hours, don't see any leaks.
*concept "feels" like there's margin for error but I know people use them
*install was way too easy so that seems almost unfair but it's working so far

 

[Woodyman]

Seems like your off to a good start!


Here's some further reading

RO/DI Basic Guide

There are always a lot of questions regarding which RO/DI setup do I need, how many stages, how do I know when to change filters/membranes, I’m getting a weird TDS value, etc. Hopefully this clarifies a few things and helps some of you out one day. My first recommendation would be to find the...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Woodyman]

My wife/kids bought me a BRS 6-stage RODI (75 GPD "Plus") unit for my birthday.
Up until now, I've just been buying bulk RO/DI water from my LFS at 25 cents / gallon so this will be my first foray into filtering my own water.

Install looks pretty straight-forward so I'm mostly worried about the normal use of it, which I have no experience with:
***tons of info so I just need to go back and read more
-- First use, do I run for a long time and dump (since filters are brand new)?

Long time, probably not - just enough to flush out any sediment and rehydrate the membrane if it's dry. If it is dry that will take longer than a wet membrane.

-- Normal use, I think I'm supposed to flush the RO membrane for some amount of time before and after each cycle, right?

The effectiveness of this is debated, but unless your paying a bunch for your water (which it doesn't sound that way, but I could be wrong) it's not going to do any harm. However, not flushing could harm the membrane under the right conditions. Without knowing specifics of your water can't make a judgement. Overall though worst case by not flushing you shorten the usuable life of your membrane.

*spent a couple of hours just trying to clear out space in the garage where I want it so didn't get too far:

Never used a uniseal before so have it "testing" out in the dirt for now but, after a couple of hours, don't see any leaks.

Yep that's all there is to them, they are forgiving which is the appeal. Just be careful you don't bump it to hard one day!

 

[EricR]

I’ve produced two separate batches of 20-25 gallons so far so figured I’d post some metrics (for BRS 6 Stage Plus system).

— Tap water = 475 ppm TDS
— Waste water = 660 ppm TDS
— After RO membrane = 15 ppm TDS
— Final output = 0 ppm TDS
*using HM Digital TDS-3 handheld meter except for post-RO only used BRS included/mounted HDM meter

Water pressure at gauge on unit = 48 psi but falls to 42 psi when other water is being used in the house.
*just living with this for now but may look into booster pump at some point.

Product:waste was roughly 1:2 but that wasn’t perfectly measured,,, just collecting/dumping buckets and noting,,, so that’s probably my error since specs for the unit aren’t even that good.

One surprise was that my DI canisters were never filling more than about an inch until I found threads here and “vented” them by just unscrewing enough to let the air escape. After that, they ran fine and were mostly full.
*just noting since nothing I saw in the installation manual mentioned this as something to do.


Things I still need to investigate:

1. Flush mode — there’s still a small “drip” going to product line which I didn’t expect but, looking at the way I think the flush valve must work, maybe that’s to be expected?
2. Auto shut off valve — don’t think mine is working since, when float in product barrel closes, there’s still waste water begin produced. Not sure how long it takes for that auto shut off valve to work so will need to experiment more and maybe give it more time for back pressure to build up.