Water advice

Lenny · May 10, 2011

I'm thinking about using well water for my reef tank.

Does anyone use well water?

My city water is burning out my carbon filter and something evil is getting through. I get about 30 gallons of GREAT RO/DI water out of a new dual carbon filter. I'm using a new Spetrapure 5 stage unit and I just upgraded the filters from the filter guys and my TDS meter reads 0.

After 30 gallons is used up and I make some more RO/DI water my corals start to stress out and then if I continue using the RO/DI water they end up dieing. I've gone to steam distilled water and everything is thriving and growing.

Looking for advice and insight.

boehm742 · May 10, 2011

I have always had to use well water. Its like 300ppm tds outa the faucet but the RODI gets it to zero for me.

CJO · May 10, 2011

Why do you think it is the carbon stage being affected so quickly? Is your city using chloramine?

I've known people to use well water before, but it all depends on the quality of water. Can you run your well water through your RO/DI unit?

CJ

Lenny · May 10, 2011

boehm742 said:
I have always had to use well water. Its like 300ppm tds outa the faucet but the RODI gets it to zero for me.

OK

CJO said:
Why do you think it is the carbon stage being affected so quickly? Is your city using chloramine?

I've known people to use well water before, but it all depends on the quality of water. Can you run your well water through your RO/DI unit?

CJ

Yes on the chloramines. I will need to run a booster pump for the RO unit.

CJO · May 10, 2011

Chloramines is probably what caused your issues. You can add another stage in your filters to get rid of it, if you want to stick with the city water.

CJ

kingfisherfleshy · May 10, 2011

I am using well water, and have for the past 9 years on various SW reef tanks.

Get your well water tested real well, and make them run everything that they have. It only cost me $40 and I got a really good break down. Turns out that there are 3ppm of "nitrogen" in our well water which means not too much of any one kind. Either way, been growing softies, LPS, and SPS now for nine years without any issues.

It all depends on the well.

_Alex_ · May 10, 2011

i have been using well water but mine is REALLY BAD!!! tds is well over 600-800... im goign to have it tested here soon becuase even with 2 prefilters before my RO unit, it burnt threw both my DI resins in about a months time... im goign to try some more prefilters and better quality filters and di resin. but i think im goign to have it tested first.

CalmSeasQuest · May 10, 2011

Horrible, high-iron well water for 20 years (sediment pre-filter and water softener.) ~350 TDS into the BRS RO, ~1 TDS into the dual DIs (Love the booster pump) = 0 TDS into the tank.

I replace RO pre-filters every 6 months. DI media replaced as needed (about 160 gallons per cartridge refill.)

_Alex_ · May 10, 2011

CalmSeasQuest said:
Horrible, high-iron well water for 20 years (sediment pre-filter and water softener.) ~350 TDS into the BRS RO, ~1 TDS into the dual DIs (Love the booster pump) = 0 TDS into the tank. I replace RO pre-filters every 6 months. DI media replaced as needed (about 160 gallons per cartridge refill.)

think that is some of my probelm to. im gong to be trying out the spectrapure filters very soon and there DI's, AZdessertrat on here pointed me to them and said his tds is 800+ and said it gets his down to under 5 out just the RO so goign to give them a shot. oh also gonna use there 90GPD membrane.

CalmSeasQuest · May 10, 2011

The BRS six stage is working wonderfully for me. The key was the addition of the boost pump. At 85 PSI, it improved the RO output by 300% (3TDS to 1TDS.)

_Alex_ · May 10, 2011

yes im running the 6 stage BRS and the boost pump, my ro tds went from 15 down to 6.... so yes was a huge increase. but 6 is still high after the RO. so like i said goign to try all different filters and maybe add on another 2-prefilters from a older RO unit my water is very very poor. i ahve it running threw a carbon prefilter, then a softener and the another prefilter and then the RO. im having to change the first 2 filters almost monthly ... so im gogn to do everythign i can to make my RO unit work even if it meens running 2 more filters and maybe even 2 membranes.....

AZDesertRat · May 10, 2011

What makes you think you are going through carbon blocks? If that is the case then you are using the wrong prefilter in front of the carbon. The prefilters purpose is to protect the billions of tiny microscopic pores in the carbon that do the job of adsorbing chlorine and VOCs. If the prefilter is a larger micron size than a 1.0 then that is part of your problem, its not doing its job. I use a 0.2 micron absolute rated pleated prefilter than not only filters better it also has 10x the surface area so lasts longer and has less pressure drop. I follow that with a 0.5 micron 20,000 gallon carbob block then the membrane.

Chloramine carbons are a waste of money. If you use a high quality carbob block like the KX Matrikx+1 in a 0.5 or 0.6 micron size thats more than enough for the chlorine portion of chloramines. Don't let anyone tell you you need a special carbon. If they do tell them its not the carbon thats important, its the DI resin. The resin is needed to filte rout the ammonia portion of chloramines and is as must. The chlorine is a walk in the park, the ammonia is tough since RO membranes are only marginally effective at all forms of ammonia including ammonia, ntrites and nitrates.

More stages are not important and probably cause more problems since each stage has a related pressure drop associated with it. For a reef quality RO/DI you want and need 4 stages, thats it, no more and no less unless you want to add an additional DI filter which does provide bang ofr the buck.
1. 0.5 or no larger than a 1.0 micron prefilter, and absolute rated is better than nominal rated
2. a single 0.5 or 0.6 micron 20,000 gallon carbon block.
3. a Dow Filmtec 75 GPD, GE Water 100 GPD or better yet a treated and tested high rejection rate Spectrapure 90 GPD RO membrane (on sale for $35)
4. a single vertical refillable 20 oz DI filter, I use Spectrapures SilicaBuster DI resin in this position since it is specially blended for silica, nitrate and phosphate removal in a reef system.
5. f you want to adds omething make it Spectrapures MaxCap DI in the 4th stage and install the SilicaBuster in the 5th stage. The MaxCap makes the SilicaBuster or any normal mixed bed resin last at least 3.5x longer so it pays for itself quickly.