Does anyone use an [I]upflow[/I], as opposed to a[I] downflow, [/I] di filter arrangement? I’ve read that an upflow system swirls the water, thus eliminating channelling that can occur in a downflow system, thus getting longer life out of the resin. But Ive only seen downflow systems on pure water systems used in window cleaning.
I plan to MacGuyver an old filter housing & some garden sprinkler bits to test the theory. Anything to squeeze a bit more life out of my resin.
i guess i don’t know the technical definition of “upflow” but i think that’s what my system does. i have refillable cartridges. the water enters the housing, fills it up and then flows up through the bottom of the cartridge, through the resin and out.
My current resin vessel has a tube with a strainer located through the middle. The water flows into the housing and through the resin, then up the strainer tube and out. Upflow is the reverse of this. I think the term used depends on where the water enters the filter media and direction it needs to travel.
This is an edited snippet of what I found:
[SIZE=3][SIZE=2]"Channeling is the process where small tunnels form in the media allowing water to flow in the same channel every time. Water always takes the path of least resistance. The system forces the water in an Up-Flow direction up from the bottom of the tank in a swirling motion causing the carbon media to swirl. This motion allows the water to have maximum contact with the carbon media resulting in a very effective filtration process without the possibility of channeling. " [/SIZE][/SIZE]
Very interesting, I havent heard of this concept yet, but I would like to hear more.
Found another water filter company saying about the same thing:
Upflow Brining – Generic softeners are notorious for downflow brining, in which hard water enters the softener from above the resin bed and is expected to flow throughout the resin to complete the ion-exchange process required for softening. Unfortunately, hard water naturally settles above the resin and only penetrates the upper layers of the resin bed, meaning the full softening capacity of the resin is never utilized and frequent regeneration is required. Upflow brining, in contrast, injects hard water at the base of the resin bed, allowing it to flow upwards through every media layer before the pristinely soft water is delivered to your tap.
Curiouser and curiouser. Didn’t know hard water settles above the resin. Might just “reverse the polarity” on one of my filters, as the good Doctor would say, and monitor the results.
You may need to incorporate a flow regulator as it would seem to need more pressure to up flow…I think the channeling is really a non-issue. My former industry we used resin to reclaim gold cyanide so channeling was closely monitored and critical but even then seldom happened.
