Probably put around 700 gallons through the system on RO/DI and readings showed a consistent TDS of 000 for the first couple of weeks.
Did an RO flush last week and TDS read 002. I know this is acceptable and way below the 050 limit for the human eye to see on glass but I was curious and tested RO only and got a TDS of 023. Still acceptable I know but I got a shock when I tested DI only and got TDS of 200. No DI for high for me!. Water hardness is around TDS 500 if I’m pulling from someones well or 350 if I’m pulling from municipal supply. Any thoughts on why my DI reading should be so high or why my TDS has increased by 2 overall?
your filters are shot…
incoming tds of 500 will chew it up quick…
Are you saying that ALL my filters are shot?
no somethings messed up with your DI is what it sounds like… I know hardwater plays havoc on these systems, when I was doing research for my system the guys from dultmeier told me it is advisable to soften the water before putting it through your system… I don’t have this issue as I live in an area where my tap is 120 tds coming out of the wall…
but I would reckon based on what your saying that something is shot, and it sounds like your DI…
if you have 500 coming in and 23 coming out of your RO than that thing is working hard…
We clean at 500 tds all the time. Running that level through a di only will chew through the resin pretty quick. Your RO should be fine, but you may have prematurely killed your DI resin.
Also, you can run 700 gallons of water through the system in just a few hours. If you’ve been using the system for a few weeks than you certainly have flushed over 700 gallons through it.
I’ve never ran it in DI only. Always use RO/DI
Oh, I misunderstood you as well. The way you said “no DI for high for me!” made me think you’d indeed done straight DI.
I just tested the DI only function to try and track down the rising TDS. I know it would be suicidal to run the DI only with our TDS levels being so high
Ok let me see if I can help you. First please understand that you can run just DI on situations where there is not enough water pressure to use the RO. That will only be on a few occassions but it will allow you to use a wfp instead of having to climb a latter. This unit comes with a 20 inch DI cartridge that holds 1/3 cubic foot of resin. That much resin will remove alot of TDS. A 25 liter bag of resin will remove 2 million TDS giving you 225 hours of work. You may have run the water through your DI to fast not allowing it to take the TDS out. The manual says you can get 76 gallons with a 500 reading. If you run it through the RO and DI you will get 2016 gallons out of the DI. But in your case you are not getting that so lets try this. Hook you pole up and shut the water off to the brush. Let it run for 30 minutes. Do this with RO only. Then check you TDS RO only and send me your readings.
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A water softener is definitely of no value … the TDS stays the same - calcium molecules are replaced with sodium molecules – that is all it does. The reason is that Wash-iT PRO is designed with every measure to prevent scaling … and all of them are equally as effective as a water softener. Remember, we are talking state-of-the-art here …
I replied to this at length from my iPhone last night … and the battery died before I could send it … sorry for the delay …
OK … this is all maths … your DI is shot. But you can, and should still use DI for HIGH …
Here is your scenario : You have a new canister of DI Resin that will remove 320,000ppm. You operated it for 700 gallons (2650 litres) with RO DI, assumed TDS 023 - that is 61,000TDS - then you did an RO flush with water at 500TDS - if you did this till you got a reading of TDS002, I m thinking you ran this for 10 minutes at 3/4gpm? That is another 15,000 TDS … so total 76,000 or 25% the capacity of your canister.
So … the maths does not add up - maybe you used more than 700gallons ? Maybe there is a problem with the resin? We still don’t know from what you have told us, but the symptom says your DI Resin has failed.
That said, I would immediately advise you to wash one of your windows at home with RO ONLY water … let it dry and see if it is indeed spot-free - if so, that will save you from consuming DI all the time.
Why does the TDS go to TDS200 from TDS500 when it fails ?
DI Resin is actually 2 resins combined 60/40. The resins are called cationic and anionic. They are designed to ionically attract molecules of the opposite charge, so that is why you have both charges in there.
In your case, imagine if the 40% side of the resin fails, but the 60% side of the resin is still working … 40% of 500 is TDS 200. So … clearly, one side of your resin is depleted.
With regards the TDS002 from the DI Flush of your RO ?
We are never expecting you to get it to 000 - anything below 10 is fine. Did you test each minute ? What were your readings ? how long was your flush cycle and at what volume through? You can in fact, in High TDS areas, fill, let it stand, fill again (turn on the spigot and wait 2-3 minutes) then let it stand again … the DI water will do it’s job!
Does this help ? Please ask for clarity on any point.
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Not suicidal - the formula for DI ONLY cost in $ per hour is : ‘your local TDS’ ÷ 100
In your case, 500/100 = $5.00 per hour assuming 1/3 gpm flow rate.
The hours usage you can get is : 3500 ÷ your local TDS
In your case, DI ONLY should last you 7 hours
If you are working 4 stories DI ONLY, then reverting to RO ONLY for the balance of any job ( 3 stories, 2 stories, Ground FLoor), you are unlikely to use even 7 hours on a big job. In this case the cost is less than $30 - but your chargeable rate is over $100 at 4 story work!
John. Are you saying I should close off the RO valve and let thje source water run through the waste valve for 30 minutes?
yes just close the valve.
If you can produce pure water with you DI then flushing the RO with pure water or letting it soak would be the best but from what you are saying your DI is expired. There is a video of this in the video section
Im running TDS 002 through the RO as I type this. The water coming out of the waste valve s reading TDS023 so far. I don’t suppose running my TDS 002 through the DI would help much would it?
No do not run it through the DI. Did you check the waste water TDS after a few minutes to see if it came down. You gave your RO a good flushing. Maybe do this once a week and it will prolong the life of the RO.
RO waste was reading 012.
Here’s something I forgot mention. Since searching through posts here I have learned that knocking the unit over can cause the resin to mix and become less effective. I did pull the unit over once on a grassy area after pulling on the hose too much.
The unit was also transported horizontally in the back of an unladen F250 which bounces around a bit due to the hard suspension. I’m thinking that this rough treatment has probably contributed to the increasing demise of my resin.
The wash it us designed to allow horizontal transport and operation.
