tap water quality

[the Squid]

I was talking to a friend about water in our area and told him about my reef tank. we were discussing RO units. he was telling me that water hardness will clog my RO befor i can get 25g through it. he said that our local water com. keeps it at 25 (dont remember the term) and it should be about 5. he suggested a water softner then the RO. money is an issue for me whats the best way to get good water cheep?

[whatevva]

Kent Marine makes a flush kit for the membrane if you have really hard water. There is NO WAY that you'll clog a membrane after just 25 gallons. There would have to be boulders in the water!!

[Twitterbait]

I agree. just get an RO with a high rejection rate and flush it and you should be fine.

[cornetet]

I live in Ohio as well. Ohio water is hard because of all the limestone we are sitting on.

I went to HomeDepot and bought a WaterBoss Water Softner unit.

http://waterboss.com/products/model900.cfm

I believe the unit was around $300 and I had a brother-in-law install it.

I also put a WholeHouse filter. The WholeHouse filter filters down to 5microns if you get the highest-end filter cartridge.

http://www.homedepot.com/prel80/HDUS....jsp?pn=162839

I !LOVE! my setup.

If you have around $400-$500 you'll have great water for your tank, great water for you to drink and great water that wont clog up your dishwasher and washing machine.

[wtrguy]

If you have a good flow to the drain and can flush dth drain side of the r.o every now and then you will be fine. Remember the thing that kills a reverse osmosis membrane it sitting with out use. unlike other filters that hold on to the crap r.o rejects it to the drain. don't let it sit use it. if it sits it will grow bio film / this will clog the r.o.
feed the dog / waste some if you don't have the storage and water changes to use it allot.
wtrguy
Tom

[ChrisPrusha]

My apologies for being slightly off topic: a question for those with flush kits...how often do you use them? Every time you make water? Or less than that?

[wtrguy]

I made my own flush kit, take out the flow restictor on the drain, install a little ball valve. You keep the ball valve just cracked so it the same as the flow restrictor. Then every mnth or so open up the ball valve run for 5 min / this will flush out the bio film. a /t.d.s meter is a good tool to have it will let you know when to replace the membrane. 88 o/o to 98 o/o rejection is good / after that the membrane is going down hill.
wtrguy
Tom