Water: The Most Essential Compound

doc111

doc111

Well-Known Member
Weerdoe said:
no, nor do I wish to spend my time looking for them for you, seeing as i have the knowledge and opinion in my head. Also there are no claims made here I see facts of what distilled water consists of and a fact of what any water, especially distilled(look up the polarity of water, you'll figure it out if you look enough)can do to soil, and a fact that any descent gardener knows. why, I only back your info on no minerals and stuff.
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Dude, I can't even understand what you're saying.:? I am well aware of what distilled water consists of (they teach you that when you get your masters degree in chemistry;-))and I have a post about distilled water in the beginning of the thread. I have also had a few discussions throughout the thread about distilled water. I'm not pimping anything here. This thread is solely for purposes of educating growers who are interested in water quality, different types of filtration and what the differences are, and a few other things related to water. Thanks for voicing your opinion (whatever it was), and if you don't like the information in this thread you are free to disregard all of it.:weed:
 
J

justpassingthrough

Member
Doc, thanks very much for continuing to maintain this thread. I'm new to this stuff, I think that a lot of the trouble I'm having getting started is water-related, and I'm looking for practical solutions. I get what you're saying about grocery-store RO, but that doesn't really work for me, as the cost is significantly higher here and the distance to haul it long. So I need to figure out the right way to process my water on-site without breaking the bank with capital costs. I read this thread hoping to find a little more detail on how to attack the problem, but so far you've been a little light in that regard.

I'm working with well water, very hard e.g. 750ppm. I haven't had it analyzed, though I think that's going to happen soon. The calcium content is obvious from shower-head cloggage and the carbonate residue left on pots, and I think the iron is high as well, judging from the rust ring at the water line in the toilet. I have both a conventional salt (NaCl) softener and a consumer-grade RO. The question is whether these pieces in the right combination can solve the problem.

Reading the RO unit's specifications, they set ceilings on Mn (<.05ppm), Fe (<.1ppm) and TDS (<10gpg). That suggests that feeding hard water directly into the RO is going to fuck it up, probably by clogging the membrane. Preconditioning the water with the softener is going to yank out that stuff and add the undesirable Na, but since their specifications don't say anything about sodium that should be okay, and suggests that it'll in turn be removed by the RO. In fact, in the footnotes in the RO specs they say their ratings are based on a "supply TDS 250ppm softened tap water".

So does hooking it up in that order make sense to you, both in terms of the desired water chemistry and component longevity?
 
doc111

doc111

Well-Known Member
justpassingthrough said:
Doc, thanks very much for continuing to maintain this thread. I'm new to this stuff, I think that a lot of the trouble I'm having getting started is water-related, and I'm looking for practical solutions. I get what you're saying about grocery-store RO, but that doesn't really work for me, as the cost is significantly higher here and the distance to haul it long. So I need to figure out the right way to process my water on-site without breaking the bank with capital costs. I read this thread hoping to find a little more detail on how to attack the problem, but so far you've been a little light in that regard.

I'm working with well water, very hard e.g. 750ppm. I haven't had it analyzed, though I think that's going to happen soon. The calcium content is obvious from shower-head cloggage and the carbonate residue left on pots, and I think the iron is high as well, judging from the rust ring at the water line in the toilet. I have both a conventional salt (NaCl) softener and a consumer-grade RO. The question is whether these pieces in the right combination can solve the problem.

Reading the RO unit's specifications, they set ceilings on Mn (<.05ppm), Fe (<.1ppm) and TDS (<10gpg). That suggests that feeding hard water directly into the RO is going to fuck it up, probably by clogging the membrane. Preconditioning the water with the softener is going to yank out that stuff and add the undesirable Na, but since their specifications don't say anything about sodium that should be okay, and suggests that it'll in turn be removed by the RO. In fact, in the footnotes in the RO specs they say their ratings are based on a "supply TDS 250ppm softened tap water".

So does hooking it up in that order make sense to you, both in terms of the desired water chemistry and component longevity?
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Well, thank you for reading and posting. Unfortunately, the methods I've outlined here are it for the most part. This is where creativity comes in. Mixing r/o with tap water to bring it into the desired range is always an option. I saw that you have a water softener and an r/o filter. You should be all set. I have read that Na softened water is hard on the r/o membrane but not much worse than really nasty hard water. The water softener basically replaces the Ca and Mg ions with Na ions. The r/o filter will remove most of the Na ions but if there is too much left behind you could have some Na related problems. A little bit (sorry, I don't know the cutoff concentrations right off the top of my head) of Na is fine for plants but too much and you're screwed! One of the keys to making your membrane last longer is to make sure the rate of waste to filtered water is in the correct range. Another is to make sure you are changing your sediment and carbon prefilters at recommended intervals, if not sooner since your water is ridiculously bad. Are you using your r/o water at this point? :leaf:
 
J

justpassingthrough

Member
No. We've been using straight well water to maintain our mothers (in dirt), and experimenting with both well and bottled RO water in our aerocloner, but the results have been shit. My thinking now is that running the mothers on pH-adjusted well water without any added nutes is leaving them in a state too rough to yield viable cuttings for the cloner. So we're going back to first principles, cleaning up the water, adding commercial veg nutes, and see if mom's condition improves enough for us to start to get good clones.
 
doc111

doc111

Well-Known Member
justpassingthrough said:
No. We've been using straight well water to maintain our mothers (in dirt), and experimenting with both well and bottled RO water in our aerocloner, but the results have been shit. My thinking now is that running the mothers on pH-adjusted well water without any added nutes is leaving them in a state too rough to yield viable cuttings for the cloner. So we're going back to first principles, cleaning up the water, adding commercial veg nutes, and see if mom's condition improves enough for us to start to get good clones.
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Your well water is way too hard IMO. You will more than likely need to do something to fix it. You are one of the smart ones. Many people just don't believe that poor water quality will have noticeable effects on their grow. I found out the hard way and struggled for months before I took a look at my water. I think the way you are thinking of doing it (running your well water through a softener and then through the r/o filter) will probably be your best bet. Remember to change out those prefilters (in your case I'd consider doing it at least every 6 months). This is the sinlgle best thing you can do to preserve the life of the membrane. Best of luck and happy growing.:weed:
 
Medi 1

Medi 1

Well-Known Member
good info. and did you know ro water does not remove all chloramines,. only partial. needs an upgraded filter to remove all of it.
for the hydro logic ones its a kdf 85 filter you need.
 
doc111

doc111

Well-Known Member
Medi 1 said:
good info. and did you know ro water does not remove all chloramines,. only partial. needs an upgraded filter to remove all of it.
for the hydro logic ones its a kdf 85 filter you need.
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From what I understand a simple carbon filter will remove most chloramines and every r/o unit I've ever seen has at least one carbon prefilter.:leaf:
 
Medi 1

Medi 1

Well-Known Member
well i sell water systems and they dont remove all of it. says partial right from factory. we sell the hydro logic and needs an upgraded kdf85 for all of it. there is a diff in the carbon to.
 
doc111

doc111

Well-Known Member
Medi 1 said:
well i sell water systems and they dont remove all of it. says partial right from factory. we sell the hydro logic and needs an upgraded kdf85 for all of it. there is a diff in the carbon to.
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This is the first I'm hearing of this. I just bought an r/o filter and it doesn't say anything about only removing "partial chloramine". I'm not saying I don't believe you but I find it hard to believe that a Brita will remove most chloramine but a carbon prefilter for an r/o system won't.:-? I have read that r/o does remove most chloramine and I've read that it doesn't. I wouldn't be surprised if this is some sort of ploy from snake oil salesmen trying to make an extra buck off of growers. Thank you for posting.:peace:

Here is an article I found which says that a simple carbon filter DOES remove chloramine. http://www.pwgazette.com/problemchloramines.htm

Unfortunately I don't work in a lab anymore or I could test this.:sad: It does go on to say that the contact time is going to determine how well chloramine is removed. After saying all that they then go on to recomend a "special" carbon filter to do the job better.:roll: It sounds supsiciously like snake oil to me but who knows?:leaf:
 
Medi 1

Medi 1

Well-Known Member
who says brita removes chloramines? and like i said there is a diff in the quality of the carbon used in the systems....this is right in your link....

In choosing carbon for chloramine removal, a specially prepared carbon called “catalytic” carbon is far superior to regular carbon. there was more to the link saying the same as well.

there is a diff in carbon as we know this from making exhaust filters as well. the ones we use have a 2 year gaurantee. not many filter give that. not water but the exhaust smell filters. so my point was that not all carbon is equal.

ive gtot a chart ill show later after work...no time right now. has all what teh filters remove.

sorry for the typos here, my spell check deal isnt working
 
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