Dual DI
- Thread starter bknapp
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dwilliams87
Valuable Member
Why are you thinking you need it?
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bknapp
Has been left unattended
That's kind of what I was thinking too, but I know some people run two, and I was wondering why.
dwilliams87
Valuable Member
One thing that I wonder with these reef ro's is how accurate the 0 tds is. I know in my profession we have to use DI from time to time. We have very expensive TDs meters and getting absolute 0 is very difficult. Any experts on the subject?
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bknapp
Has been left unattended
You ever use one to test your water at home?
GAW
New Member
I have a dual DI system, and frankly there is no great advantage to it other than a bit of convenience. That is, the DI in the first chamber will exhaust well before (several hundred gallons) the second chamber which allows plenty of time (weeks) to replace the resin in the first. The reality is that the water coming out of my dual chamber DI is no better than from a single chamber--- at least for our purposes. Some seem to be needlessly obsessed with wanting molecularly 100.00% pure H2O. While I believe that RO/DI is a great idea and absolutely needed for some with nasty water, the fact of the mater is that our make up and replacement water does not have to be "nuclear grade". I ran a fine reef tank for years on unfiltered well water and an acquaintance down the road from me has one of the best SPS tanks in the area run only on tap water----- plenty of TDS here in Va. In short, the second DI is ok for convenience but nothing really to be gained ( certainly nothing material in terms of potential tank success).
dwilliams87
Valuable Member
Yes, my BRS said its 0 but a good quality one buts it closer to 1.
dwilliams87
Valuable Member
Puts it closer to one.
Chameleon
Valuable Member
if you have a dual you can put cheaper resin in the first and more expensive resin in the second. some people require specialized resins for their water so instead of opting to exhaust their expensive resin quickly and spending a lot they add in a second DI and use it for the expensive resin so the cheap resin takes the bulk of the work....at least that is how i understand it
michaellee64
New Member
Adding a 2nd stage is a fantastic idea! When your 2nd stage hits 1 tds, move it over to the first stage and add new DI resin to the 2nd stage. I've been doing this for a lot of years and it sure saves the amount of resin I go through.
A properly designed dual DI system makes all the difference in the world and costs much less to operate.
Look at Spectrapure's MaxCap dual DI system which uses their MaxCap resin in the first chamber and SilicaBuste rin the second. Both these resins are designed specifically for reef use and are custom blended based on years and years of testing all over the country. Myself, I have a tap water TDS that exceeds 550 and I get over 1000 gallons out of each SilicaBuster DI cartridge and over 3000 gallons out of each MaxCap cartridge so the cost of ownership is very minimal.
Another option is to use the same resin in both cartridges, something like the SilicaBuster or an off the shelf fresh nuclear or semiconductor grade, and when you first start seeing signs of TDS coming from the first cartridge you switch the second into the first position and add a new refill to the second so you get double the life. In all cases it is imperitave you have a test ball valve or inline TDS meter between the two cartridges so you can monitor the TDS of each DI or yoi are throwing money away.
Look at Spectrapure's MaxCap dual DI system which uses their MaxCap resin in the first chamber and SilicaBuste rin the second. Both these resins are designed specifically for reef use and are custom blended based on years and years of testing all over the country. Myself, I have a tap water TDS that exceeds 550 and I get over 1000 gallons out of each SilicaBuster DI cartridge and over 3000 gallons out of each MaxCap cartridge so the cost of ownership is very minimal.
Another option is to use the same resin in both cartridges, something like the SilicaBuster or an off the shelf fresh nuclear or semiconductor grade, and when you first start seeing signs of TDS coming from the first cartridge you switch the second into the first position and add a new refill to the second so you get double the life. In all cases it is imperitave you have a test ball valve or inline TDS meter between the two cartridges so you can monitor the TDS of each DI or yoi are throwing money away.
