Interesting find concerning Huntsville water

[H@rry]

For the past several years I have experienced rapid depletion of my DI Resin. Also a RO membrane that formally lasted several years needed to be replaced after 6 months. I thought that possibly my membrane housing may have had scratches that were letting the water bypass the membrane so I replaced that. No change. I understand that the Carbon Block removes chlorine from the water before it gets to the membrane to prevent it from damaging the membrane and also depleting the DI resin. I began to suspect that Huntsville Utilities may have changed from chlorine to chloramine (which would not be removed with a standard carbon block). I called Huntsville Utilities and spoke with a person in the water department who told me that they only used chlorine and to the best of his knowledge, no water system in the state of Alabama used chloramine.

Fast forward a year or so: last week I replace my DI resin and it did not last a week. I know I use a lot of water but something has changed! Out of curiosity I bought a total chlorine test kit. This tests the waste water (that has gone through the sediment and carbon block but not through the membrane) and tests for Free Chlorine and Total Chlorine. If they both test the same then it is chlorine. If total chlorine is greater than free chlorine it is chloramine. My free was 0 and total was .5. I interpret that to indicate chloramine. I could be mistaken about the test readings as this is one those things where you hold the test strip up against a color chart and guess which one it looks most like.

I then tested water from the tap and it would indicate chlorine and not chloramine. Go figure.

I installed a new membrane, sediment filter, a carbon block that supposedly removes chloramines, and replaced the DI resin. We'll know in a couple of weeks.

 

[DFW]

What is the tds reading out of the tap?

 

[H@rry]

What is the tds reading out of the tap?

TDS out of the tap is 112 ppm. I'm not sure that would have anything to do with what I was talking about though.

 

[DFW]

Well, if you had 1000 ppm at the tap, everything in your filter system would have to be replaced more often than if it is 112.

We have chloramine in Ft. Worth for many years now. I never use any special carbon blocks on my ro di unit. I have 4 ppm coming out of a 3 year old membrane, and the di resin lasts a long time. We get tap water about 150 ppm tds.

 

[beaslbob]

Huntsville utilities in incorrect in that harvest monrovia in fact does use chloramine. they use something like aquamag or something like that.

 

[H@rry]

Well, I bought the best carbon block I could find. Hope that helps. It's a pain having to service the unit so often.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Aquamag is not chloramine, though. It is Magnesium hydroxide and used to raise pH of the source water before water treatment to remove excess hardness which can cause scales in pipes and machineries. It also removes some microbial contaminants and dissolved organics, but I don't think it replaces chloramine, which is used as a disinfectant.

 

[gcrawford]

Huntsville utilities in incorrect in that harvest monrovia in fact does use chloramine. they use something like aquamag or something like that.

Not correct, unless they've changed recently. I was assured by them that they do not use chloramine. What is your source for this information concerning Harvest Monrovia Water?

 

[TrishW]

Having chloramines is not the same as using them for disinfection. They are a byproduct of using chlorine for disinfection.

If you want to see what is in your water go to the Huntsville utility website and look at the consumer confidence report (CCR). It will tell you the average, max and min of every parameter they are required to monitor. I look over this carefully every year. Obviously by the time the report is compiled any problem would have already occurred but it is still a great tool.

 

[TrishW]

BUT......the free chlorine at my house always exceeds 3 ppm, which is much higher than most systems target. Is it possible that a higher chlorine level causes the resin to have a short life?

We used aquamag as a corrosion inhibitor after having high results in required copper lead monitoring. It puts a coating on the inside of water mains, particularly ductile iron mains but will also help with homes that have lead pipes or copper with lead soldier. Unfortunately if the pH is then allowed to drop below 6.5 or so because you have an idiot as an operator the coating in
mains will begin to slough off and cause a heck of a mess. Drained more than one elevated tank as a result of this.

 

[bamareef]

Chlorine will cause damage to the RO Membranes and shorten the life of the membrane. We have seen huge swings in the quality of water supplied from HSV Utilities. I will check next week at work what HSV is supplying us. I think we check it daily and record it. I will get back with you on the numbers.

 

[beaslbob]

Not correct, unless they've changed recently. I was assured by them that they do not use chloramine. What is your source for this information concerning Harvest Monrovia Water?

Actually it was harverst monrovia water authority themselves.

But then Tomoko clarified what aquamag was.

 

[beaslbob]

Aquamag is not chloramine, though. It is Magnesium hydroxide and used to raise pH of the source water before water treatment to remove excess hardness which can cause scales in pipes and machineries. It also removes some microbial contaminants and dissolved organics, but I don't think it replaces chloramine, which is used as a disinfectant.

thanks. and interesting.

 

[bamareef]

Well I did find out we dont monitor chlorine levels daily. We monitor Calcium and Conductivity. Now After some discussions with Friend of mine, which is a scientist, he did some rrsearch and CO2 can deplete resin beads quicker. Not sure if that affects the RO Membrane or not. Also, have you saved your old resin beads Harry? I am going to replace my media with in the next couple days. I have a plan to try to regenerate the DI Resin Media. If it works, I will post a thread on it.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

I don't think co2 affects membranes, but it does deplete do resin quickly. The drinking water in Madison comes primarily from wells and therefore are quite rich in co2 due to the respiration of soil bacteria and microorganisms.
I have recharged mixed di resin before. The procedure is simple and easy to follow, but separating the cation and anion resin and treating one of them further was somewhat tedious. I lost a lot of blue resin beads by accidentally locking a sieve. I hope you have a good luck with recharging. It should save you some money. Bigger money saver to me would be GFO recharging. The procedure is even simpler. It just takes a little lingers - like 72 hours.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

I meant to say knocking a sieve instead of locking. Also di resin instead of do resin. Darn cell phone

 

[H@rry]

I've never tried to save the spent resin, just dump it in the garbage. I read about how to regenerate it a long time ago but it sounded like too much trouble or maybe problematic (can't remember the procedure now). I have been buying the 10 pound packages from eBay vendors but BRS had a good price on the last 7.5 bag I bought.

Since I changed out all the pre-filters and membrane the last canister of resin lasted a month. Before that it would only last 7 - 10 days.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Boy, that's a lot of resin in such a short period of time [emoji79]