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How often to change Carbon Blocks in Phoenix?


ps2cho

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Sort of a question for AZDesertRat since I know you live here...

 

I have been running 1micron spectrapure sediment and carbon blocks. What's the change interval recommended here? I live in Mesa.

 

Also other than BRS (so I don't have to pay the shipping) any other test kits I can buy that can do the chlorine/cholormines check on my carbon blocks?

 

I am wondering if my tanks problems could be stemming from this...

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Just look on Amazon or eBay and you should be able to find test strips there. You might get lucky and find some that are free shipping or are labeled as Amazon Prime. Nobody can really tell you exactly how often to change them because it will change from person to person. You are just going to have to test it periodically and make sure everything is in line.

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AZDesertRat

Spectrapure like most other vendors recommends replacing the sediment and carbon block filters every 6 months. You can extend that and I have detailed that many times here on N-R, I think I even answered a thread just this morning on that subject.

 

Here it is from another forum:

"There are things you can do to extend the 6 month replacement schedule provided you have good water quality and a low silt density, little to no particulates in other words.
The first is always use softened water if you have it available, membranes love soft water as it does much of the work for them so they last longer. Another is you can use pressure gauges before and after the sediment and carbon filters to monitor headloss due to fouled or plugged filters. If your waters suspended solids or particulates are low the sediment filter can very well last longer than 6 months so you watch for signs of headloss and change it when you start to see a differential between the upstream and downstream gauges. Along with that you need a low range chlorine test kit to monitor for chlorine breakthru from fouled or exhausted carbon. Yet another thing often overlooked is to do at least an annual disinfection of the system to keep things clean and sanitized. If you have ever seen a membrane covered in slime you would understand why it is necessary.

All these things can add up to a reduced cost of ownership and don't take much time or a large investment."

 

I use the low range chlorine test kit from Spectrapure to test for chlorine breakthru and its only like $5. They are in Tempe and you can order and pick stuff up locally if they know you are coming. I try to get over there at least a couple times a year just to check out new stuff and look at their reef tanks on display.

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How can I tell if Mesa uses Chlorine or Chloramines? The BRS Video is my concern....I don't want to go 6 months on a Carbon block if its pushing a bunch of chloramines through as their video shows that many blocks are totally useless for chloramines after as little as 80g.

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Look it up on the website of the company you get your water from. They should tell you if they use chlorine, chloramines, or both. Here in Chapel Hill, NC they use chloramines 11 months of the year and right about now they use chlorine for a month.

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AZDesertRat

Watch the BRS video but don't put much faith in it, it is flawed in my professional opinion.

Their parameters were not what you see in normal usage so of course any carbon was set up to fail.

Mesa uses free chlorine or chlorine dioxide depending on the plant or well site, only the Brown Rd. CAP Plant uses chlorine dioxide if I remember right. They still get about 10% of their water from deep wells and the rest is from Brown Rd., the Johnny G. Martinez (an old friend of mine who has passed on) plant or the Val Vista plant. No worries, any of Spectrapure's 1 micron or smaller chlorine blocks is more than capable of removing chlorine present in both chloramines and free chlorine.

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Ok great so a 6mo service interval should be good right?

I use about 20g a week with a 1 to 4 ratio so 80g a week through the system which is 1000g in 6mo roughly.

 

Is that a reasonable gallonage for a carbon block?

 

On your prior post too I should probably sanitize and clean the whole system. It's about 18mo old and I haven't cleaned it yet.

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AZDesertRat

A good 0.5 micron carbon block is good for 20,000 total gallons (16000 waste and 4000 treated), 1 micron is 15,000 gallons, 5 micron is 9 to 12000 gallons and 10 micron around 3000 to 5000 total.

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Picked up the 0.5 micron maxcap kit...so I am replacing the sediment, carbon, maxcap and silicabuster all together. Do you think that with my 20g/week usage that 1 year on the sediment and carbon is reasonable, or should I go with a 6mo interval?

 

Is it ok that I used ammonia to flush the empty system? I didn't have any unscented bleach...

 

EDIT: Looks like its all good. I am getting 98.4% out of the RO membrane. 7ppm out from 425 in. I flushed the sediment and carbon stage only with the ammonia, then let it run for 10mins to clean out. Then removed each housing and cleaned it in the tap and with paper towels to make sure.

 

There was some slight yellowing on the membrane/housing that I am going to upload a photo of. Just wondering if its bacteria or not. Either way I wiped it clean although it seems the housing is somewhat stained by it...

There was also some carbon residue from me not flushing prior carbon cartridges. I just swapped and turned on. Going forward I will flush each carbon and sediment before letting it hit the membrane.

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AZDesertRat

That discoloration is normal and easily cleaned out.

You should be able to go 12 months but the only real way to tell is by monitoring your pressure drop across the filters and chlorine breakthrough. Spectrapure talks about both in their FAQ section.

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Gotcha.

 

For understanding, why would 0.5 micron last longer than 1micron? I would have thought that filtering greater would reduce lifespan since it would get clogged faster?

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AZDesertRat

The 0.5 micron filters make your RO membrane and DI resin last longer so the overall cost of ownership is lower. The less stuff that the membrane has to deal with, the cleaner it will stay, the better it will work and longer it will last. I use the 0.2 micron ZetaZorb sediment filter myself and they last about 18 months here in N Phoenix.

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