Waste/pure ratio

[TimB]

The only thing that will reduce the flow in your membrane if it’s blocked due to dirty water coming in. This is normally caused by dirty mains water.

You can normally unblock it if you flush your membrane for a good hour or so.
If that fails then the membrane may be blocked.

A tell tale sign is when you open the membrane housing and dirty water comes out.

Hi Doug. So I've disassembled the whole thing. Undoing Champ housing nearly made me pass out but I got there. No dirty water anywhere, below is the pic of the membrane but not sure how much can be told from that.

Reassembled it and its still low ppm but very low flow. No change. Removed filters as you mentioned before and flow is the same or even worse actually. I can't increase flow whatever I do, so membrane must be bust I guess?

As I asked in my last post, any idea on what could have caused this and how I can avoid it? My water from tap is between 350 and 500 depending on the day. And as I've mentioned I forgot to change carbon filter for 4 to 5 months.

 

[scottish cleaning service]

Hi Doug. So I've disassembled the whole thing. Undoing Champ housing nearly made me pass out but I got there. No dirty water anywhere, below is the pic of the membrane but not sure how much can be told from that.

Reassembled it and its still low ppm but very low flow. No change. Removed filters as you mentioned before and flow is the same or even worse actually. I can't increase flow whatever I do, so membrane must be bust I guess?

As I asked in my last post, any idea on what could have caused this and how I can avoid it? My water from tap is between 350 and 500 depending on the day. And as I've mentioned I forgot to change carbon filter for 4 to 5 months.

Did it ever freeze?

 

[TimB]

Did it ever freeze?

No, it's never gotten that cold.

 

[doug atkinson]

I’ll have a look next week at the picture on the PC so I can expand the picture. If I spot anything will let you know.

 

[TimB]

Fitted a new membrane today. Your shop said sold out of the axeon so I bought from a local supplier. A spectrum low energy membrane.

Voila seems to be working. So it was the membrane. I'm getting (after 30 mins of flushing) 35 seconds per litre of pure to 25 secs of waste at 90psi.

The chap selling it wasn't sure, and I can't seem to find online, does anyone know the optimum psi for this membrane? Might crank it to 100, as that ratio favours waste a little too highly I think?

Thank you for all the suggestions. Spruce I think your original idea re calcium and hard water may be correct. Kev used this system for years before but religiously changed the carbon filter every 14,000 litres. I know as Doug says, and have others, that it should be OK to run for longer. But maybe the water here is so hard that I need to replace these filters every month or two. I'll be ordering a stock of those carbon blocks from you Doug.

 

[spruce]

Fitted a new membrane today. Your shop said sold out of the axeon so I bought from a local supplier. A spectrum low energy membrane.

Voila seems to be working. So it was the membrane. I'm getting (after 30 mins of flushing) 35 seconds per litre of pure to 25 secs of waste at 90psi.

The chap selling it wasn't sure, and I can't seem to find online, does anyone know the optimum psi for this membrane? Might crank it to 100, as that ratio favours waste a little too highly I think?

Thank you for all the suggestions. Spruce I think your original idea re calcium and hard water may be correct. Kev used this system for years before but religiously changed the carbon filter every 14,000 litres. I know as Doug says, and have others, that it should be OK to run for longer. But maybe the water here is so hard that I need to replace these filters every month or two. I'll be ordering a stock of those carbon blocks from you Doug.

GAPS water do have a lot of specs on their website which maybe of some use.

SPECTRUM Reverse Osmosis Membranes

SPECTRUM membrane elements boast both excellent average rejection rates (99%) plus the ability to operate at very low (3.6 bar) pressures, resulting in some of the best performing membranes available

www.gapswater.co.uk

If you click on your model membrane, you will see document and more information tabs at the bottom of the page. The document tab usually has that membrane's spec sheet from the manufacturers.

 

[doug atkinson]

If you hack both sides of the membrane then you should be able to unroll the membrane sheeting. You can then tell a lot what has gone wrong.

If there is a white powder stuff then that is calcium. If holes in the sheeting then has been damaged.