[Dazzawatkinson]

whats the best Reverse Osmosis, i can buy to purify my water. for my 1000l water tank in the garage, and how low can i expect to get the water quality.

[replacement]

This one looks the best.

Justin

[Dazzawatkinson]

i mean around a couple of hundered quid, also can i run the water through the r.o system then through a d.i system and then fill up my tank,

[pjulk]

Look here

RO Man Link

[stephen d]

agree with paul ro-man.com

[Philip Hanson]

Personally, I am very impressed with a brand new unit by GE Osmonics : The MERLIN

The merlin (like all of these smaller RO Units) is designed for domestic use, but due to a breakthrough in RO construction that GE Made last year, the Merlin outperforms similar sized and priced units by a Long way:



The Merlin costs around £495 (+VAT) and is able to deliver RO water at a staggering rate of 750 gallons per day.  (Yes 750 Gallons or about 2 litres per minute)

Similarly priced systems will typically produce about half of the Merlin's capacity, and its my opinion that suppliers will probably be selling off their stocks of other units like the Aqua FX Barracuda which is imported from the USA and sold under different names here.  While an excellent little unit, it can't really compete with the production rate of the Merlin.

However, it's important to note that the Merlin is an RO-only unit, and the water will need further treatment (DI) for use with window cleaning.  Some suppliers are already selling Merlins together with a DI vessel:

Here, Andrews Water Treatment are selling the Merlin under their own name "Rhombus Wizard" together with a DI vessel.

So that's my recommendation, get a merlin and seperate little DI vessel to polish, and you'll have a good little unit.

-Philip

Get Merlin From:

Andrews Water Treatment

Freshwater Systems

Gapswater

Fountain Softeners

[sham33]

Philip, i've just bought 1 of those from gaps water. Whats your reading before di? Mines around 40ppm with or without pump, i have decent tap pessure. I do agree though its very fast. I see gaps are selling an extra pre filter now, reckon its worth getting 1 of those?

[Andrews_Water]

Philip,

Thanks for spreading an independent word about the Merlin.  Ours differs from the Merlin supplied by others in that it has been modified so that it sends much less to waste, and it also incorporates a dual in-line TDS meter for only £544.  The 8" x 22" DI column costs another £115, so for well under £700 you can produce over 2500 litres of water per day at 0 TDS.

I agree that this revolutionary new machine is likely to take the RO industry by storm.

Yours, Andrew

[Philip Hanson]

Thanks Andrew, I was hoping you'd comment.

Out of interest Andrew, did you see sham33's comment above about an output at 40ppm?

Is this usual for the merlin?  I was wondering if these new membranes had acheived the fast production speed at a small cost to efficiency.  Either way, I think its a worthwhile trade-off. 

Would I be right in saying that extra pre-filters may increase the life of the membranes, but would have not much effect on the TDS?

-Philip

[Ian_Giles]

Philip,
I saw a post over on another forum from a guy that had got one of these systems and was worried about the TDS being only 0.040 ppm.
His original setup was taking it down to under 0.010 ppm.
Won't this make a significant impact on the life of your resin?

I'm shortly going to be upgrading to a van mount system, I thought the Merlin one looked a real good choice, a little concerned that it only takes it down to 0.040 ppm though .

[sham33]

Im that other guy on the other forum  Trouble with me is i live on a 1st floor flat. So im filling up 25 litre containers and taking them down to van to fill up a 300 litre tank  :

My old RO use to fill up 1 25 litre container every 50 minutes, the merlin fills 3 in just under an hour 

So, though im far from happy with a tds of 40ppm i still wouldn't go back to the old one. I only use about 6 containers a day so the merlin saves me a lot of hassle, guess the di tank wont last as long but 40ppm is still better than 300ppm from my tap.

I will be looking into ways of making the tds from the merlin lower if possible.

[Andrews_Water]

Hi Philip (& sham33),

The Merlin is stated by its manufacturer GE to be designed with TDS rejection between 90 and 95%, with a quoted average of 93%.  Interestingly, it’s also designed with a small optional extra “flush tank” (Part no. 1261345), and already has a Speedfit connection in the manifold to accept this flush tank.  The purpose of the flush tank is to eliminate the problem that commonly occurs in a stop-start situation where the first water produced by an RO after a stoppage has much higher TDS than after it has settled down and been running for a few minutes (often referred to on this forum).  This flush tank should greatly improve the 40ppm TDS that is currently being obtained in sham33’s situation.  I don’t think that the extra prefilter mentioned will improve the TDS, although it should cerainly extend membrane life.

On test in early February, with our modification to the Merlin, we produced 2138 L/day at 19ppm TDS, from  Southport tap water at 280ppm TDS, at 11 degrees C, and a pressure of 53psi (3.5 bar).  Our waste : product ratio was 1 : 1, far better than the unmodified Merlin,  at  3.25 : 1, and   this may be an important consideration if your tap water is metered.

Hope this helps.

Andrew

[thewindowcleaner1]

Andrew,
Do you stock the filters ect for the Merlin?

[Andrews_Water]

Hi,

Yes, we stock the integral replacement carbon prefilters (Part No 1237460) and membranes (Part No 1238342) for the Merlin, but they aren't yet on our site, as they shouldn't be needed for some time.  The postfilter (Part No 1244746) which comes with the machine is unnecessary for window cleaning, and needn't be fitted. 

Tomorrow we should know price and availability of Part No 1261345 - the Flush kit referred to in my earlier post, and I'll post details then.

Yours, Andrew

[sham33]

Hi, does the flush tank fit in the pre filter housing on the merlin?

[Andrews_Water]

Hi,

No, it plugs into the manifold, in the connection specially designed for it, that you will have plugged at the moment.  What could be easier ?

Andrew

[Andrews_Water]

Hi,

Now have flush tanks in stock - not the ones from GE (which in our opinion are too dear), but locally sourced @ £45 + £13 carriage plus VAT.  They can be ordered on-line at http://www.andwat.co.uk/acatalog/Reverse_osmosis_units.html

Yours, Andrew