Advice on pH filter

[sophosis]

Some backstory.. I recently purchased a home in an established neighborhood. Well water. After some time in the home, I started getting blue streaking from the tub faucet to the drain. I gathered that this was going to be copper related pretty quickly. Did some searching. Seems I've stumbled onto this world of water quality.

I bought a cheap water test kit from the hardware store and checked pH. Strips lowest pH color was 6.0, which is what the strip showed in my water. Bought some pool pH test strips.. same result. Bought a medical-use two-color pH test strip set with a low starting range of 4.0. Those strips showed my water to be below 5.5 pH. Bought a Hach 5B kit at the same time and I'm seeing about 2 gpg hardness.

Underhouse plumbing (crawlspace) is PEX. 1" at the balloon tank, reduced to 3/4" from there out. I can nearly fully stand in the crawlspace where the water comes into the house. The space is easily accessible. I need to take a tape measure with me, but ground to floor joists is right around 60" of space. I was thinking of putting the pH filter (and softener if I end up needing it) in the crawlspace.

Right now, it's just me in a home with 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths. I would like to size things for a family of four so the house is still in good shape, as far as water treatment goes, if I'm to sell the place later down the road.

I've been looking at the Fleck equipment on apluswater.org, for starters. 100% open to other/better suggestions. Not sure on what size tank I should be getting. I still need to try to measure gpm flow for the pump. I have the pump brand and model number, if those will be a good indicator for sizing. The other issue I had been pondering is for drainage, with a backflow model. There's a crawlspace water collection point not far from the water setup that has a 3" drain pipe going for some number of feet under ground out into the yard. Don't know if it would be a bad idea to attempt to use this for backflow drainage.

This ended up being long, but wanted to provide as much info as possible. I'll try to get any other info needed/requested.

Thanks!

 

[Reach4]

I won't be able to help you with treatment. I think you you should get a lab water test. I like kit60 from http://www.karlabs.com/watertestkit/

Whoever suggests a system will be able to make use of the info which is more accurate and complete than test strips.

It includes a couple bacterial tests, one of which seems to be very sensitive. You would want to sterilize the faucet you will draw your samples from. You might also consider sanitizing your well and plumbing system. http://www.moravecwaterwells.com/index.php/maintainance/disinfection-and-testing is more rigorous than what people usually do. With your pH, you won't need the vinegar.

When your new system is installed, it would be good to put PEX or CPVC before the acid neutralizer rather than copper.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[sophosis]

Just remembered the water report from the home inspection was delivered via email and not a paper print, so I can include those numbers now. I had no clue on water quality then, or I probably would've asked for the more comprehensive testing.

Coliform/E.Coli - Absent
Iron - 0.062 mg/L
Lead - 0.015 mg/L
Turbidity - 0.3 NTU
Nitrate - 0.90 mg/L
Nitrite - None

 

[ditttohead]

Wow, that is not a lot of information. A neutralizing system would be ideal. Your low hardness of 2 gpg is excellent but is also part of the cause of the low pH.

What is your exact height availability? This may be a problem with the dome hole tanks.

 

[Bannerman]

Depending on the depth and spacing of the floor joists, there maybe just enough space for the tank and control valve but as Dittohead mentioned, it maybe difficult to replenish the media through the tank's dome hole.
One option is to cut the basement floor and dig-out a small pit for the tank to sit in.

 

[sophosis]

In the area around the water tank, ground to floor joist is 65 inches. No concrete or flooring. Plastic covers the entire ground in the crawlspace.

 

[Reach4]

One option is to cut the basement floor and dig-out a small pit for the tank to sit in.

How about a new trapdoor above the filter?

 

[Bannerman]

While many tanks are 54" (+ top dome and base), depending on the tank capacity required, there are also some 44", 48" & 65" tanks. Adding to the overall height is the control valve which sits on top.

Since pH media is consumed, the tank should have a removable plug in the top dome, to permit the ease of periodically replenishing media. A 65" joist height maybe enough to allow adding media, it would probably be desirable to have additional space to the joists.

As it is not a concrete floor, it seems it maybe a dirt floor?
To gain some additional clearance for the tank, you could cut an 'X' opening in the plastic vapor barrier to dig a pit, just large enough to sink a plastic bucket or Rubbermaid type container as a vapor proof well for the tank to sit in. A well could be decided after the pH filter is in-place, particularly if connected with flexible lines.

 

[sophosis]

So well over two years later, I'm back to update the thread. Thanks for all the previous suggestions.

I got a filter with a Clack head a little while after starting this thread. A lot of things came up between then and now, so only just last month did I finally get it installed.

I installed it to the crawlspace where there's enough height for it to physically exist. I dug a hole through the vapor barrier and set the filter in a 5 gallon bucket. This dropped it below ground level another twelve inches or so while keeping enough of the bucket above ground to keep any flowing water that might get into the crawlspace out of the bucket. This left me just enough room to empty the calcite bags into the filter using the fill plug and funnel.

1" PEX to the filter, 3/4" out. With a friend who's much more familiar with water works, the backwash drain line we plumbed to go outside. I need to finish where this terminates. I was thinking either to a runoff ditch that runs nearby or into a dry well I could bury at a later time. Any thoughts here? I don't want to run into any plumbing code issues. I'm outside of any city limits, rural NC.

I'm thinking about adding a water softener, but I think I'll do a comprehensive water test before adding any more water quality products. The wife (one of the 'things' that popped up in the past two years) doesn't like the taste of the pH-adjusted water nearly to the point of nausea; she compares it to Evian bottled water. Hardness jumped to 9-10 gpg using the Hach test. Current pH is now about 7.25, up from 5.5 according to the medical test strips I'm using.

 

[Ryan Symons]

A 1.75 ph jump just from calcite is huge. I've never gotten that performance out of it in this area. Unfortunately if it's that low sodium hydroxide usually has to be used if you want to get it to 7.0. That stuff is nasty so it's a last resort at best.

 

[ditttohead]

We stock a lot of sodium hydroxide, it is actually fun to play with (in a safe and controlled environment, safety first.. PSA over). It is a very effective media for raising pH, also for degreasing, bathtub rings, floccing agent removal, removing anodizing from aluminum parts, membrane cleaning and it is a lot cheaper than most other chemical used for raising pH.

 

[Ryan Symons]

I totally agree but it's not the caustic that scares me. The end user isn't too bright sometimes and caustic can be harmful if not handled properly.

I never tried it for cleaning membranes. I've always used iron x, citric or muriatic acid. I'll put that on the to do list.

 

[ditttohead]

It is used for floc fouled membranes or bio fouling. Acid would typically be used for scaling or iron fouling.

Agreed, end user safety concerns need to be considered carefully. Then again, I like to eat citric acid...