diggity
Member
Seeking some advice from the good folks on this forum. We have been suffering with high iron ever since we built our house 10 years ago. Our water is pretty lousy: 15-20 ppm or so of iron, 50 grains of hardness, pH of 6.5, manganese is around 3 ppm. Fortunately we don't have any problems with metals, pollutants, or bacteria (although there is a mild amount of iron reducing bacteria).
We have a large Kinetico dual softener for the hardness and iron. I know that softeners are not usually the tool of choice for iron, but to its credit, it knocks down MOST of the iron, bringing it from 15-20 ppm down to probably 1-2 ppm or so. Unfortunately, of course, that is not low enough, and we get staining on fixtures etc.
We're finally going to throw some money at it and re-engineer things a bit. I'm in the process of fixing the pH (we actually have a calcite neutralizer which Kinetico said we didn't need a few years back, so they put it in bypass. Recent tests have shown the pH at around 6.5, so we clearly do need it. So I'm adding more calcite and putting it back in service).
As for the iron filter, I'm leaning toward peroxide injection in front of a filox type filter. I know I could inject chlorine instead, but I'm not a fan of chlorine for several reasons.
So I have a question as to whether the peroxide and filox should go in front of the softener, or after the softener. So in other words:
Acid Neutralizer -> peroxide injection -> contact tank -> filox filter -> catalytic carbon -> softener
-or-
Acid neutralizer -> softener -> peroxide injection -> contact tank -> filox filter -> catalytic carbon
I know typical recommendation is to put iron removal before the softener, but I'm a little worried that if any ferric iron breaks through, it could foul the softener. Any advice appreciated - thanks in advance!
We have a large Kinetico dual softener for the hardness and iron. I know that softeners are not usually the tool of choice for iron, but to its credit, it knocks down MOST of the iron, bringing it from 15-20 ppm down to probably 1-2 ppm or so. Unfortunately, of course, that is not low enough, and we get staining on fixtures etc.
We're finally going to throw some money at it and re-engineer things a bit. I'm in the process of fixing the pH (we actually have a calcite neutralizer which Kinetico said we didn't need a few years back, so they put it in bypass. Recent tests have shown the pH at around 6.5, so we clearly do need it. So I'm adding more calcite and putting it back in service).
As for the iron filter, I'm leaning toward peroxide injection in front of a filox type filter. I know I could inject chlorine instead, but I'm not a fan of chlorine for several reasons.
So I have a question as to whether the peroxide and filox should go in front of the softener, or after the softener. So in other words:
Acid Neutralizer -> peroxide injection -> contact tank -> filox filter -> catalytic carbon -> softener
-or-
Acid neutralizer -> softener -> peroxide injection -> contact tank -> filox filter -> catalytic carbon
I know typical recommendation is to put iron removal before the softener, but I'm a little worried that if any ferric iron breaks through, it could foul the softener. Any advice appreciated - thanks in advance!