Reverse Osmosis system for machine shop

[Wish-I-Were-Fishn]

I'm wanting to install a reverse osmosis system for my CNC machine. The machine takes an initial fill of about 40 gallons and then requires topping off about 2-3 times per week of about 10 gallons per time.

I'm assuming I need a holding tank, but other then that I know absolutely nothing about them. Any recommendations?

[Cicada]

This may be irrelevant, but I work in an appliance store and we have problems with RO systems that have been hooked up to refrigerators. The reduce the water pressure so that the valve can't completely shut. Does you situation require a minimum amount of pressure?

[CAMAN]

Every shop I've ever worked at had deionizing equipment not reverse osmosis. Somehow deionizing prevents water from rusting equipment, lessens the amount of evaporation, and allows coolant to mix better. (So I have been told)

If you have a wire edm you definitely need deionized water.

[delcecchi]

As I recall, reverse osmosis is one way of deionizing water. There are other processes involving special resins that filter out ions.

[Eric Wettschreck]

The job of an RO is to remove dissolved solids. In a way it will de-ionize but not really. If DI water is what you want it will usually have an RO (to remove dissolved solids) then some type of ion exchange resin, depending on the ions left over from RO.

As a boilermaker, I do a bunch of this stuff for a living.

To help you out I'd have to know just how Ultra-Pure of water your machine requires, and how much, and the water quality of your incoming water. Or, hit me up with a PM and I can recommend a company and give you contact info. They're good at what they do.

One thing to remember with ultra-pure water, all the piping and fittings either need to be stainless steel or plastic. If it's copper, black iron, brass, etc it will erode.

[delcecchi]

Yep, boilers are one thing. My background was integrated circuits. They need really pure water.

There are a variety of ways of getting the stuff out of water. RO is one of them. Resin beds basically absorb the ions.

[jmd1]

so we put in a huge RO system for our cotton seed facility. It has 2 5000 gal tanks. One is for pure water one is for water that has all the junk and minerals in it. We create about 4 tanks of junk water to 1 tank of good.

Also we added a water softner to it, but the fact that we were using 4 pallets of salt per week put a damper the whole project.

Really look into the whole project, pull water samples to see what is actually in the water, work with someone who knows everything about RO systems. Good luck.

[Eric Wettschreck]

Yep, boilers are one thing. My background was integrated circuits. They need really pure water.

There are a variety of ways of getting the stuff out of water. RO is one of them. Resin beds basically absorb the ions.

Yes there are a variety of ways and this isn't the arguement the OP is looking for. By the way, resin beds don't absorb ions, they transfer them. I know quite well aboot integrated circuits and the Ultra pure water they need. I've built my share of systems that take care of just that...........including IBM in Rochester. High pressure boilers, depending on the system, need as pure of water as the electronic stuff you're used to dealing with. Right now I work with purified water systems, for a major pharm company, that injects that stuff into your body. Let's just say we make it cleaner than clean.

Anyhoo, to the OP,I sent you a PM with some contact info for a group of people that are very reputable in the field. Give them a ring. You have nothing to lose.

[Eric Wettschreck]

so we put in a huge RO system for our cotton seed facility. It has 2 5000 gal tanks. One is for pure water one is for water that has all the junk and minerals in it. We create about 4 tanks of junk water to 1 tank of good.

Also we added a water softner to it, but the fact that we were using 4 pallets of salt per week put a damper the whole project.

Really look into the whole project, pull water samples to see what is actually in the water, work with someone who knows everything about RO systems. Good luck.

I understand. I'm guessing the softener was added to remove the calcium and Mg prior to RO. It makes the RO work less. With the softener you'll have backwash/brine/slow/and fast rinse water that has to go somewhere. Then, when softened water hits the RO, you'll have a % of water that is seperated between permeate and reject. Depending on the quality of the feedwater it could very well be 4 to 1.

You hit the nail very much on the head when you said look into the whole project. Make sure feed water samples are taken and analyzed. Also, you really need to know the specs on water quality you need. This is a bit of a shark infested industry and there are many companies out there that will try to sell you what you need.

Example: you need 25 u/hmos water and a company will try to sell the stuff needed to make 18 M/ohm. This is overkill for the project.

[delcecchi]

That is good to know. Wasn't trying to diss you. I know they used a lot of DI water, but the fab in Rochester shut down quite a few years ago and some of the details are a little foggy. I also remember the resin stuff for the DI water, but that could easily have been pre-processing the stuff that the city sent us.