Aqua Reef 6 stage 100gpd ? too good to be true!?

Hi guys this sounds like an amazing deal. From what I have heard most of these systems are all the same basic parts and they are just marketed different.
Does this look like a good one!?
Aqua Reef RO DI Reverse Osmosis Water Filtration System - eBay (item 170501347854 end time Jun-23-10 14:40:34 PDT)

 

Its a very low end system, worth about what they are asking. With RO/DI you really do get what you pay for almost every time, if it seems too good to be true you can almost bet it is.

Looking at that system I can point out several things you want to avoid. For one the horizontal DI filters are very poor performers, they channel and short circuit so all water and resin do not come into contact with each other. You want only a full size 10" vertical canister with a 10" refillable cartridge inside which flows from the bottom up so all resin is used.
Next it uses a 5 micron prefilter. This is bad since everything up to and including 5 microns is going to pass through and foul or plug your carbon pores which adsorb the chlorine. Worse than that is the granular carbon which breaks down and actually adds TDS to the water, did you know granular activated carbon only lasts about 300 total gallons before it is exhausted, thats 60 treated gallons and 240 waste gallons at the normal 4:1 waste ratio. Then to top it off they include a 5 micron carbon block which does a very poor job of prortecting the RO membrane again because its too coarse andsecond because it only has a chlorine capacity of about 1500-3000 total gallons if its of the quality I believe it to be, again thats only 300 to 600 treated gallons and 1200 to 2400 waste gallons. What you do want is a single solid carbon block in 0.5 to 0.6 micron range such as the Matrikx+1 from KX Carbon good for 20,000 total gallons of water or 4000 treated gallons and 16.000 waste gallons at 4:1. Huge difference in quality and performance and you only want and need one carbon since two can cause additional pressure drop to the membrane.
Notice thye do not tell you who makes the RO membrane? Or any of the filters for that matter or what any of them are rated for. I always shy away from a product that the vendor is not proud enough of to tell you what it is.

Some reputable vendors and manufacturers or true reef quality systems I would suggest looking at include:

SpectraPure Customer Appreciation SALE! 20% - 50% off
Notice you can get the CSP-DI which includes a 0.5 micron absolute rated prefilter, 0.5 micron 20,000 gallon carbon block, a batch tested 90 GPD RO membrane, a full size vertical refillable DI with custom blended reef specific resin, a dual inline TDS meter and a inline pressure gauge for just a little more than the one you were looking at which does not include a single thing I mentioned.

www.buckeyefieldsupply.com
They have a 75 GPD Premium that is a great system, very similar to the above.

www.purelyh20.com
They also have their Optima series which include some very nice systems.

www.melevsreef.com
Marc is a reef hobbyist himself and builds a nice system.

www.bulkreefsupply.com
Again they have some nice systems.

www.airwaterice.com
Very popular vendor

Don't fall in to the "stages" trap like the ebay vendors want you to. Remember two cheap inefficient carbons don't even come close to one good quality carbon. Two inefficient low capacity horizontal DI's don't equal a single vertical 20 oz DI when plumbed properly. Stages don't mean a hill of beans, its what those stages contain that make the difference. For RO you need 3 stages and RO/DI 4 stages. If you want to improve upon that add a second vertical DI not some granular carbon.

 

Would you say even the economy 4 stage model from BRS is better then it?
75 GPD RO/DI 4 Stage Economy System - English

 

Yes but you will still need a TDS meter and pressure gauge at a minimum to tell if the system is working or not. Add another $33 for those and now you are at the cost of the much much better CSP-DI which includes the treated and tested 90 GPD membrane, 0.5 micron absolute rated prefilter, 0.5 micron carbon block, capillary tube flow restrictor and best of all SilicaBuster DI resin. Its an easy choice to me.

Remember, if the prefilter and carbon block are doing their job much of the contaminats never reach the membrane making it perform better and last longer, which in turn makes the DI perform better and last longer, both saving you money from day one. 0.5 microns, especially an absolute not norminal 0.5 microns beats 5.0 nominal microns every time.

 

I've got the dual DI horizontal cartridges and can attest to the channel effect mentioned by DesertRat. Definitely not ideal. Once my filters and resin are spent I will be upgrading and swapping out the dual horizontals to the 10" vertical cartridge mentioned as well. My dual DI's also sprung a very slight leak somewhere - even after carefully packing and using teflon on all the threads.

If I were to do it again, I would just go with the BRS system. You'll probably end up getting their prefilter/carbon blocks/DI Resin and eventually the membrane from them anyway since they're pretty much the best. Might as well get it all in one go around.

 

The Spectrapure system is much better than any of those mentioned and at a better price. remember, I said look at what the stages contain. An absolute rated 0.5 micron prefilter not a 5.0 micron nominal rated prefilter, a 0.5 micron 20,000 gallon carbon block not a 5 micron 6,000 gallon carbon block. A 90 GPD RO membrane that historically puts out better than 98% rejection rate due to its proprietary treatment and batch testing compared to a dry off the shelf 75 GPD rated at 96-98% rejection. Specially blended Silica removing DI resin hand blended the day the unit is built and shipped not off the shelf factory blended DI resin. A dual inline TDS meter vs no meter, an inline pressure gauge vs no pressure gauge etc.
Look at what you get for your money and how long the company building and selling the unit has been in business doing just waht they do, 25 years in Spectrapures case and in the same Arizona city that whole time in a brick and mortar storefront. You really do get what you pay for.