CR Spotless... is it worth it?

Want some feedback on the system... thinking of getting one this summer. Can I attach it to my water tank in my trailer?

I have a line that runs from the tank, through a screen filter, then to the pressure washer... I would like to attach it in btwn the screen filter and pressure washer. thanks

 

i would think that is a waste cause it is expensive to maintain(the crystals are only good for "cleaning" the water so long). i would get a cheap tank and fill it with the "cleaned" water and a pump to rinse the car, no real reason to use it anytime other than rinsing.

 

If you have a water tank Ive heard its a lot cheaper to buy the water from a car wash

 

what do you mean? cause they usually reclaim the water or something and it pumps a couple gal a min so for 5 bucks you have like 50 gal? or do you mean they already filter it or something?

 

To be honest I think it's very valuable on having this filter system and here why I think it's valuable.

I'm now detailing large fire trucks and can you imagine trying to dry a fire truck :shakehead: now can you imagine how many water spots you would have not having proper filtered whater, but that's just me.....now I do agree it's not cheap to maintain but it pays for it's self, just imagine your self rinsing off a vehicle under the sun (I'm sure you guys have all done that and experianced that) and trying to avoid those water spots, what happens when you miss a spot/area you get some water spots...now water spots are no biggie but I personaly I'm trying to reach perfection and I'll utelize any tool to help me reach my goal.

As for how long it lasts it all depends on how bad your water is, here in town I've been able to detail about 5 to 7 firetrucks so that's not too bad oh and keep in mind that most of the time my CR system sits there with water in it waiting to be used.

Well like I said just my opinion on the system, but I agree with FMINUS if you can get RO water from a car wash or just from any source at a reasonable price I would imagine it would be more economical.

 

They sell deionized water

 

Water Filtration:
a) de-ionized (DI) – is water that lacks common Cations (ones with positive charges, i.e. Na+ , Ca+, CU++ , Fe++ ) and Anions (ones with negative charges i.e. Cl-, Br-), so you are left with OH- and H30+ (effectively H20 and H+) this is achieved by passing the water through an Ion exchange resin. This is usually an organic polymer with a surface that simultaneously traps one type of ion, while releasing another, hence the name ion exchange; de-ionized water can still contain bacteria, endotoxins and organic compounds.

To provide spot-free vehicle rinsing and to remove hard water minerals, raw water is passed through a pre-cleaner and then through a cartridge that contains mixed bed resins, a Cation (sacrificial anode) and anion resins, the process is that through an exchange of mineral ions for sodium ions, mineral ions are attached to the resins. Once the resins are depleted, which can be checked with a total dissolved solids (TDS) meter, periodically they require recharging, and the most common material used is a salt bath (the same salt that’s used in a domestic water softener) . One of the advantages of DI water system is mineral free water and little to no wasted water –CR Spotless - CRSpotless.com - Wash, Rinse, and Walk Away
(See also CR Spotless De-ionized Water Filtration System, Total Dissolved Solids (TDS))

b) The CR Spotless DI100WM provides approximately 100 gallons of mineral-free, de-ionized water that will provide spot-free vehicle washing and remove hard water minerals, based on your water input quality. It consists of two 10-inch de-ionization housings that feature replaceable cartridges that simply slide into the watertight tubes. This unit can be mounted next to your hose bib and comes with pre-drilled mounting holes.

Using a cation/anion mixture; you get twice the filter life than the mixed bed which comes with the unit. The cationic resin goes in one chamber and the anion resin goes in the other. You won't get the 0 PPM reading that you would get with the mixed bed, but it'll be around 5 PPM (spotless if less than, 25-30PPM)

Input TDS Level Expected Yield
50 PPM 1600 gallons
100 PPM 800 gallons
200 PPM 400 gallons
400 PPM 200 gallons

The unit has a water purity indicator light that, when plugged into any normal (I would advice the use of a Ground fault indicator AC outlet) TFI illuminates when the de-ionization resin is still active, when the light no longer activates, it's time to replace the resin. (Includes two 10-inch cartridges, unit weight 30 Lbs.
CR Spotless http://www.crspotless.com/index

Operating costs formula -
Operating costs = 235,000 / TDS * 0.33 cubic feet of resin = Gallons
Cost of refill / Gallons = Final cost of de-ionized water
Using the above formula - hard water area with a total dissolved solids (TDD) meter reading of 550 PPM = (235,000/550) 0.33 cubic feet of resin = 141 gallons. Approximate cost of refill $90, de-ionized water costs me about 65 cents per gallon. Average final rinse 3-5 gallons

The EPA Secondary Regulations advise a maximum contamination level (MCL) of 500mg/liter (500 parts per million (PPM) for total dissolved solids (TDS). Numerous water supplies exceed this level.

For those of you who are wondering how hard the water in your area is, here's a general map you can use - What Is My Water Hardness? - United States Water Hardness Map, What is my water hardness?

Caution- if you use this filter on its own in a hard water area you may get as few as 5 washes before the filter becomes exhausted, if used in combination with a 30-TDS green filter up to 30 washes can be expected in hard water areas and up to 90 washes in softer water areas.

 

See I didn't think you could use salt for Demineralized systems. FMINUS tried this and it didn't work and I checked with our chemist and was told the following: (this was posted in this thread http:/http://www.detailingbliss.com/forum/f39/recharging-cr-665.html)

OK got some very good info from our chemist today. First he said that many people get confused with deionized water and soft water. Soft water filtration systems take calcium out of the water by exchanging the sodium for calcium since it's easier to lose the sodium and pick up the calcium. To recharge these systems you use a very strong salt water solution. When you flush these systems with salt water and the solution is so strong that now the sodium overpowers the calcium and attaches and the calcium can be flushed out and you are right back where you started. This is what FMINUS tried.

Deionized water has actually used resin beads to take out cations (magnesium,calcium,iron,etc.) and anions (silica) out of the water and demineralize it. It exchanges these cations and anions for Hydrogen and OH or HOH (can't remember exactly which one he said) ions. This demineralizes the water and thus gives you "pure water". This water he said would have very good cleaning abilities and would also give you spot free drying because all minerals have been removed and spots are caused by the evaporation of water and minerals left behind. He said he could see how demineralized water would be extremely beneficial to all aspects of detailing. He said the only negative about demin water would be that over time it can be corrosive. However for that to happen he said you would basically have to soak a car in a pool of demin water for about a year. Don't think anyone here is doing that! As far as being counterproductive to the LSP since the water cleans so well he said no way.

He also gave a very good explanation of TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) to me because I really didn't understand this that much. He said that what makes the TDS go up on your CR system is completely dependent on the water that is going in. For example using only tap water would cause the TDS reading to escalate at a lower pace than if one was using well water that has a lot higher solids count. So when someone like FMINUS gets 8 washes out of his system before the TDS reading gets high enough to change the resins Nica might get more or less depending on the solids count that is going into his system. I asked if you could use another filter to help and he said it would not be beneficial. He said think of it like putting sugar in your tea and stirring it up. The sugar dissolves (this would be like the solids in your water that your CR system is removing), but if you continue to put sugar in, at some point it will not dissolve into the water and just lay out in the bottom. Another filter would get rid of that sugar but the sugar that had already dissolved would not be removed which is really what you want out in the first place.

Now for regeneration. He said that these systems could be regenerated at home but it would take using Sulphuric Acid and Caustic. The Acid would be used to regenerate the beads that remove cations and the caustic would be used to regenerate the beads that remove anions. The process would work if the beads were in seperate canisters. I'm not sure if that is how the CR system works but would think so. Nica and FMINUS do you have different resins in each canister or are they mixed resin canisters? If they are seperate you would put a 30% solution of Sulphuric Acid in the cation one and a 30% solution of Caustic in the anion one. Let them sit for about 1 hour and then thouroughly rinse. This process would cause the beads to be regenerated thus making it much easier for them to take on the cations and anions again and your TDS reading would drop. He did say that your best bet for regeneration would probably be to find a power plant that does it's own regeneration and find someone there that would be willing to do it . If you have a mixed resin canister then the process would be much more difficult as a special process is used for this and doing it on your own would not be very possible.
Hope this info is helpful on some level as I really learned a lot about the science behind spotless systems!

 

Good info- Thanks ( I got the recharge (salt) info from CRS) that'll teach me to check everything I'm told even by the chemist/supplier

 

Wolf- The 2 tanks are the same resin.

TOGWT- Whats this 30-TDS green filter you speak of?

 

Yeah that really makes it so you can't recharge them your self. You would have to have seperate resins in each tank so you would know which one got Acid and which got NAOH.

 

I get filtered water from the carwash... not DI water, but soft like 1-5 ppm. but in texas it gets hot and humid in the summer and I don't like to setup my tent... so if the PPM is that low, then I should get alot of use from the machine right?

 

Whats going to be the difference?

 

In theory the resins should last you longer becuase your using filtered water with 1 - 5PPM but to be honest I have no hard proof to back that up. I'm just using logic, I mean the life of the resins is dependend on how hard/bad the watter is, if your getting water that has been filtered down already and with only 1-5PPM well that "should" really help the resins last longer as they don't need to clean as much but like I said that's just me using my comonsense :shrug:

 

Correct. If you start with water that is that clean, your media should last a very long time. I think it's on their website, a chart showing how much clean water you will get based on how hard the input water is. The chart won't go down that low, but it will give you an idea.

 

hhhmmmm.... i'm just having a hard time justifying the cost in my head. When i use my foam gun in the summer, i usually add a couple cap fulls of ONR to help the spotting. I just wish the had a magic tablet you could drop into water to clean it!!!

 

Im still confused as to what the difference would be from you getting filtered water which is 1-5 ppm and using that water plus the CR.

 

Just because water is filtered doesnt mean it's deionized. It could just be filtered to remove some solids but doesnt mean there has been an exchange of molecules like goes on in the CR system

 

So basically ppm isnt the only thing that matters, so what else matters? Drinking water is one thing, but water to wash cars with. What else needs to be done to it, is getting the ppm down to ~5 not good enough?

 

I think they are actually going for TDS or total dissolved solids. PPM is just parts per million of something. To keep from spotting you have to demineralize the water and that is done through ion exchange. Cations and Anions are exchanged for hydrogen and OH ions I believe. This makes pure water and prevents spotting because nothing is left behind when the water evaporates.