Nuvo H2o

Total scam.

This is overkill for cooler water filtering.⇓

Lyn,

The lady said she wanted to use the system to " condition" her homes water supply, I.e. water heater, washing machine, faucets, toilets, drinking water, shower, etc. And the Swamp Cooler water supply

Sorry, I should have been more specific.

Tony

Wow, I need to be more specific about being specific.

When I said " condition" , what I really meant was to say soften, like a water softener, just without using salt.

Thanks for letting me correct myself.

OK.

That's not something I claim even a casual knowledge of.

My experience is in process water filtration.

Never had a water softener.

You can't soften water without using salt! Softening is about swapping the precipitable species with sodium chloride.

Find out if you if these units work like a nanofilter: They take water to a charcoal filter to remove larger particles, and remove chlorine, then there is a prefilter, and finally a nanofilter cartridge (like on home RO system). It could be the middle housing is also dissolving citric acid as a chelating agent for water scale minerals like calcium and magnesium. If all this is present, it might be worth the value shown, otherwise, I am not too sure it is worth it.

Nanofilters are highly efficient at softening without salt, and typically need no booster pump, because these operate at reasonably low pressure. There still is three connections: (1) feed, (2) product (permeate), and (3) concentrate (still contains most of the salt, and all of the hardness minerals.

Recovery is limited for a single element in a single cartridge, so there might be 1 gallon wasted for every gallon of soft water recovered, or it might be better than that.

I have been doing some online research. Here some things.

A. Where is the housing/cartridge was sourced from ? I went to Ali baba and tried different keyword combinations, but all could see were your typical clear, white, blue housings with pressure/non pressure relief tops. I have a feeling that the housing may be proprietary item.

B. I looked at pentair/pentek and applied membrane and most of their systems use plumbed ball or gate valves to create a shut-off or a bypass.

C. I read several reviews where people needed spare parts and the people were told that only complete assemblies were available.

D. I did a BBB search and saw where nuvo is located in kaysville, Utah. Incorporated in Az in 2010. Odd that is not on their website.

I need to do more research.

I checked out the NUVO H2O web site, and while most of the claims on the web site are basically true, I saw one error in their explanation of pH and how lowering the affects the concentration of hydrogen ions. They seemed to claim that a change from pH 7.9 to 7.4 somehow decreases H+ concentration, but this is patently wrong.

pH = -log [H+], so clearly if pH decreases this means an increase in the concentration of hydrogen ions. If they introduce sufficient citric acid in the cartridge to reduce pH this will have an effect on the Langelier Saturation Index, thus scale forming tendency would be reduced. At the same time, there would be the addition of citrate to the water that can chelate the hardness ions and/or sequester them to further reduce scale tendency.

The drawback to this form of water treatment is that the citric acid supply will go away, and has to be re-supplied on time/water usage to keep the system effective at all.

Some areas have high levels of dissolved silica (especially where well water is being used). Most surface waters are fairly low in silica. This makes the well-known scaly deposit on the bottom of ice cube trays. Chelant will not have any appreciable effect on silica deposits.

I would offer the client a nanofiltration system as an alternative for their evap cooler.

reduction of PH, its probably removing calcium...

when they start adding to neutralize, imo, it's beginning to sound like sanitation waste disposal procedures before releasing down the sewers.

Softening water requires replacement of Mg++ and/or Ca++ ions with Na+ ions. typically using Sodium Chloride in some sort of packed bed system on zeolites, such as in a standard home water softener. Reverse Osmosis (RO) units (such as those used on small yachts or cruise ships are also available and use medium pressure pumps and selective diaphragms to separate the hard water ions (Ca++ and MG++ in the raw water into a pure water stream and a waste water stream containing the hard water salts. The later systems are generally more expensive, however, I have personally prefer my drinking water and house hold water to be un-softened for several reasons; soft water always feels slimy to me and it adds sodium to the water which is not especially good if you are required to be on a no-salt diet for medical reasons.

It does, however, eliminate hard water deposits. This can be good (or bad) depending on your home's internal plumbing. Those salts can help seal minor leakages.

I have always thought of 'softening' as reducing hardness. As such, it would seem replacement with sodium would not be required, so long as magnesium and calcium ions were reduced.

Your comment is ambiguous as to RO, are you saying it does or does not result in softer water, i.e., is or is not qualified as softening?

RO rejects all ions in water to a high extent, for example, in a power plant, we may use a two-pass RO to remove up to 99.99% of all ions, but even that is not enough, and we will resort to even further treatment, such as a mixed bed ion exchange or continuous electro-deionization unit to get the water up to 99.999%, or 99.9999% pure.

Sodium rejection for a typical RO membrane might be as high as 99.7%, and for calcium it might reject 99.9%. Industrial systems are arrays of up to about six membranes of 40" length in one vessel, several vessels in parallel, with the brine from the first set of vessels staged to another set of vessels, such as a 4:2 vessel array that could recover up to 80% of the water (depends on how well the water is treated upstream of the RO). Design of these systems has progressed to the point that different membranes are placed on the inlet end of the vessels from the ones on the discharge end of the vessel to balance water flux rate through the membranes to appropriate values. Flux (gallons/m²-day) is usually constrained based on the particle content of the water.

What about steam distillation for making "pure" water?

FYI, Orange County, CA uses a multi-stage RO system to make their waste water into tap water.

We have a condo in OC and you would think the water wouldn't leave too many hard water spots. The water here is harder than at out house!

In Soft water regions, people have a tendency to get more heart attacks and some bone disorders, which is why my father always left the kitchen supply, where people might drink from "un-softened" to coin a phrase.

The amount of salt added, in a correctly running softener, is really tiny, less than that in some of the bottled waters around, as the rest of the salt sitting on the resin is washed away down the drain, but it is still there....simply don't worry about it! Normal foodstuffs often contain trace amounts of salt anyway....

When washing anything in softened water, including clothes and crockery, the normally available "soaps" and detergents from the supermarket are simply "balanced" for hard water and contain chemicals to combat these effects.

Having hard water on your skin, leaves it "rough", so washing with soft, till you get used to using only tiny amounts of soap, will feel slimy.....

Good water softening companies also sell special soaps and detergents, but without those chemicals as they are not needed, so that the amounts of soap and detergent needed for actual cleanliness are tiny in comparison, this seriously reduces that "slimy" feel.....and saves you money.

Also, clothes tend to not get bleached out as quickly, retaining colour and form better....my Mother loved its effects on her washing....as well as on her pocket book!!!

But as I said, do drink hard water, I find it tastes far better and is far healthier too....

On RN ships, we made our fresh water using various forms of evaporation, so I had years of experience in how to live with soft water!!! We only got hard water when the tanks were filled in harbour from the local water mains.....

Excellent facts on the benefits of soft water.

Ion exchange water softening systems are easily switched over to potassium chloride in households where sodium is a major concern. Nanofiltration softens the water without adding any salt. It is simply based on a difference in the ion transport coefficients for Calcium and Magnesium than for sodium and potassium, as applied to a semi-permeable membrane.

For such things as showering, evaporative coolers, washing clothing, washing dishes, I would prefer the softened water, however for drinking, RO water is preferred. One gets all the minerals they need from condiments and from minerals already contained in food. Any further concerns can be addressed by taking mineral supplements as needed to maintain a healthy electrolyte balance in the blood plasma and cells.

RO water will not dissolve your teeth, any more than rain water would.

You beat me to the answer. I've recommended potassium chloride to people who have high blood pressure.

Chelation with citric acid is a feasible way to soften hard water without using salt.

And you're correct about RO water for drinking! Ditto for the benefits of soft water.

GA to you! Good job!

I totally agree.

My Father, after he retired in 1970, and sold his electrical contracting business, took on a small, but ailing, water softener business, and pulled its "nuts" out of the fire....

The make was I believe American and was called Lynsey if I remember correctly.

They cost quite a lot, but the ONLY running costs was to fill up with pelleted salt from time to time.

Everything else was completely automatic!!

This appears to be them today in the USA:-

Lindsay water conditioning USA

Certainly paying for an expensive cartridge does seem to be a backward step after those units he sold in the 1970's.....

As using common salt, the resin particles can be cleaned/reversed back to full working order and only need to be replaced every 10 years or so if I remember clearly. As they wear out quite slowly and I would fully expect modern resins to be far better than those of 40 years ago, and they were a massive advancement on the old "green sand" used previously......

I pay here about $30 for a 25 Kg bag of these salt pellets for our W.U.M. (washing up machine!) and it lasts around 5 years as the large pellets take far longer to eventually pass through the salt sieve than the salt sold in Kilogram packets in stores!!!

Tell the lady to look around carefully before buying, as the running costs for the $728 one sound simply awful from the infos supplied......to be avoided like the plague....

Quite extraordinary expense to save a $20 pump I think.

You are right.

Also, there are small portable (camping?) softeners around, for small amounts of money, that could be installed just to supply those units!!

See here for RVs for instance:-

Best-portable-water-softener-reviews

A water softener pays for itself in other ways. It reduces wear on appliances and water heaters, you also use less soap in all applications and you use less sugar for sweetening, you use less cool aid mix and your ouchees heal faster and reduces wear on your clothes, so they last longer. So if you were to tally up the amount of soap and sugar you use in a year to using 1/4 of what you normally use, you might find yourself saving money and saving money on the unplanned costs such as appliances breaking due to hard water damage.

Really? Ouchees heel faster?? Water heaters in my experience generally give up all about the same time whether soft or hard water is heated. Other factors play a role here.

Water heaters in my experience generally give up all about the same time

Yes, about 2-6 weeks after the warranty expires. And that is on hard water and soft.

Who every is that statistician these water heater manufacturer hired, sure is good.

Yep. They are. I think there must a slow-dissolving tablet that finally gives way about that long after warranty period.

"...about 2-6 weeks after the warranty expires."

Lucked out on my last one, I beat the statisticians by about several months (had the original install documentation)

Auto batteries, lawn mowers, weed eaters and water heaters all get the date of purchase written on them with a permanent marker when I buy them.

We get a lot of years from our water heaters (tank type). Here's the secret! Shhhh. At the top of the unit, there's an anode rod. Change the anode rod about once every 7 years (if you have hard water, do it a couple years sooner). How do do it?

1. Turn off the water inlet line (valve at the top of water heater cold inlet line). Open up a few faucets (hot side only - don't put it on warm). Then hook up a garden hose to the drain valve near the bottom of the tank. Twist the valve - make sure the hose is dumping the water in a place that's okay to have hot water dumped - not in the flower bed! When about 2/3 to 3/4 is drained out, remove the anode rod (it's at the top of the the water heater - usually a large bolt, about 1 1/16 inch 6 point socket works great! Put it on a long breaker bar - have someone hold the water heater tank from turning and take the bolt off. One brand puts the anode rod under either the inlet or outlet line. You may need to tip the water heater to get clearance to pull the anode rod out. If there's a lot of "meat" on the anode rod, I'd reinstall it. If it's pretty thin, replace it with a segmented anode rod. This way, you don't need to tip the heater to get clearance above the unit to install the new rod.

The longer warranty water heaters have two anode rods. Many are 15 year warranty units.

The anode rod's purpose is to keep the water heater from eating up the tank - electrolytice effect. Once the anode rod is gone, the water heater tank will dissolve very quickly.

Change the anode rod about once every 7 years (if you have hard water, do it a couple years sooner).

Good advice.

When I was replacing my dads heating element, before the tank went, the condition of that element should have been my first clue. My excuse I was only 17 at the time.

3 years ago, I had to replace my girlfriends gas water heater. 2 months out of warranty.

I think I'll check it in a year or two.

Another way to check is to look at the galvanized nipples (some plumbers use them) on the water inlet and outlet. I've seen them show signs of corrosion (white crusty stuff), right around the time the tank goes.

Most times, plumbers use copper or brass nipples and then hook up flexible copper or stainless mesh hoses. Those don't show signs of corrosion.

Another tip - I use a Sharpie and write the installation date on the tank. I then put a date five years down the line for the inspection of the anode rod.

One final tip - use teflon paste on the threads of the anode rod. It would be wise to do it on a new install as well (remove the anode rode, put some teflon paste on and reinstall the rod). Better yet, if there's a height clearance problem, install a segmented anode rod in place of the solid one. When it's time to check the anode rod, it'll be much easier.

Curious.

Why paste instead of tape; better performance or just cheaper?

From my experience, paste Teflon works better than tape on a pipe connection where there is mechanical vibration or very high or very low temperatures. Depending on your application, Teflon based pastes of different formulations, including those that will dry or stay semi-dry should be used. Or a paste for mating different materials, such as abs to copper or PVC to aluminum, etc.

Think of using the correct paste as a time saver as well as a potential damage prevention, you use the wrong paste, then you got to disassemble the connection and start over and if the fluid leaks, it may cause damage to other structures as well as present a hazardous condition.

I have 3 different types of paste in my inventory, although I use a paste such as, " Harvey's TFE paste, white, slow setting, part # 023030, most often.

You posted:-

One final tip - use teflon paste on the threads of the anode rod. It would be wise to do it on a new install as well (remove the anode rode, put some teflon paste on and reinstall the rod).

Why is this needed and what am I missing?

Thanks for your answer.

Teflon paste on threads helps two ways: first, because it has lubricating properties, it makes it easier to tighten a fitting and secondly, because it has lubricating properties it makes it easier to remove after its been connected for an extended period of time.

Paste is more forgiving - if you over tighten it you can back off a bit. Never had much luck with tape in that situation..... but then again I'm not a pipe fitter.

Tony said it best. Teflon paste works better than teflon tape in a number of ways.

And the reason I remove the anode rod, put some paste on and reinstall is to make sure it was done the right way. That makes it easier to remove years down the line. also, if the ceiling in the water heater closet is low (can't get a solid anode rod out), then I put a segmented one in. I don't have to tip the heater to get the old one out.

Plenty of info and all the parts you need from these guys. http://waterheaterrescue.com/

Good point!

Depending on the brand, some have a combination hot water out/anode rod.

A little more complicated, but still doable.

Hmmm, so remove offending ions with a water treatment system in part to extend the life of things like a water heater...

...only to have a sacrificial anode add stuff back in ..

... to extend the life of the hot water heater.

.

I don't know what material hot water heater use for sacrificial anodes. Zinc or aluminum probably would not be good choices due to passivation at high temperatures and low chlorides respectively.

Magnesium would probably work.....but isn't that one of the main culprits that brought about the desire to soften in the first place?

Zinc or magnesium, or even combination anodes to not contribute sufficient ionic content to the water to be a hazard to persons who might be in contact with the water.

Soft water is simply less corrosive than hard water due to a much reduced tendency for advancement of under deposit corrosion (that can become a runaway issue).

I have a working familiarity with water chemistry and corrosions. I wasn't suggesting the magnesium added would be cause for health concern.

I was merely noting that hard water deposits from the hot side might still be problematic even though the water upstream had been 'softened'. Hardly 'off topic'.

There might be very thin "egg-shell" scale from zinc interacting with low levels of phosphate that can be present (mostly in surface sourced water). I see this as more of a corrosion inhibitor for iron pipes, but not real concern as to causing problems anywhere in the downstream system.

Thank you for your responses.

I suspect magnesium is probably what is typically used (if anyone knows for certain, that would be great). Zinc passivates in higher temp water, interfering with utility as a sacrificial anode. Aluminum passivates similarly in the presence of chlorides...found in abundance in tap water.

Yes, magnesium is used quite often, but I've also seen aluminum/zinc as well.

Total scam...

..."The nuvoH2O claims to produce softer water by using citric acid rather than sodium. However, experts in water technology say getting softer water from a salt-free system is impossible; the only way to soften water is to use sodium. A salt-free system like nuvoH2O produces conditioned, not softened, water.

While a small percentage of users say they see some improvement in scale deposits, or say their water seems to taste or rinse better after installing the NuvoH2O, the majority are disappointed, saying the Nuvo does not even come close to living up to its claims. In addition, plenty of experts point out that, except for one study that was sponsored by Nuvo, there is no independent, third party testing to back up the claims made by the company. We saw a few test results posted by owners who tested their water "before and after" NuvoH2O and found no discernable difference in their water.

Those who are most satisfied seem to be homeowners who don't have very hard water to begin with and who primarily want to control scaling. Even then, many say, you need to change the cartridge more frequently than the recommended every six months -- most say three months is better for optimum de-scaling. Unfortunately, that can add up. The base price of the basic NuvoH2O system is $650, and replacement cartridges are around $100. The reason that most people try the Nuvo in the first place is because water softeners are so pricey -- they can run in the thousands of dollars -- but if you have to replace cartridges that frequently your costs will add up quickly, and you still won't have a water softener."...

http://www.consumersearch.com/as-seen-on-tv/nuvoh2o-review

https://www.amazon.com/Nuvo-DPHB-Water-Softener-System/dp/B0042A8HFY

Con.

No MSDS? Forgot, now they're called SDS.

I believe that all systems such as cooling towers and swamp coolers need an automatic blow down to keep conductivity and dissolved and suspended solids within specs. There is no magical " cure or fix ". A lot of plants use DI water to avoid mineral deposits. Very expensive initially .... but probably very cost effective in the long run.

I never heard of an automatic blow down for a swamp cooler. Please elaborate.

Automatic B/D's are commonly used on Cooling towers and boilers - they use a sensor that measures conductivity - when it gets too high a valve opens to dump some of the mineralized water then the level control opens up and adds fresh makeup water to the system restoring the proper level and water chemistry.

Yes, I understand what you mean. Only one company ( that sells a cooler here, / Breeze Air ) has this type of sensor in the cooler water basin. Upon receiving a signal to the controller, the solenoid operated purge valve dumps to drain ( I am not sure if the sensor constantly sends a conductivity signal to the microprocessor or if it is a timed operation) line.

The breeze air wholesale is about $900.00, the price point makes it difficult to sell.

Several of the Chinese made coolers also use that type of sensor, ( much lower cost, not sold here, must be something to do with tariffs/ protectionism/ political(?))

Australian domestic market systems use conductivity sensors as well.

The bleed off has been discontinued in this market area because of drought conditions.

In spite of idiot local politicians, the bleed off is good for flowers and shrubs (or cactus) that might be present. I am about tired of morons on soapboxes running the whole entire show for everyone, when they are clueless about reality.

Maybe not automatic, but a small tube is usually all that is needed to keep a steady trickle to the lawn. Some idiots used to mess with the basin overflow to achieve a blow-down, but that usually results in a messed up roof.

I've seen some swamp coolers dump a large amount of water. For instance, I hooked up a Durango system to one of my rentals and the bleed off dumped so much water, it was swampy in that area next to the house. I moved the drain to another part of the yard to keep the water from the foundation of the house.

Auto broker. Not to go off topic, you say that you hooked up a durango to one of your rentals.

Would i infer that you installed the cooler ? Is it a window unit ( side draft ) ? 1st or 2nd generation ?

1st generation requires blower housing to be removed to gain access to control module, 2nd generation requires front cover to be removed to gain access to control module.

When installed? Any operating issues ? I have installed 20 of these in the last 2 seasons.

Virtually no one in the whole world uses RO water on a cooling tower, unless they have no concern about the costs of the water used. Enough said.

DI water can be injected into gas turbine engines for more power and NOx control.

RO water might be useful on some evaporative coolers used on intake cooling of gas turbines. Too pure a water there can damage the fill material, and too much TDS will result in carry over issues into the gas turbine compressor.

Treated effluent is used by many large power generators, as this is generally plentiful, and quite effective in a cooling tower, as long as certain pretreatment cautions are maintained.

For what it's worth.

(depending on whether you are buying or selling)

http://www.pelicanwater.com/

I don't think the Pelican system gets rid of hardness in the water. It's more of a filtration system.

Like I said, for what its worth. I only read the online blurb and the price and then bought a regular softener. For that money I can buy quite a few regular softeners and for the cost of the tanks I can buy a lot of salt.

Whole house water filter system is the best solution . Whole house system filters will generally filter down to the five micron level. Why not lower? Two reasons — first, the liquid has likely already been through a treatment facility. Second — filtering down to the sub-micron level is going to slow down water flow. Ten gallons per minute is about standard for the filters we review here while half a gallon a minute is considered high speed for 0.1 micron whole house filters.

All that means this — if you’re looking to get rid of absolutely everything, youmay need to run more than one filter — a whole house system to get most of the stuff out, then additional filters at each faucet to finish the work. Remember, your whole house filter will be filtering the supply for your water heater, toilet, washing machine, and other stuff. You may not need to get that liquid super clean. But for your drinking water? Might wanna tighten that up a bit.

One final note about stages of filtration: generally the more stages you have, the better it is going to be. However, a lot of that will depend on how each stage functions and what it does exactly. Multiple stages will usually filter out progressively smaller particulates as the supply flows from filter to filter. In theory, that is a more effective plan, but sometimes a single stage filter can do a better job than multiple stages. It all depends on the makeup of the filters themselves. The main point – don’t get bogged down in searching for the highest number of stages. Instead, focus on what they do and what they get rid of.

"....filter down to the five micron level. Why not lower? Two reasons — first, the liquid has likely already been through a treatment facility...."

.

That first reason seems like a non sequitur.

Are you a water expert? So ten five micron filters are better than one? Really?

Especially when the lead is not in particle form, but is actually a solute, or even as a colloid. Surely you know what colloids are...