Indoor Brita PPM more than tapwater...?

[DarthMaul]

Hello,

I received my TDS meter today and I checked my tap water it was around 285 which i guess is a bit high but manageable.
However, I tested the brita water filter which is suppose to remove chlorine, calcium and other crap.... How the hell is it that i get a reading of 295 ppm with the Brita water? This really confused the hell out of me.... I will stop buying those stupid brita carts since it is clearly not doing anything to remove PPM rather adding more parts to it.....

Thanks

 

[ballzbeard]

First off, did you calibrate the meter? Second, how old is the Brita filter?

 

[briman]

Great call ballz! Max rep for that!

 

[DarthMaul]

First off, did you calibrate the meter? Second, how old is the Brita filter?

the PTS meter came out of the box and is precalibrated.
The brita filter is around 2 weeks old.

 

[Dark Matter]

Make sure you cleaned it before testing Britta filtered,water. There,may be residue on the still messing up your readings,also!

 

[Waira]

Hey Cyclos- this a pitch type filter? I think I know what's going on,...their filters have activated carbon and ion exchange resin beads... note the exchange part of that! The carbon attracts and adheres chlorine and certain metals to itself, but the resin beads behave differently,.. I don't which ions they're attracting, but when they do, whatever ion attaches itself to they displaces another more weakly bonded (preloaded) ion on it's surface...this is partly why the ppms aren't really dropping, and with a fresh filter extra ions might be shedding off..? ....This is how the old style water softeners work too, ...you know, the ones you needed to add salt to? Their resins beads attract Ca/Mg ions, displacing the more weakly bonded Na ions,.... the salt soln. is how the Na is recharged on the resin bead surfaces, by using an overwhelmingly salty solution, displacing the bonded Ca/Mg ions, with a kind of brute force chemistry going on there,... once rinsed, the equation is reset for fresh water to come in and get softened again by the usual exchange between Ca/Mg ions for Na ions,... this ends up making the soft water very high in Na content, and that's why it's bad to water anything with it, or use it for aquariums and the like,...Na build up will burn roots, mess with pH, etc.,.... ... now that said, I don't know what ions are exchanged/swapped with Brita's beads,... email and ask them, I'm curious too,... they're attracting metal ions for sure,...