[StirCrazy]

all are pretty much the same and very generic. stay away from calgon ro systems, they are a different design and you have to use there filters.

the ones we use are standard 10X3 filters and down filmtec membrains, the difference between companies come in the accesories they offer, the stickers or paint they put on it or the claims they make.

stay away from anyone claiming to not have any waist.. a dow filmtec membrain is designed to have a reject rate of 4 to 1, so for every gal of good water made you are rejecting 4 gal of water. this ensures the surface of the membrain is properly flushed and kept free of buildup. you can reduce this to 2 to 1 as I used to but then back flushing becomes very important and required more often and for longer periods to flush the membrain. failure to keep the membrain "clean" results in a lower life span.

I would recomend looking for the cheepest set up you can find that has at least three canisters and one RO housing, and a PSI guage (not that important as the companies use garbage ones anyways.. and a backflushing atachment. (although all a back flushing atachment is is a bypass for the flow restrictor so it realy isn't a back flushing per say but a removal of the restriction which allows full flow accross the face of the membrain)

you also want to make sure they advertise they use dow filmtec membrains and not rebranded garbage.. if they say they use there own membrain shop somewhere else.

for sizing you want to figure out you average usage per day and multiply it by 4. I go even bigger but remember they are rated under ideal conditions in a 24 hour period so a 25 gpd membrain will take 5 hours to make 5 gal (aprox) where a 100 gps will make 5 gal in little over and hour. so as a min I would recomend a 100gpd.


Steve