Spotless Water Conversion

Does this system have brine with backwashing capability to clear the resin of hardness (calcium and magnesium) and refresh the resin or do you use the resin to exhaustion and then have to replace? If you could brine the resin and then backwash it, I don't see why you couldn't keep reusing the resin for years/100s of car washes. This is what water softeners do for houses. The resin for this shouldn't be any different.

If you have iron in your water, it could also be reducing the life of the resin as iron takes up capacity that would otherwise be used to collect hardness. Brine with citric acid is typically needed to clear softening resin of iron.

gsmith22 said:

Does this system have brine with backwashing capability to clear the resin of hardness (calcium and magnesium) and refresh the resin or do you use the resin to exhaustion and then have to replace? If you could brine the resin and then backwash it, I don't see why you couldn't keep reusing the resin for years/100s of car washes. This is what water softeners do for houses. The resin for this shouldn't be any different.

If you have iron in your water, it could also be reducing the life of the resin as iron takes up capacity that would otherwise be used to collect hardness. Brine with citric acid is typically needed to clear softening resin of iron.

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No. There is no backwash function at all... I have heard the resin can be refreshed, but it takes some pretty crazy chemicals to do it... But, I haven't given it much research as we do have quite a bit of iron in our water I think - at least at the hose bib that I work from (which is before our household water softener that uses salt).

All you need to do is soak the resin in salt water (brine) and after a sufficient enough soaking time, rinse the resin with clean water and it will have been refreshed for continued use. No "chemicals" needed. That is all the water softener is doing in your house plumbing and no reason it couldn't be done here too (although manually as the equipment doesn't have a backwashing valve like a house water softener). The attached paper (from Rohm and Hass) does a very good job explaining how and why water softeneing (which is specifically cation ion exchange) works. Most household water softeners last decades before having to replace the resin because it is continually refreshed when its capacity has been exhausted. I don't see why the resin in your car wash system couldn't also do the same thing.

Resin eventually looses its ability to function (after 1000s of use cycles) but we are talking decades of use for that to occur. I don't think unused resin suffers that fate.

just realized too, that you indicated the hose bib for your car washing tees off before the water softener. While it is generally a good idea to have outdoor bibs unsoftened (mostly for watering plants), it is also a good idea to have a softened water hose bib (maybe near the garage) specifically for cleaning cars. Then if you run a hose from that bibb through through your CR Spotless sytem and I guarantee that the resin in it will last a hell of a lot longer. Why? Because you are leaving your house system (with brine and backwashing) to do all the hard work with the CR Spotless system cleaning up any hardness "leakage". Read the paper on why there might be leakage. Otherwise, if your CR Spotless system is seeing raw well water, it better be sized and have the ability to brine/backwash just like your house system. Small plumbing mods are probably cheaper than continually buying resin.

Gsmith22 gave good advice. Use some of the salt you use in your softener to recharge the CR Spotless resin in a five gallon bucket. After soaking an hour or so, pour off the brine and add fresh, softened water to rinse the resin. Give it a couple of rinses. For long term use, add a hose bib connected to household soft water as gsmith22 recommended. Then use the CR Spotless system as a final polisher and your car will clean up better than it ever has.

gsmith22 said:

just realized too, that you indicated the hose bib for your car washing tees off before the water softener. While it is generally a good idea to have outdoor bibs unsoftened (mostly for watering plants), it is also a good idea to have a softened water hose bib (maybe near the garage) specifically for cleaning cars. Then if you run a hose from that bibb through through your CR Spotless sytem and I guarantee that the resin in it will last a hell of a lot longer. Why? Because you are leaving your house system (with brine and backwashing) to do all the hard work with the CR Spotless system cleaning up any hardness "leakage". Read the paper on why there might be leakage. Otherwise, if your CR Spotless system is seeing raw well water, it better be sized and have the ability to brine/backwash just like your house system. Small plumbing mods are probably cheaper than continually buying resin.

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Our house water softener uses salt... our RO system uses a cartridge with Ro Di resin... Most of these spotless car rinse setups use mixed bed de-ionizing resin. I assume that's different? I don't know my *** from a hole in the ground.

I asked my buddy at AMMO what he does with his resin and he mentioned you can recharge mixed bed stuff, but it can only be done with Lye and muriatic acid.

Regardless, I don't really mind my current setup now that I can do a car for less then $5 in resin...

Interesting article on it:


I'm actively trying to stop myself from learning more about it... I think my brain might be running out of capacity.

Holy ****!!! No thanks...I'll spend the money and buy new mixed bed resin. Yikes!!!

if you read that paper I attached above, it discusses both cation ion exchange (which is removing positively charged ions such as is done with water softening) and anion exchange (negatively charged ions). Di (Deionization), mixed bed, etc. are all just nomenclature for a system that uses both cation resin and anion resin in a single process. Because both resins are used, dissolved possitively charged ions (Ca++ for example) as well as dissolved negatively charged ions (SO4-- as an example) are both exchanged for the positive and negative ions provided by the brine solution (Na+ and Cl- in the case of salt).

Resins come in different flavors. Most people are familar with water softener resin (a cation resin) refreshed with salt (specifically the Na+ of the salt). There are both cation and anion resins available that can be refreshed with NaCl as well as cation resin refreshed with H+ (typically from HCl ie muriatic acid) and anion resin refreshed with OH- (typically from NaOH ie the Lye you mentioned). That happens to be the resins he has but you don't have to get that flavor. My whole house water system has both cation and anion resins both refreshed with NaCl.

RO is a diffenert process entirely where water is forced through a membrane to remove stuff in the water (ionic and non-ionic). Ion exhcange does exactly that- trades ions that tend to preciptate (such as Ca++) or that you don't want in the water (such as Fe++ or Fe+++) for ones that stay dissolved or aren't harmful (such as Na+).

Based on your descriptions, adding a hose bibb fed by softened water and then running that hose through your CR Spotless will 1) remove all hardness and 2) push out your resin rebedding way into the future (say 5 or more years). Alternatlively, don't replace the resin at all and just soak it in softener salt, rinse it off with softened water, and replace in unit and keep going. Hose bibb change is the key though.

gsmith22 said:

if you read that paper I attached above, it discusses both cation ion exchange (which is removing positively charged ions such as is done with water softening) and anion exchange (negatively charged ions). Di (Deionization), mixed bed, etc. are all just nomenclature for a system that uses both cation resin and anion resin in a single process. Because both resins are used, dissolved possitively charged ions (Ca++ for example) as well as dissolved negatively charged ions (SO4-- as an example) are both exchanged for the positive and negative ions provided by the brine solution (Na+ and Cl- in the case of salt).

Resins come in different flavors. Most people are familar with water softener resin (a cation resin) refreshed with salt (specifically the Na+ of the salt). There are both cation and anion resins available that can be refreshed with NaCl as well as cation resin refreshed with H+ (typically from HCl ie muriatic acid) and anion resin refreshed with OH- (typically from NaOH ie the Lye you mentioned). That happens to be the resins he has but you don't have to get that flavor. My whole house water system has both cation and anion resins both refreshed with NaCl.

RO is a diffenert process entirely where water is forced through a membrane to remove stuff in the water (ionic and non-ionic). Ion exhcange does exactly that- trades ions that tend to preciptate (such as Ca++) or that you don't want in the water (such as Fe++ or Fe+++) for ones that stay dissolved or aren't harmful (such as Na+).

Based on your descriptions, adding a hose bibb fed by softened water and then running that hose through your CR Spotless will 1) remove all hardness and 2) push out your resin rebedding way into the future (say 5 or more years). Alternatlively, don't replace the resin at all and just soak it in softener salt, rinse it off with softened water, and replace in unit and keep going. Hose bibb change is the key though.

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Thank you sir. I think I have a better understanding now...

Keep us posted on your findings. I also came across the rv-mod kit but I figured all it will do for me is increase the capacity of the resin...but not help with the shelf-life of the resin so I moved on. The shelf-life is an issue for me because I don't wash cars as often so it sits unused for 3-4 weeks at a time. I only got it for my Black car. Plus the water is super hard where I live 400+ TDS. I do tip the cartridge over to let the water drain out at the end of my wash but I'm sure it still holds quite a bit.

this shelf life argument is pure nonsense. If you are going on vacation, do you disconnect your house's water softener and drain it for fear it won't soften the water upon your return? If anything, water left in the system will be ultra soft by the time you use it again because "contact time" is the basis for how effective all water treatment devices are. Leaving water in there for three weeks is a hell of a lot of contact time vs the time it takes for water to move through the column of resin (and soften it) while actively using the device to wash you car.

Microorganism/algea/bacterial growth might be a great reason to drain the CR Spotless system between uses. To be clear, that has nothing to do with resin function or lack thereof from leaving it sit full (or not full) of water.

The CR Spotless system is nothing more than a water softener without a valve. Without the valve, the system can't regenerate the resin when it is exhausted. You are physically changining out the resin when it is exhausted. It isn't intended to be fed with hard water because that will exhaust its capacity rapidly as Ryan has found out. Feed it with soft water and it will last (nearly) forever. The system should be thought of as a "polisher" because all the hard work was done by the house's water softener and this picks up any remaning "leakage" of hardness that got through the house softener.

I've contemplated getting a softer for car washing to eliminate what little spotting I get, but it sounds like my water isn't near as hard as yours is @Ryan . Part of what's kept me from getting one is not wanting to fall down the rabbit hole of information and choices.
This thread gave me a little better idea on getting one.

one thing to keep in mind is the source of your water. If municipal source, the hardness can vary depending on how they are obtaining water. Multiple sources for municipal water aren't uncommon so if you have municipal source, may want to test hardness several times throughout the year for an average hardness. Alternatively, many water municipalities will list info on their website or in pamphlets about where they get water from and which sources are used when. Long story short, don't rely on a single water test if your source is municipal.

Well water (deep wells say over 50ft) tends to stay consistent throughout the year so you can probably test once and get a good handle on the hardness. Shallow wells this may not be the case as surface water can mingle with water underground if not careful. A good online testing agency is NTL: https://watercheck.com/ Obviously local testing is fine too but NTL has very customized tests for as much or as little info as you want and all you need is a post office

DI water is something I've been thinking about for a while now but I've been hesitant to pull the trigger (partly due to some analysis paralysis).

A friend recently installed a more commercial sized system (see link below) at his house for washing cars and this is likely the way I'll go as well. I need to figure outa plan but ideally I'd get a covered enclosure of some type which can house this tank and my pressure washer. For me, a permanent install on the driveway side of the house will be most practical vs something portable on wheels.

I'm not sure how much resin the Spotless system holds but I'm guessing quite a bit less than this tank which holds 1cuft and should last quite a while. It's more expensive than the Spotless system but not by that much - especially when you factor in the cost of the resin.

The wife and I have also been talking about a water softener system and I think this thread has sealed that for me. Looks like we need a softener system and then a dedicated DI setup just for cars. Time to get planning!

I didn't want to cloud the thread yesterday but some more detail on DI: Its short for deionization which means that all ions have been removed. So total dissolved solids (TDS) will be reduced to near 0 after. And that is acheived by having water move through both cation and anion resins removing both positively charged ions and negatively charged ions, respectively. But, in order to remove all (or nearly so) ions, DI resins are setup in the H+ and OH- forms and if you were to regeneate them, use HCl and NaOH as the regenerates. These are chemicals that you want to be really careful handling. The WashPak-100 is like the CR Spotless in that it doesn't have a valve for regeneration so you are using this to exhaustion, not regenerating with chemicals, and then replacing the resin. I would not recommend attempting to regenerate DI resin manually as I described above with HCl and NaOH. The benefit to DI for this car wash application is that you are exchanging positive ions (hardness as Ca++) with H+ and negative ions (say SO4-- I used as an example above) with OH-. The H+ and the OH- that move from the resin into the water then combine to form HOH ie more water. So you can get almost no ions remaining in the water coming out of DI systems because of the form of the resin (in H+ and OH-). I suppose this is a benefit for car washing but I can't imagine resins in the Na+ and Cl- form causing spots unless you let the water sit and not dry the car off. Na+ wants to stay dissolved in water; while Ca++ does not which is what leads to the water spots. Water is the great dissolver - it likes to have ions dissolved in it. If you remove all the ions, it will then tend to canabalize whatever it is in contact with effecively acting like an acid or caustic even though the pH will probably be 7. So DI water is harsh on whatever it touches - don't know how that effects car paint long term but you will not have water spots. Solve one problem to maybe create another!?

For domestic drinking water, I would strongly suggest only resins in the Na+ and Cl- forms.
1) these won't create dionized water, just water with NaCl dissolved in it rather than whatever ions they were exchanged with (so TDS doesn't change, just the components of what is making up the TDS)
2) handling salt to regenerate the resins isn't dangerous to you
3) for reasons already mentioned, you don't want DI water cannibilizing things it touches like pipes, fixtures, your body, etc. Generally, mineral water is preferred for this reason because of the dissolved ions keeping water's dissolving mechanisms in check. There is an LSI index that measures water's ability to either scale hardness or be corrosive. pH is one component of the index calculation but not the only component. It is possible to have low TDS water with a pH above 7 and still have a corroding effect on things like your plumbing and that is all due to water liking to dissolve things.

Sorry about the dissertation but I see so much nonesense, predatory marketing, and confusion about this stuff online it drives me nuts. I have a well water system that needed treatment and so took it upon myself to understand how all this works. I don't doubtsome of the same things I ran into have held some of you up in dealing with domestic water hardness. In my case, my well water has a whole host of dissolved solids you don't want to be drinking (radium, uranium, radon) as well as the usually stuff (hardness, small amounts of iron) and slightly low pH (6.5ish). It was an education to say the least in making this water potable without causing health or plumbing problems.

gsmith22 said:

I didn't want to cloud the thread yesterday but some more detail on DI: Its short for deionization which means that all ions have been removed. So total dissolved solids (TDS) will be reduced to near 0 after. And that is acheived by having water move through both cation and anion resins removing both positively charged ions and negatively charged ions, respectively. But, in order to remove all (or nearly so) ions, DI resins are setup in the H+ and OH- forms and if you were to regeneate them, use HCl and NaOH as the regenerates. These are chemicals that you want to be really careful handling. The WashPak-100 is like the CR Spotless in that it doesn't have a valve for regeneration so you are using this to exhaustion, not regenerating with chemicals, and then replacing the resin. I would not recommend attempting to regenerate DI resin manually as I described above with HCl and NaOH. The benefit to DI for this car wash application is that you are exchanging positive ions (hardness as Ca++) with H+ and negative ions (say SO4-- I used as an example above) with OH-. The H+ and the OH- that move from the resin into the water then combine to form HOH ie more water. So you can get almost no ions remaining in the water coming out of DI systems because of the form of the resin (in H+ and OH-). I suppose this is a benefit for car washing but I can't imagine resins in the Na+ and Cl- form causing spots unless you let the water sit and not dry the car off. Na+ wants to stay dissolved in water; while Ca++ does not which is what leads to the water spots. Water is the great dissolver - it likes to have ions dissolved in it. If you remove all the ions, it will then tend to canabalize whatever it is in contact with effecively acting like an acid or caustic even though the pH will probably be 7. So DI water is harsh on whatever it touches - don't know how that effects car paint long term but you will not have water spots. Solve one problem to maybe create another!?

For domestic drinking water, I would strongly suggest only resins in the Na+ and Cl- forms.
1) these won't create dionized water, just water with NaCl dissolved in it rather than whatever ions they were exchanged with (so TDS doesn't change, just the components of what is making up the TDS)
2) handling salt to regenerate the resins isn't dangerous to you
3) for reasons already mentioned, you don't want DI water cannibilizing things it touches like pipes, fixtures, your body, etc. Generally, mineral water is preferred for this reason because of the dissolved ions keeping water's dissolving mechanisms in check. There is an LSI index that measures water's ability to either scale hardness or be corrosive. pH is one component of the index calculation but not the only component. It is possible to have low TDS water with a pH above 7 and still have a corroding effect on things like your plumbing and that is all due to water liking to dissolve things.

Sorry about the dissertation but I see so much nonesense, predatory marketing, and confusion about this stuff online it drives me nuts. I have a well water system that needed treatment and so took it upon myself to understand how all this works. I don't doubtsome of the same things I ran into have held some of you up in dealing with domestic water hardness. In my case, my well water has a whole host of dissolved solids you don't want to be drinking (radium, uranium, radon) as well as the usually stuff (hardness, small amounts of iron) and slightly low pH (6.5ish). It was an education to say the least in making this water potable without causing health or plumbing problems.

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You rule man. Thanks for taking the time.

Glad we have someone knowledgeable on here about the resin stuff. As for my shelf-life concern I was going by the FAQs I read on CR Spotless's website where they said for longer storage (I reread, they said 60-90 days) drain the water to extend the life of the resin. If that's not an issue then that's awesome not having to worry about yet another thing lol


I've been considering the whole house water softener system. The units seem inexpensive ($500-1000) but when I called around to get installation quotes no one got back to me except a Home Depot partner company but they wanted to change out the water heater at the same time and their quote came out to be over $5k.

i read the CR Spotless FAQ. So it clarified a few things:

1) CR spotless is using both cation and anion resins in the H+ and OH- flavor so it is in fact deionizing the water attempting to get TDS at or near 0. Initially I thought this was using just cation resin in the Na+ flavor to remove only hardness (Ca++ and Mg++) but apparently it is trying to remove all dissolved solids. I suppose if you intend to air dry the car to avoid microscratching from towels, then this is the way you would want to go becasue any dissolved solids will be left behind on the car when the water evaporates. If you towel dry the car, its probably only hardness that you have to worry about because hardness ions don't like to remain dissolved. So hardness could cause water spots even if you are drying the car off with a towel. I would not want to attempt to regenerate deionization resins for reasons already stated. Fun fact, you could turn those resins into Na+ and Cl- simply by soaking them in salt water after they have been exhausted. Switch them back soaking in HCl and NaOH - chemistry can be fun!

2) the reason they are saying softened water won't extend the resin life is because deionization resins attempt to make the TDS 0 and softeners don't make TDS 0, they just trade ions you don't want (Ca++ and Mg++) for more preferable Na+ ions. Your viewpoint on whether Na+ is good or bad probably depends on the use. For drinking water, plumbing pipes and fixtures, Na+ would be fantastic compared with hardness. For air dry car washing probably less than ideal although still better than hardness. If it was me, I would run softened water through the CR SPotless.

3)i would change out the resin once you aren't happy with the results. 0-20 TDS is insanely low even though they are suggesting that should be some sort of upper limit on when you know resin is done. TDS of the source water will ultimately affect how long you can get low values of TDS coming out of CR Spotless.

4) their recommendation of not letting resin sit in water is entirely based on algea growth if you read that paragraph.

For sizing whole house water softeners, you need to know the source water conditions (testing from NTL or the like) and your household's water use. This is all to properly size the unit so water has contact time with the resin in the unit while water is flowing through it. Don't be surprised if you don't need something on the order of 1 to 2 cuft of softener resin in like a 10 dia x 54" to 60" tall tank. Clack and Fleck are both good valve systems. There are others too but then tend to have proprietary components and sole source providers so less than ideal if you need to fix something. I highly recommend this forum for this type of stuff: https://terrylove.com/forums/index.php?forums/water-softener-forum-questions-and-answers.22/ lots of posts on there about doing what I have briefly described. I would avoid softener units at Home Depot and Lowes. they will almost assuredly be too small to be effective and are generally not fixable if something breaks. Water treatment "professionals" are like the last bastion of snake oil sales so you kind of have to keep your guard up. I had a similar experience not being able to find anyone to really diagnose what I had and effective ways to treat it. Most wanted to throw tanks with different media or resins as it with no rhyme or reason as to how or if it would work to elimnate what testing showed I had in my water. So i ended up taking this up on my own with the help of that forum even getting equipment from some of the people that frequent it. The thing to keep in mind with water is that most of the things that are not great for you or your plumbing are invisible so testing is really the only way to figure out if what you are doing is working. Most problems are somewhat benign (like hardness) but I had no idea what was in my well water until I tested it. Sometimes wonder about the health of the prior owners....

I'm surprised that DI resin is used like this without and carbon or RO stages and mechanical stages. I do RO for aquariums, and that gets my very hard water down to 6-8ppm of TDS. In these systems, DI resin is for scrubbing the last few ppm's. There's a LOT of **** that you want to get rid of before DI.

RO is very handy and cost effective. $40 consumables generates many thousands of gallons of RO water. Drawback is speed. I've got 2x 250g storage tanks. Takes 24 hours to fill one.

-Ryan

Everything I have read indicates you want to feed an RO system with softened water because hardness is very hard on the RO membrane, effectively reducing the membrane's service life. I dont' have and haven't used RO so I can't tell if that is good advice or not. Guess it depends on how much water you are runnning through the system - maybe whole house RO this is standard practice but for smaller uses like an aquarium not so much? (I have no idea how much water an aquarium uses so please don't take offense) So typically its softener -> RO - > house for domestic water. I can't see the need for carbon filtration in this situation because the RO is going to remove nearly everything (dissolved ionized and non ionized substances). DI resin will only remove dissolved ionized substances. There are lots of non ionized substances (like all of the organic chemicals) that would remain in water run through DI but not RO. Carbon is great at removing organic chemicals (and other non-ionized stuff) so in non-RO systems it could be used for that purpose after softening. Also carbon is great at solving secondary things like taste, smell, and color. So in domestic systems its often used just to clean up water that is otherwise safe to drink.

I will say... Yesterday I used my CR Spotless with the RV-Mods conversion and resin. I washed the car with water straight from the hose and then switched to the filtered water for the rinse. I rinsed top down and spent some time making sure I got all of the soap off the car. Typically, I hand dry at this point... But decided to let it air dry to see how it did.

Came out damn near perfect. I am super happy with the setup as it is... and with the water I have to deal with.

I think it (and similar systems) have the potential to be great so long as you realize how they work and how that correlates to resin lifesapn (my main goal in initially responding). Although crappy resins exist, I highly suspect one company's DI resin car wash system will be equivalent to another company's DI resin car wash system with only 1 potential variable: amount of resin. Based on the description, your RV-mods kit just added to the volume of resin. Resin lifespan will be exclusively dependent on three variables: TDS of the source water (probably can't control this unless feeding unit with RO water from house), amount of resin in the unit (compared with a competitor unit), and how often you wash the car (can control this). Taken individually, reduction in resin lifespan will occur with higher TDS source water, smaller amount of resin, and the more often you use the unit. Two people with the same unit/amount of resin, same frequency of use habits, but different source water will probalby have different outcomes. I guess what I am getting at is the CR Spotless probably isn't doing anything unique that Washpack-100 is doing (or insert your favorite brand here). With the same source water and frequency of washing, adding more resin to the system added longevity between resin changouts. So anything that adds resin volume will create longer times between resin changeout.

gsmith22, do you have a DI system?

not DI. I have seperate cation and anion exchange systems (resin in individual tanks, each with its own backwashing valve) for my domestic water in the Na+ and Cl- forms. a DI system would use both of those resins in the H+ and Cl- forms.

I am not an expert on all the different resin types

• Strong acid cation resins
• Weak acid cation resins
• Strong base anion resins
• Weak base anion resins
• Specialty resins

the systems they are implemented in or what you are using your system for. I have owned the CR system reviewed above for six years and have used a Culligan commercial system at work for over 18 years to generate DI water as a quench media for aluminum ageing.

The resin in these systems cannot be regenerated by salt, it works completely different than a water softener and uses completely different resin. DI resin can be regenerated through a process that requires the use of acid and because the resin is so much smaller internally "as you stated earlier" Microorganism/algea/bacterial growth" plugs the resin and at best once regenerated it is only 70% as effective as it was when new. This is also the reason it has shelf life, and that really doesn't change by draining it, it would need to be dried and I am unsure if that would damage it. i have purchased cheap resin in an effort to save cost, this resin was regenerated and in one case only produced a third of the DI water the new resin produced. It likely had been regenerated twice.

Running "soft water" into a DI system has no effect on the longevity of the resin. The system does not care if it is hard mineral or soft mineral it is still a mineral. If you have a TDS meter measure your hard water versus your soft water the number will be almost identical.

After trying many different things, including the tubes the OP posted about, I resigned years ago to just buying new resin from a reputable source. CR spotless themselves has an exchange system that suits my needs because I do not use the system at my home year-round and anything larger would go to waste for the reasons stated above. The TDS for INDY water in my area hovers around 390ppm, I get about 300 gallons of DI from new resin which allows me to rinse my vehicles for about 8 months out of the year. I am moving in a few months to a home on well water and the TDS is nearly 100ppm less. I have not done the math yet but that should be very close to a 30% increase in DI water from the same amount of resin.

Honch said:

I am not an expert on all the different resin types

• Strong acid cation resins
• Weak acid cation resins
• Strong base anion resins
• Weak base anion resins
• Specialty resins

the systems they are implemented in or what you are using your system for. I have owned the CR system reviewed above for six years and have used a Culligan commercial system at work for over 18 years to generate DI water as a quench media for aluminum ageing.

The resin in these systems cannot be regenerated by salt, it works completely different than a water softener and uses completely different resin. DI resin can be regenerated through a process that requires the use of acid and because the resin is so much smaller internally "as you stated earlier" Microorganism/algea/bacterial growth" plugs the resin and at best once regenerated it is only 70% as effective as it was when new. This is also the reason it has shelf life, and that really doesn't change by draining it, it would need to be dried and I am unsure if that would damage it. i have purchased cheap resin in an effort to save cost, this resin was regenerated and in one case only produced a third of the DI water the new resin produced. It likely had been regenerated twice.

Running "soft water" into a DI system has no effect on the longevity of the resin. The system does not care if it is hard mineral or soft mineral it is still a mineral. If you have a TDS meter measure your hard water versus your soft water the number will be almost identical.

After trying many different things, including the tubes the OP posted about, I resigned years ago to just buying new resin from a reputable source. CR spotless themselves has an exchange system that suits my needs because I do not use the system at my home year-round and anything larger would go to waste for the reasons stated above. The TDS for INDY water in my area hovers around 390ppm, I get about 300 gallons of DI from new resin which allows me to rinse my vehicles for about 8 months out of the year. I am moving in a few months to a home on well water and the TDS is nearly 100ppm less. I have not done the math yet but that should be very close to a 30% increase in DI water from the same amount of resin.

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Resins being discussed are strong acid cation either in the hydrogen H+ or sodium Na+ forms and stong base anion either in the hydroxide OH- or chloride Cl- forms. Strong acid H+ and strong base OH- resins are required for dionization; strong acid Na+ for water softening; and stong base Cl- for various inorganic compound removals from potable water (Uranium, arsenic, nitrates, sulfates being common ones). Stong acid/base resins work over the entire pH range while weak acid/base resins only work over a limited pH range and are most commonly used in chemcial processes.

gsmith22 said:

just realized too, that you indicated the hose bib for your car washing tees off before the water softener. While it is generally a good idea to have outdoor bibs unsoftened (mostly for watering plants), it is also a good idea to have a softened water hose bib (maybe near the garage) specifically for cleaning cars. Then if you run a hose from that bibb through through your CR Spotless sytem and I guarantee that the resin in it will last a hell of a lot longer. Why? Because you are leaving your house system (with brine and backwashing) to do all the hard work with the CR Spotless system cleaning up any hardness "leakage". Read the paper on why there might be leakage. Otherwise, if your CR Spotless system is seeing raw well water, it better be sized and have the ability to brine/backwash just like your house system. Small plumbing mods are probably cheaper than continually buying resin.

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Within the city system and still fairly hard water here. Ran both hot and cold softened water spigots to the inside wall of the garage. Has worked very well on cars and dogs for over 22 years. Totally agree that if you’re still wanting that CR option as a follow up, go for it. But I’d bet you’d be more than satisfied with just water from the softener.

Great discussion, I learned some good information. Thank you.

For car washing, I've been using this for a few years now. No complaints.

I can wash my cars and I don't have to kill myself trying to dry them before they water-spot.

I built my own DI filter or converter tank from 2- Pentair 20" big Blue tanks in my garage. Basicaly a CR system. Not sure if i saved any money building my own since sourcing materials is a pain in tha ***. I have a tds meter on the outlet. I use a softener on city water but now putting together a RO system with a 30 gallon holding tank to fill up RO then pump thru the big blue DI resin canisters for the final polish for washing the car. In the motorcoach water that flows in the fresh water tanks and its system all go thru a onboard RO system first. Been using onboard water to wash the coach, air dries with no spots.

You can also pay for your local Culligan guy to drop these off and you have about 3,000 gallons of clean water. It comes with a little LED sensor that turns from green to red when it is ready to call them for a swap. $21 a month and about $105 for a replacement.

Ill admit, I didn't read the whole post, but what do these systems cost, and how much water can they produce before they need new filters/membranes? I work in the marine industry, so spot free water is a huge deal here. I am a Dometic/spot zero dealer, so just wondering how these would compare. I can also sell FCI products.

ste6168 said:

Ill admit, I didn't read the whole post, but what do these systems cost, and how much water can they produce before they need new filters/membranes? I work in the marine industry, so spot free water is a huge deal here. I am a Dometic/spot zero dealer, so just wondering how these would compare. I can also sell FCI products.

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see post #24 for the three main variables that control longevity

My wife has an Audi and that led me down the Rabbit Hole !

once you get everything purchased and set up you can wash the car in 30 minutes start to dry!
the idea is not SCRUB on the paint, you don’t need to really touch the car

1 -
get an electric pressure washer, you don’t need a lot of pressure 2,000 psi is fine
my Depot Ryobi 1.2 gallon 2,000 psi PW works great

the 1.2 gallon minute is key So you don’t use a lot of gallons and to SLOW down the flow of water so it gets completely filtered thru the Resin to rinse the car

a FOAM Cannon is great for spraying soap thru the PW gun onto the car

2-
adapt the DI filter with a bypass ( see pics below) Y hose fittings and a washing machine water supply hose so you can bypass the DI filter. The idea is to hit a couple Ball Valves so you don’t need to connect / discount
hoses when you go to use the DI Filter Spot Free Final rinse

When washing the car you use regular hose bib ( preferably softened water) and bypass the DI filter you only use the DI filter as a final rinse it’s best to use a low flow nozzle to allow the water to be completely filtered thru the DI Filter

quick release fittings on the garden hose and PW hose fittings, work really well and save time


A-
rinse car

b-
use foam cannon soap car

c-
use a soapy foam mit to wash car all areas

d-
rinse off soap

e-
use the ByPASS to run water thru the DI Filter and do a final SPOT FREE rinse start on the TOP and work your way down
shut off Pressure Washer

F-
use lawn / Leaf blower to blow off all water on the car, I use a Milwaukee M-18 cordless blower

G-
crack a Coldie!

CR spotless sells a Bypass Kit but you can make your own!

see pics below





See Foam Cannon below