Hard water for high pressure rinse?

[mrfixit]

We know we need soft water for presoak & RO process, but that seems to be all that is necessary for a good wash from what I can find.

Currently all of my iba water is softened for high impact pressure (40gpm) and all my iba lp passes are RO. Presoak,wax,trifoam, rainshield,ect.

With a hardness of 25grains I am still considering going to hard water for high pressure rinse function and undercarriage.... Soft water for soaps and waxes, ro water only for spot free.

The water is very hard, I know. I worry about the consequences for the granfoss pump and nozzles. One therory I have is that at 40gpm the flow is so high that it will keep deposits at bay. Distributor says the pump can handle hard water.

Waxes are said to work better with hard water and worse with RO water. Soap is said to foam better with soft rather than RO.

Making this change will reduce my salt use, reduce RO process, waste water, and cost. It should rinse the soap off the car a lot better. Possibly improving the wash quality.

Does anyone see a problem with this?
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[robert roman]

Softened water for high-pressure wash or undercarriage is a waste of resources whereas soft water for soap and wax is not.

If you want to reduce cost, high-pressure is good application for reclaim but many touch-less in-bay operators believe it’s too complex, hard to get right and too expensive (about $35K installed).

Practicing alchemy with pre-engineered equipment usually doesn’t get very meaningful results.

In fact, it often leads to unnecessary problems.

 

[Jeff_L]

What do you do with your RO reject water? I keep mine and use it for underbody and rinse. It has a high TDS count since it's more concentrated, but it's been softened and dechlorinated so I use it. Some just throw it down the drain, but not me, it's still better than the tap water.

 

[mrfixit]

Its discharged. We don't have much room to give up, I'll think about adding another tank for that. Probably a 55 tandem to the auto tank.

Its the salt that's killing me man. 2 pallets a month at peak just for softener its too much lugging. It has to be carried to the back of the room.

Plus the new' softener that was suppose to reach our 80gpm capacity is really only 50gpm. I took over operations here last year, I never would have let them put in 2 pair of 1 ½ 213ods in. We need another pair on top, which I have the big old fleck unit that can be added to bring it up to 80gpm. But then more salt and a third salt tank and changing all plumbing to softeners to 2 inch.

Alternatively I run an 1½ off the main to the iba tank and run hard.

If there anything wrong with hard water rinse? Is softened hp rinse and underbody preferred by anyone for a particular reason?

I will use soft or RO for everything else.

About half my total water usage is the high impact pump. If its off the softener my flow problems will be solved. Currently have a 50psi pressure drop when the holding tank fills every wash. Down to 30psi. The main is 2" and we had to put the dogwash on it because theres not enough flow to run it with softened. No pressure loss off the main...

Hi impact = a ton of water.

 

[mrfixit]

Softened water for high-pressure wash or undercarriage is a waste of resources whereas soft water for soap and wax is not.

If you want to reduce cost, high-pressure is good application for reclaim but many touch-less in-bay operators believe it’s too complex, hard to get right and too expensive (about $35K installed).

Practicing alchemy with pre-engineered equipment usually doesn’t get very meaningful results.

In fact, it often leads to unnecessary problems.

I would run away from a Reclaim system. Way more than we need unless it's mandatory at which case, in a small town, it would be a major hit.

So you say, or your vote is, soft is not needed for hp rinse.

Practicing alchemy with pre-engineered equipment usually doesn’t get very meaningful results.

Are you saying I would be doing this changing to hard? And causing unnessesary problems? Sorry not sure.

Ryko has installations where the pump is on hard water according to my contact.

 

[kentadel]

I would switch it so High pressure would use hard water. I don't think you will see any difference in wash quality and your pump should be fine. I have a location with similar hardness set up this way and haven't had any problems.

 

[mrfixit]

Thank a million kentadel. As a bonus I expect it to rinse a lot better and free up soft water pressure for other uses.

Here in the salt belt I have to wonder... Spraying softened sodium water on the car to get salt off and prevent rust? Wouldnt the sodium in the softened water aid in rust formation?

Hard water should flush salts better no?
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[kentadel]

Not sure on that, I just know you will carry less salt.

 

[Jeff_L]

Softened water doesn't have salt in it. Salt is used to flush the minerals your resin has attached to it inside your tank.

You're going through a lot of salt. If you're not using tap water for rinse, then you must be washing your bays down with soft water too? That's expensive and unnecessary.

IMHO - use tap water for your rinse option. Use soft for chemical application and to feed your spot free system. However, clients will need to learn to use spot free rinse every time.

 

[mrfixit]

Yeah not really salt but the hardness is exchanged for sodium. You can taste the salt if you drink softened water, so..

Yeah for bay rinse down everything other than hose spicket and dog wash is soft. Softeners won't feed enough pressure for the dogwash they are overloaded already.

One of my partners is concerned about hard water spots. And it's a good point. Its more controlled in the automatic cause there is always a spot free. But the undercarriage can spray water when some one is under the dryers and if the wind is blowing right it could hit the car on the way out. We have a short bay with f/s dryers at the exit door.

I could force delay so the undercarriage can't start till the dryers are off. Its probably about 5 seconds on the next car. It just upsets the customer under the dryers anyway.

Paranoid about spots now, on cars and equipment.

But nothing rinses like hard water. Wash your hands with dish soap, the soap never seems to come off with soft, with hard the soap is gone right away.
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[Jeff_L]

So, to get back to your original question of, "With a hardness of 25grains I am still considering going to hard water for high pressure rinse function and undercarriage.... Soft water for soaps and waxes, ro water only for spot free.", IMHO I do not see a problem with this.

 

[jprb]

We use hard water for rinse at our IBA washes. Soft water will leave spots, just like hard water. The spot free rinse will prevent the spotting.

 

[mrfixit]

Thanks for the feed back. yes i have limited softwater spots now so those may well end up being hard waters spots if i switch. Ro is good and i run it slow but, still always had a very slight spotting, from short bay I believe.

I've tested the tds of our soft water(328) and hard water (304). The tds is higher on the soft water!

I'm still debating this, I don't think I have enough control of the water in what would be considered a short bay with dryers inside the back door.. Probably only 3 feet from home position on the arm. Rinse water gets under the dryers, all around, and on the back door. I have water dripping off the backdoor seal on the exit when the door is in use. This is soft water currently. Hard water there may leave hard spotting...

I know I get white spots from the soft water where ever it is left, like side mirrors. What if it were hard? Etched glass like hard water spots?

I'll have to bypass softeners one day and try a couple washes it I guess.

 

[jprb]

As far as I know, the spots from hard or soft water (High TDS - above 40 TDS) would be the same. It is your Spot Free water (low TDS) that removes/prevents spots.

JPRB

 

[mrfixit]

But the soft water spot wipes off easily, hard water can become a hard calcium deposit that doesn't wipe off. Like in your home with hard water. 28grains leave a spot that has to be scrubbed, or use a lime away type product.

The concern is I now have soft spotting in some areas, if it were hard it may not wipe off easily.

I double pass RO but still it doesn't hit certain spots on different vehicles and usually always the side mirrors will have some spots on the glass.

Maybe in the winter I can get away with it because of all the salt on the roads. I've pretty much disbanded the idea barring some physical testing.


But I would be doing good going to soft water for my presoak rather than using RO for presoak. Should be better.

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[Ryko CS]

The HI cycle pump is normally plumbed to use either reclaim or fresh water. The RO or soft water are normally only used for the chemical passes on an OHD machine.

 

[mrfixit]

So hard water and it shouldn't be much of a problem...
What about short bay issues?
Would you say my water is harder than others running hard water (fresh). 25grains + 3 ppm(?) iron

Historically we go though two pallets a month during peak. Lots of salt to haul.

I may be worried about a problem... That I may not even notice!! We have never run hard water for anything here before... Everything is soft. (Except bay weep of course)

Soon its going to be plumbed with an option for untreated water (fresh) to the tank so I can switch between the two if hard water doesn't work out.

 

[cantbreak80]

Based on my understanding of your issue, I believe your water softener system is being seriously overdosed and under-rinsed.

A pallet of salt (63 bags @ 40 lbs) will effectively soften 403,200 gallons of 25 grain water.
That’s 13,400 gallons of water per day! (403,200 gal. / 30 days)
Using 80 total gallons of water per wash, that’s an average of 168 cars per day!
You stated that your peak wash months will often consume two pallets of salt. Using the same math, you should be washing 336 cars per day.
If so, congratulations!!!

Except for people with super-tuned taste buds, soft water does not normally taste salty.

The TDS reading of soft vs hard water should be comparable…softening has little to no effect on TDS. Your readings may be indicative of excessive brining and/or, insufficient flushing of the resin bed. Increased water spotting on the vehicle is another indicator.

The “feeling” you get when rinsing your hands with hard vs. soft water is due to the fact that hard water absorbs the residual soap while soft water continues to react to that residual soap. Soap test kits effectively demonstrate that phenomenon. That said, by using hard water rinse, your wash system will more effectively rinse any residual soap and foaming agents by simple “absorption”.

Unfortunately, rinsing with 25 grain water may increase the water-spotting potential if your Spot Free Rinse volume is insufficient.

So, my suggestion…Tune the softener system to use 6 lbs of salt per cu. ft. of resin AND plumb hard water to the Ryko rinse tank. And, double pass the SFR if necessary.

At the least, you’ll save your back.

 

[mrfixit]

Thanks!!

Softeners have been a big problem here.

Yes when if found the tds high I lowered the salt dose, as it was to high. Its a kinetico 'professionally installed as a replacement, it was suppose to fix our problems.lol. I think they over did the brine setting and disc trying to cheat it to work without hard water bypassing... I wasnt here at the time and we had some problems appearantly, it couldn't keep up.. I was a fleck expert and that was tuned perfect, this kinetico I'm still learning.

Also since my demand (~80gpm) is so much higher than the softener rating (~50gpm) the bed can get stripped too. They are finally suppose to be fixing it by adding our old big16" softner pair back in (~40gpm) , i requested plumbed parallel for the auto.

At peak last year both 213 ods were in constant regen all day long with no breaks. Until the cars stopped.

Oh I should add - Hi impact auto, 4 mebrane RO, 3 ss bays stacked all day, and a dog wash in use. So a lot of water. I have smart metered 18,000gal in a day, maybe 19,000 I have to check notes.

On the busiest days I do peak at 150 cars per day on the automatic only!!
plus 3 ss stacked all day, and everything else is just taxed hard core at this time. Ro output drops due to low flow.. Usually something breaks also of course.

One 150 car day trashed the contactor and protection for the high impact pump and shut me down. It may have got a low water condition and overloaded, I don't know for sure.

Also add in all the back washing gpm for for all the regens in a busy day for 2 pair 231ods.

Also iron is at 3, so added to hardness, total is 28g.

We have a ton of RO now that i moved up to 4 membranes and 250g tank. No problems there.