A very clean and well maintained nursing home located between Stratford and Mitchell has been a customer of ARC Water for many years. During that time, the water treatment system has been maintained on a regular schedule to ensure that it is meeting the highest standards as required by provincial regulations.

The water enters the building and receives an injection of chlorine from a Stenner chemical dosing pump. The water then enters the 2 pressure tanks where the chlorine has chance to do its job attacking any bacteria that might be present and oxidizing the iron.

The water then passes through the iron filters which have been sized to take into account the amount of water used in a typical day. These 2 units will completely remove all the iron and then backwash at night to purge themselves clean again. Once the water leaves the iron filters it goes through a stainless steel housing which holds multiple 5 micron sediment filters. This unit ensures that there are no small particles present as the water makes its way through the 50 gpm ultra violet light. The ultra violet light serves as a secondary disinfection system to the chlorine and will kill any living bacteria that it comes in contact with.

The final process is to remove all the calcium hardness so as to protect the dishwashers, washing machines, pipes and fixtures in the building. The softener is the large unit seen in the foreground of the top picture on the left hand side. The nursing home uses A LOT of water each day so we installed a very large model with a commercial valve on top.

The system as a whole is able to;

1. Provide an uninterrupted supply of iron-free, softened water that is safe from bacterial contamination.

2. Treat the water at a rate that even exceeds the gallon-per-minute rate that their well pump is able to deliver.

(between Lucknow & Kincardine)

 
This brand new barn was built last year and boasts 3 state-of-the-art robotic milking stations. The fully computerized system tracks each cows milk output and production rate along with keeping tabs on time between visits to the parlour.

The water enters the barn from the deep well and is injected with a steady dose of 35% hydrogen peroxide via a Stenner chemical pump. The peroxide oxidizes the iron and any sulphur that might be present. As well, the extra oxygen in the water attacks the organics and serves to sanitize the water.

The treated water is then filtered through 2 backwashable iron filters. These units are plumbed in parallel and programmed so that when one of them is going through the cleaning process, the other one is still filtering the water to remove the iron.

The iron-free water then heads into the barn and travels through a plate cooler to reduce the temperature of the collected milk. Once it passes through the cooler, it returns to the utility room where it goes through the water softener. All the calcium is removed from the water and it is feed into the plumbing manifold where it is distributed to the water troughs, the boot washing stations, the parlours, the showers and the bathrooms.

The operator needed reliable equipment and, in case anything did go wrong, he wanted to be assured of prompt service.

We promised both.

 
A neighbour called us about a year ago to say that they were starting to get a lot of rust stains in their dishwasher, washing machine and showers again. We inspected their existing equipment and determined that the Culligan iron filter was malfunctioning and needed to be replaced.

Instead of having us change it out then, the homeowner asked if there was anything that could be done to get them by until they were in a financial position to replace it. We put the iron filter in bypass and unplugged it. Then we adjusted the settings on the water softener taking into account the heavy iron load that it would have to handle. The salt setting was increased and the amount of water it would allow to go through in between cleaning cycles was dramatically reduced. It was a temporary fix that would only work for so long.

When the original system was installed, there were 4 people in the house. Now that the kids have grown up and moved away, there are only 2. As such, they will be using less water.

We cut out the Culligan’s and hauled them up the stairs and outside. There is only 1 word to describe these old brutes – HEAVY! There was also some corroded galvanized pipe fittings that were almost completely rusted through so they were cut out as well.

The new water softener was installed using 3/4″ pex pipe to ensure there is lots of flow for when it backwashes.

The customer will have perfectly conditioned water that is completely free of hardness and iron. As far as salt consumption goes – the homeowners will use 50% LESS with the new system.
 

The owner/operator of this very nice motel wants the water for his guests to be excellent. The entire property is very well maintained, the rooms are bright & clean, and the water for washing and showers is perfectly conditioned.

There are 2 completely separate systems in place – which ensures that each and every room has softened water delivered with good pressure. A hot shower away from home never felt better!

Due to the very high volumes of water that are used during peak seasons, instead of a single softener on each system, parallel units have been installed. With a single softener, if water is used while it is going through the regeneration cycle, water with calcium (hardness) would be delivered to the rooms.

With a dual-tank setup, the water is always conditioned because when one is cleaning, the other is still softening the water. This configuration is also very efficient on salt consumption which means less expense for the owner and the brine tanks don’t need to be filled as often.

In addition to the water softeners on each system, ultra violet lights have been installed to treat the water. These lights work in tandem with the chlorine to provide complete protection against any bacterial contamination that might come up from the well. With the sensors and warning alarms in place, the operator has peace-of-mind knowing that his guests are taken care off with his reliable water treatment equipment doing its job.

A semi-annual service schedule has been arranged to test and inspect everything, change filters and monitor chlorine readings.

 
Chlorine does a great job killing any bacteria that may be present in a water supply, but it tastes terrible and many health studies have been done looking at long-term consumption of the chemical. Instead of buying bottled water and lugging the heavy jugs home, this couple decided to have an in-home drinking system installed. There is always lots of purified water available for drinking and cooking. The sediment filter, carbon filters and thin-film membrane clean the water right down to the microscopic level removing 99% of all contaminants.

All that is required for maintenance is an annual service. This includes; a water test, changing of all the filter cartridges, flushing the system out and checking the pressure in the holding tank. As well, the water conditioner is tested and inspected to ensure it is operating at peak efficiency.

Metered Softener

 
The water softener has a 760 Logix timer that completely monitors the household water usage. It automatically adjusts its regeneration cycle to use as little salt as needed.

If the home owners go away for an extended period of time, it will not clean itself. If they have a lot of family over for the holidays and an above average amount of water is used, it will go through extra cleaning cycles to keep up.

 
An existing customer in Zurich passed our name along to his neighbour after we recently visited his house to do a water test and filter change. The neighbour had been having some problems with the water coming out of their drinking faucet too slow. The pressure was low and they had tried to change the filters themselves last year but ran into some difficulties with some of the fittings leaking. They decided to have us come out and take a look at the system.

The holding tank for the purified water was sitting on the basement floor and had to push the pure water 9′ vertical to get to the reverse osmosis faucet at the kitchen sink. We moved the tank so it was mounted just underneath the floor joists. Now it only has to push the water 3′ vertical. This small improvement, along with boosting the tank pressure, means they will be able to fill the coffee pot more quickly. Instead of a slow tickle, the purified water will shoot out in a steady stream.

In addition to testing the water at their house, they asked if we would head over to her Mom & Dad’s place just around the corner. Upon arrival, it was discovered that the water from their reverse osmosis system had an unacceptably high level of dissolved solids in it. As well, the water had over 15 grains of hardness in it. The water softener wasn’t working properly either.

The softener was an easy fix. The problem was that the salt had clumped together at the bottom of the brine tank and was blocking the slits where the brine water was drawn through. Whenever the softener would go through a regeneration cycle, it wouldn’t get enough salt. As such, not all of the calcium was removed from the resin beads and they would only have soft water for part of a day before it went hard again.

The reverse osmosis had a couple of issues. The first was that there were 2 sediment filters in the pre-filter sumps instead of 1 sediment and 1 carbon filter. Without a carbon filter to remove the chlorine from the town water supply, the membrane wasn’t being protected. As such, it quickly deteriorated and didn’t purify the water down to the microscopic level like it should have. As well, there was no flow restrictor on the drain line. The nice thing about these drinking systems is that they are self cleaning. Normally there is a slight trickle of water washing over the membrane to send the contaminants down the drain. In this case, without the restrictor, the drain water was running at full flow. We replaced the membrane and added the proper drain flow control and got the system working properly again. They now have perfectly soft water for the dishes, showers and laundry – and – purified filtered water for drinking and cooking.

Both families have been added to our service records for an annual visit and we will call them each year.
 

The control valve is positioned between the floor joists.

A lot of the cottages in the Bayfield area (just south of Goderich in Huron County) do not have a full basement. Often there is a crawl space that is only about 48″ tall. Jammed within this tight space is often a small furnace and a short water heater. Although there are short water softener mineral tanks available for situations just like this, due to their reduced height, they are too small to accept our internal ‘Media Guard’ attachment that helps capture all the iron.

The Media Guard, along with a very high grade resin, easily handles the task of removing all the hardness and iron from the water, as well as any sulphur that might come up from the well.

The control panel has been removed from the top of the water softener and remote mounted on the edge of the stairway leading down into the crawl space. It's the little black box on the right of the opening.

 
The countryside around Bayfield (a village just south of Goderich) is beautiful. The trees stand tall and proud. The fields roll gently. The rivers slowly make their way to Lake Huron. And the ground water is very hard and full of iron.

Anyone who lives in this area knows that, without the proper equipment – the laundry doesn’t wash clean, the dishes are streaky and the toilet, tub and shower will have the unsightly redish-orange coloured rust stains. A lot of rural homeowners choose to have a complete system that removes all the iron and hardness, kills any bacteria that might be present and purifies the water for drinking and cooking.

The system shown below takes care of everything. It has a water softener, an ultra violet light and a reverse osmosis system. Besides adding salt to the water softener as needed, only one visit annually is required to test the water, change the filters and replace the UV bulb.
 

 

 
The high efficiency on-demand water heaters are great. Unlike a traditional water heater that holds 40 or 60 gallons of water and keeps reheating it over and over, the on-demand system only does the job when needed. Open any hot water tap in the house and, when the water starts to flow, the flame ignites and the water is heated as it is delivered. Once the tap is closed, the system shuts down.

These water heaters work great provided that the water going through them has no iron and very little, if any, hardness. Having either element in the water will cause problems that reduce the efficiency of the heater and lead to maintenance issues. The best scenario is to condition the water with a softener to ensure the water heater operates properly.

This family in Lucan (south of Exeter) wanted a water softener that would use a minimal amount of salt and not require ongoing maintenance. The model we installed keeps track of the household water use for the past 28 days (exactly 4 weeks) and adjusts its cleaning cycle as needed based on the past average for the upcoming day.
 
 

 
An existing customer in the community of Bluevale (just outside Wingham) contacted us to see about upgrading the water treatment system in their home. Their existing equipment had been installed about 10 years ago and required ongoing maintenance with the addition of potassium permanganate annually. Not only is the oxidizing chemical expensive but, if not handled carefully, it can make a real mess. At the time the initial equipment was installed, it was the only solution that would work for their situation.

Once we cut out and removed the old iron filter we moved the new chemical free iron filter into place and made the connections using new pipe. The system is simple and will work great. Every third night, the control valve will go through a regeneration cycle to purge the oxidized iron down the drain and refresh the filtering media that is in the tank.

During the cleaning process, air from the room is drawn into the tank and captured to create a ‘cushion’ that the water passes through as it first enters the iron filter. By the time the water makes its way down to the bottom and up the tube running through the middle, all the iron has been removed.

Clean, clear water then goes through the water softener to have the calcium removed before heading off to the kitchen and each bathroom.