What is your city water TDS level?

[the other tang]

I read mine for the first time last week and it was 635ppm, whats yours? I think that is pretty high, but I want to see how it compares to other parts of the country. If you post please add your location if its not under your avatar.

[marduc]

wow, yeah that seems really high compared to what I see in Tampa.

I just moved my tank and RO/DI unit from one side of town to the other, I used to get readings of 200-250 ppm, now it runs 350ish.

[yraveh]

125 in north miami beach

[the other tang]

Thanks guys I know the water is bad here I just don't know how bad. Maybe AZdesertrat can comment on what is standard. I'd like to get some more info from out west, up east etc to see what is low and high.

[danskim]

Baltimore is around 150ppm. At least my house.

[AZDesertRat]

Mine was 852 last Saturday when I checked it.
250 is about the national average. The lucky stiffs in the Atlanta area enjoy numbers below 50 from what I have seen. Here in the Phoenix metro area we are served by the Colorado and Salt River systems. Three guesses as to where the Salt River got its name and the first two don't count!

[jjmcat]

160 in Tulsa OK.

[Slickbaby]

125 in denver

[Boomer]

56.5 TDS, Lake Superior, Duluth, MN :lol: :D

[AZDesertRat]

Theres one in every crowd! Boomer you stink!

[PatrickJ]

250 in New Orleans area

[Boomer]

Yah Rat but the knotheads bumped the pH way to 9.1 ;( using soda ash, Sodium Hydroxide, for scale control. It use to be pH 7.1 ;) And I have not checked for a while, I gave all my stuff to Randy. Maybe on of these days I'll ask Jim from thefilterguys. I ran tanks for 30 years right out of the tap with just a dechloraminator. We were like the first city to use chloramines. Started it back in the late 70's. I forgot it was also 100.4 uS

[Billybeau1]

120 ppm in NW Indiana (Chicago water) from Lake Michigan)

Yeh Rat...... Boomers a real riot :blown:

[Boomer]

That high TDS is proably from all the dead fish :lol: And as you move East it gets worse.

Here is a short Assay
http://www.ci.duluth.mn.us/city/comfortsystems07/WhatsNew/Duluth%202005%20CCR.pdf


Your read and weep page :D You could spend an hr here learing about water, Ok our WATER :D
http://www.duluthstreams.org/understanding/param_ec.html#realdata


Some really cool stuff here, we know water here, we do not play games :lol:

http://www.duluthstreams.org/understanding/stormgraphs.html

[Billybeau1]

They don't call it "Superior" for nothing ! :D

[drummereef]

Last time I checked it was in the 250 range in St. Louis. I tend to avoid it and drink from my RO. I leave the DI for the fishies. :)

[Grunt007]

300 here, eastern PA.

[wzero]

420, Shanghai China.

[dkh0331]

The Allegheny River P water north of Pittsburgh isn't too terrible. 165.

[Mr31415]

In South Africa - Centurion I have about 200.

[cham]

132 Orlando FL

[i dont eat fish]

I get between 141 and 215 in the North Hills.

[anthony34]

120ppm Nashville TN (Hermitage area)

[MrPike]

Varies between 30 and 45 here in Ft. Collins, Colorado. I use tapwater for my stony reef, and most of the time I don't even add dechlor, too much work :)

[anthony34]

As a General Rule of Thumb of the PPM

0 - 50 - RO Water (Acceptable range)
50 - 170 - Spring Water (Acceptable range)
170 - 200 - Hard Water
200 - 300 - Marginal at best
300 - 500 - Unplesent water

[AZDesertRat]

TDS is strictly astetic per the EPA and most municipalities. There are no enforcable contaminant levels. Even though Phoenix water is in the 700 to 1000 range it is by no means offensive, unpleasant or unhealthful.

[Canarygirl]

TDS of municipal water in Lynnwood, WA is 35.

[anthony34]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9661020#post9661020 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by AZDesertRat
TDS is strictly astetic per the EPA and most municipalities. There are no enforcable contaminant levels. Even though Phoenix water is in the 700 to 1000 range it is by no means offensive, unpleasant or unhealthful.

Totally correct thats why its consider a TDS testing general rule of thumb and does not mean unhealthy, but you can taste the difference from State/City to State/City :) and I have tasted some nasty water in other States :)

[jnb]

168

deerfield beach between Boca Raton and Lauderdale

[davocean]

I get 530 here in San Diego CA.

[cristhiam]

144

[nethawk73]

220 in South Hackensack NJ

[Megalodon]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9654881#post9654881 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by the other tang
I read mine for the first time last week and it was 635ppm, whats yours?Wow, that's a lot! Mine's about 4ppm at the most.

[AZDesertRat]

Tap water TDS at 4???? Holy cow! I find that pretty hard to believe unless your utility uses membranes for treatment. A tap TDS of 4 would be highly problematic as it would be extremely agressive to plumbing fixtures, piping and appliances. It would suck the lead and copper out or brass and bronze, eat stainless steel and have a really wacky pH and Langlier Index. No utility in the USA could provide water to the public like that as it would not meet the EPAs lead and copper rules.
I am not doubting you or suggesting you are fudging but as a water treatment professional I cannot fathom that.

[drstupid]

i i just tested mine from my kitchen sink with an electronic pen meter, came up with 199 ppm with about 5 secs of cold only water flowing (to make sure i wasn't measuring anything from my known-to-be-dying hot water heater). i let the cold water run for 2 minutes, measured again and got 140 ppm.

i'm curious how many of the measurements reported were before flushing out their own water lines, and if they were remeasured, what the difference would be. especially the 635ppm measurement.

[CMcNeil]

mine comes into my house in the low 200's

[AZDesertRat]

I wait several minutes before taking mine with the meter in the water the whole time to stabilize the temperature. The meters probe and water need to be the same temp. Thats why the inline meters are not so accurate, their probes are exposed to the air temperature and not the water temperature which are rarely the same.

[drstupid]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9669346#post9669346 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by AZDesertRat
I wait several minutes before taking mine with the meter in the water the whole time to stabilize the temperature. The meters probe and water need to be the same temp. Thats why the inline meters are not so accurate, their probes are exposed to the air temperature and not the water temperature which are rarely the same.

how long does it take for the measurement to stabilize?

every time i fire up the RO/DI unit, the meter after the RO stage starts out at 200 ppm and drops down to a more reasonable 4-8 ppm after a couple of minutes. the post DI meter starts out at maybe 1 ppm and drops down to the expected 0 ppm very quickly. am i seeing the effects of temperature compensation, or am i seeing dissolved solids built up in my water lines and in the water filter being flushed out?

[AZDesertRat]

With inlines they are never 100% accurate since the temp probe is on the outside of the probe in the little rectangular hole you can see in the affter part. But you are seeing TDS creep in the beginning and after a quart or less in most cases it will settle down to as a ccurate as it is going to be. My handheld (HM Digital COM-100) is temperature compensated plus has built in thermometer so you can see when the temperature has stabilized the TDS readings quit wandering.

[HowardW]

Tap TDS is 234 here in the western burbs of Chicago

[saltpeter]

155-170 mid ohio

[J. Montgomery]

20-30ppm here in Charlottesville, VA

[Megalodon]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9666505#post9666505 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by AZDesertRat
Tap water TDS at 4???? Holy cow! I find that pretty hard to believe unless your utility uses membranes for treatment. A tap TDS of 4 would be highly problematic as it would be extremely agressive to plumbing fixtures, piping and appliances. It would suck the lead and copper out or brass and bronze, eat stainless steel and have a really wacky pH and Langlier Index. No utility in the USA could provide water to the public like that as it would not meet the EPAs lead and copper rules.
I am not doubting you or suggesting you are fudging but as a water treatment professional I cannot fathom that. Yeah, in the Greater Vancouver region it can range from 4 to 12ppm, depending on where you are and what time of the year it is. When I tested mine a couple years ago it was 4.

Right now my tap water has a pH of 6.3 and no detectable hardness. (I don't have a TDS meter anymore.) We live in temperate rain forest (or at least surrounded by it) where it rains a lot so our water is very pure.

I wasn't using an RO/DI with my salt water because I thought there was no need to. Then I found out our tap water had high amounts of copper and who-knows-else what kinds of other metals, which the water obviously picked up from the pipes. Not so high that it threatens a persons health, but for marine inverts it can, and did. So that sucks.

What also sucks is I have a African cichlid tank and I need to add baking soda and sodium or calcium carbonate just to keep the pH and water hardness up.

Great for South American and other soft-water tanks, though.

[the other tang]

Thanks all for your readings, I re checked mine and let it run for quite a while as I did before. It showed 325 on Fri, Sat, and Sun. I guess it was a spike form who knows where.

From what you guys wrote, I seem to be on the high side of the norm but still ok, apparently I will just use filters faster....great. I seems that Atlanta ,BC and Boomerville are well below the natl' average and the place to be for low tds water. Phoenix and San Diego looked to be the highest TDs levels. Florida seems to be the most similar state, swamps, on the gulf etc. The water was much better though, probable due to having a Government/Governor.

Any others on the gulf coast with readings? TX, MS, Al?

[kae]

185 in Bangkok , Thailand. :p

[Ladipyg]

Chicago 164 from tap that has been running for 5 minutes to clear pipes

[jaws_too]

245, in largo florida

[sabbath]

TDS 119 in the Twin City's Minnesota.

[Roland Jacques]

TDS 33 Atlanta Ga.

But it has not rained for a while, normaly 50sh.

[dcs03tx]

120 Ft Worth, Tx

[cd77]

~460 near Indianapolis.

... we're rated one of the worst in the country.

[cd77]

Wow, Atlanta!

Aren't cities required to add fluorine to our water, and to treat with chlorine or chloramine? Curious what good RO water with just the required additives (if there are any) would bump the TDS up to.

[Bri Guy]

160 Appleton WI, 450 in a neighboring town!!

[jthnhale]

45 on average in NYC.

[mwitten]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11085698#post11085698 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Roland Jacques
TDS 33 Atlanta Ga.

But it has not rained for a while, normally 50sh.

Over hear in the Decatur, GA (sub of Atlanta), mine ranges from about 44-48, depending. That also agrees with the county water analysis they post. They do use chloramines, I believe. I have not checked it in about a month or more, so the drought may have impacted it.

-Mike

[rodd1rj]

'bout 450 in Mid-Mich.

[landlord]

65 ppm in Northern KY