Home build test run.

[jake1]

I tested my ro today and seemed to have a pressure issue. Its got two 4040s. With a 330 procon on a 1 horse. I was using water and wanted to bring it up to pressure momentarily to do a leak check. I slowly built pressure but it maxed out at 150psi. It would not build anymore and my concentrate valve was nearly closed. No pressure relief or anything and Its plumbed correctly with a feed pump giving the Hp pump 40 psi. Sure seems like I should get higher pressure with the setup. Not sure what's up. Should have sap in a few days to do more testing with. Any ideas would be helpful thanks
Jake

[jmayerl]

So you are trying to separate water from water....... think on that for a bit.

[jake1]

Yeah wasnt sure if running strait water would effect pressure that much but I guess it probably does eh?

[Bricklayer]

You should still be able to build more pressure then that. Do you have a recirc line ? If you do, try closing it and see if your pressure is effected

[Clinkis]

Agree with Bricklayer. I can build high pressure with water. I always make a bunch of permeate at the beginning of the year with welll water and I can get it up to 250psi if I tighten it down. Are you sure your pump doesn't have relief? What are your concentrate and permeate flows like?

[jake1]

I have a feeling it may be a voltage issue. I'm off the grid running a 4k watt generator that's a pretty long run away. 150 ft of 10 gage with about a 28 amp draw when everything is at Fl amps. Procon specs are at .78 Hp 150psi. So its possible am starving it on the upper end. Its only a 1 Hp motor. When I get sap ill try running my generator right at the shop. Maybe a shorter run will help.

[BAP]

I wouldn't run it very long until you verify that you have enough power feeding it. Low voltage is a huge killer for electric motors because it causes them to get hot and eventually burns them out.

[mkoehler79]

You also may want to check that the membrane seals are put in correctly with open side of cup facing pressure feed end for each membrane.

[halladaymaple]

I have the same procon pump with 2 MES membranes. However my pump is 1.5 hp and run's at 220. You should no problem getting well over 250 psi with water, like bricklayer said, you would need a recirc line to make pressure. It sounds like the ac motor is not getting enough power, be careful, you could damage the pump if that's the case.

[jake1]

So your saying without a recirc line I wouldn't be able to make pressure? Wouldn't a recirc lower the pressure if open? Low voltage would damage the motor but I don't see how it could damage the pump? My membranes were installed with the brine seal on the concentrate inlet side cupped toward the inlet pressure side.my generator puts out 35 amps which is ample. ill just have to wait for sap to figure it out.

[Bricklayer]

What are your flows rates?
Does your concentrate flow decrease as you close the concentrate needle valve? Permeate flow should rise slowly as you raise the pressure
Where is your pressure gauge plumbed into the system. Before the membrane inlet or after? Usually there is a little bit of pressure loss through the membrane.
I found the best location to put high pressure gauge was before the membrane. Gave me the most accurate pressure rating. Some ROs have them before and after to show pressure loss through membrane.
Check your procon and see if it has the nut on the side for pressure adjustment. It might be one that has relief so double check that.
If you can't get over 150 PSI with water then you aren't going to get much higher with sap. I can get up to 250 on permeate if I want to. So something is going on my guess is your procon is set up with relief or the pressure screw needs to be adjusted.
You don't want to have a full tank of sap and be screwing with the RO to try and get it working and waiting for parts etc

[jake1]

Tried it with water again here are my flow rates.
Pressure.________Perm gpm._______ Conc gpm
40._____________ .2___________________ 5
75. ____________ 1.___________________ 3.75
100.____________ 1.5__________________3.25
150.____________ 2.5__________________2
170.____________2.75__________________1.3

At 170 my Conc valve is nearly closed and if I try to go anymore it deadheads the pump and tries to kill the motor. Its got correct power. But it just seems like the pump doesn't have it in it to turn harder. I'm seeing air in my flowmeter on the Conc side when I'm over 150. I've got no leaks on the suction side in aware of but seems like maybe pump is cavatating.but if it was I cant imagine it stopping the motor. Its got me stumped.

[Bricklayer]

No, if it builds pressure that quick means the system is full. 40 is a good feed pressure. I use my low pressure pump at 45-50 psi when I wash. I don't even use the hp pump during wash and rinse.

Have you been able to increase your overall pressure yet?

[jake1]

Nope. Won't get over 170. It seems maybe the pump Isn't functioning properly, no adjustment. its new but all systems check out just won't make more pressure. My sap is .8% so I'd be happy with getting it p to 3 or 4% maybe I could still do this at 150 psi? TheTiny air bubbles in he flomete are weird though. They only show up after 150 psi

[Bricklayer]

Hmm. Flow rates don't look to bad though.
Do you have a filter installed to filter the sap? The seals around where the oring is can suck air sometimes. And are you testing it with a filter in installed ?

[jake1]

Yeah testing with filter. Getting air must be from somewhere. I've double checked all fittings but can't find where its coming from. Maybe the feed pump. It seems to have air in the line if I just run it alone disconnected from the Ro. When it gets restricted it seems to clear up. I've fixed my fair share of problems but this one is getting to me! Tapping 1000 birch tomorrow!

[Bricklayer]

Post some pictures and show as much of the plumbing as you can. I'm sure we can figure it out. If there is a leak you will notice it dripping when the system is fully pressurized. That's how I found my leak on the filter. Might just be a small drip.
How big is your feed line to your feed pump? If your hp pump is pulling more liquid then your feed pump can supply then it would cause problems.
If your feed pump is supplying enough pressure and liquid to the hp pump then if your getting 40 psi when it's just runnng alone then when you turn the hp pump on your feed pressure should go up to say 50 psi when the system is running properly and the hp pump is getting enough feed.
Try that.

[jake1]

Can figure pics out, its a 1.25" feed line camlocked to a flotech 1/2 Hp. Then a short run of 1" camlocked to the sap pre filter then fixed 3/4 to the Hp pump. When its at idle with Hp pump running its still getting 50 psi out of the filter. When I'm at 150 its up to 60-65 psi, because flow has slowed so it doesn't seem like a feed issue, unless I'm getting air somehow through the feed. When I shut it down I see there's air in the filter housing, it burps out into the clear hose but all those fittings are tight taped doped with no leaks. Seems like there should be no air anywhere in the system when running properly.

[regor0]

Have you tried pushing the bleeder on top of the filter to get all the air out? I have all camlocks on my RO, I found if they have any tension on them they will leak air.

[mkoehler79]

My thoughts are that you may have a bad procon pump. The procon is positive displacement meaning there's not much of a curve to flow vs pressure. Looking at how your combined perm and conc. flow total drops as pressure builds tells me you may have a bad pump as total flow should be 5+ gpm even at 170 psi. I had a bad procon pump this year do the same thing and a new pump cured it. Also, the bad pump made the very slightest rattle noise I never even detected until turning the new pump on and instantly noted a difference.

[Bricklayer]

Cam locks do leak. I noticed the one on my feed inlet to my manifold on my RO was dripping a bit. But never any air getting sucked through it.
procons are pretty simple pumps. Take the snap ring off the side and the cover will come off. Have a look inside and see what's going on. Did you buy it new or used?
When I was building mine I did an air pressure test at 15 psi. I capped off the feed line to the membrane and put a pressure gauge on and gave it 15 psi and let it sit overnight. If you have an air leak the pressure will go down. And if your lucky you might find the leak right away. It will hiss a little.
I guess you could do it with membrane in also but you'd have to cap off permeate line and concentrate lines. Just easier to do them separate.

[jake1]

There is deffinety a rattle to the pump, not bad but a uniform clicking as it runs, not sure what it is suppose to sound like. Its brand new

[Bricklayer]

Does it sound like this?

https://youtu.be/f36Fvy6IyHM

[mkoehler79]

Does it sound like this?

https://youtu.be/f36Fvy6IyHM
Mine didn't even sound that bad. I just noticed my flows and pressure was down to the point I couldn't even use the recirc loop.

[jake1]

Its deffinety not that bad but it does have a slight tick. Anyone ever get a bad pump off the shelf? Wonder if it'll run for a while or do they seem to get worst and totally fail?

[Bricklayer]

Where did you buy it? Maybe get in contact with them and explain your situation and see what they can do.

[jake1]

So normal running sound should have no tick?

[Bricklayer]

My RO doesn't use a procon, so I'm not too familiar with the sound they make running. But from the ones I did see running they were very quiet. Basically could just hear the electric motor running.

[mkoehler79]

Hi Jake. Have any luck with your RO yet? Just curious if you figured out any issues.

[jake1]

I've been running it and it still only makes 175psi tops. But I've been running it at 150 pi and pulling between 90 and 120gph of water out of my 1% sap. Recirculating it to around 4%· Its incredible even in its crippled state. I have tested every almost every aspect trying to figure the problem out. Bypassing filter, changed plumbing runs to eliminate turbulence, changed suction hose on feed pump, hardwired the pump motor bypassing all wiring, and a lot more too and it is very consistently the same. Pump is making air / cavatating around 175psi. New pump gets here tomorrow. That will tell me a lot

[Bricklayer]

Has to be the pump for sure.

[mkoehler79]

We ran ours until I got sick of the drop in performance. I think you'll be surprised with the new pump and what difference higher pressure makes.

[jake1]

Ha! Got the new pump. Still the same. So I borrowed a generator that has 230 and wired it to that and the performance increased. So its an issue with the motor. Is not starved for voltage, it just wont draw much. I wired it to 115v and it doesn't seem to draw more than 5 amps. Just guessing by how My generator reacts. It runs normal and doesn't heat up more than lukewarm. But it just wont draw much load when it needs to. I wonder if there's a brush that's misaligned in the motor so is low on power? Its a new lesson 1 hp. had the front plate off at one point, maybe I tweaked a brush in the back. Don't really want to tare into it because it s working and the saps flowing. Got a spare pump now at least.

[mkoehler79]

That is odd to me. Is it a 1750 rpm motor? Typically capacitive start single phase motors don't have brushes. I have never come across a "weak" motor in my experience. At least you have some production out of it.

[jake1]

It is a 1750 rpm an yeah I was guessing on the bushes. Not my area of expertise. Its a weird one. I'll investigate more after the season. For now its doing all I could have hoped for at 150 psi. Maybe that's just all the power the motors got to give. Thanks for all the insight on the matter