Home Water Filter Recomendations

[oatmeal69]

Er, I don't know if it works, but I do know pretty well everything is debatable. And certainly the pros and cons of flouridating water *is* being debated as public awareness grows, with the result that many governments are getting rid of it, not adding more of it.

Of course everything is debatable, I've heard there are still folks who think the world is flat. But the fact that it prevents tooth decay is statistically/scientifically sound.

I do not want my government and my tax dollars supporting having "medicine" added to my tap water.

This I COMPLETELY agree with. SO tired of the expanding nanny-state... But that's a WHOLE 'nother set of discussions.

Getting rid of fluoride and lead are the two main issues that prompted me to start this thread in the first place.

What have you decided? Home filter? Bottled H2O? I think when I get more financially solvent, I'm gonna do the home delivery thing.

[junk2222yard]

What have you decided? Home filter? Bottled H2O? I think when I get more financially solvent, I'm gonna do the home delivery thing.

I am leaning towards bottled water home delivery. Trying to get the wife on board. There are quite a few services in Toronto, but one I am especially interested in -- not the cheapest! -- can give you water in a glass container! My gut tells me that glass is better than even so-called "safe" plastic, but I haven't done much research on this, so I am not totally sold on the extra expense of glass of plastic.

I am waiting for them to send me the mineral profile of the R/O filtered water they have.

This is the company if you are interested:

http://www.cedarspringswater.ca/glass.php

I am looking at glass "11.3L Reverse Osmosis Bottled Water". If glass is not recommended, I will find a much cheaper place.

[oatmeal69]

Well, I used to have a couple glass jugs I'd go get filled at the water store. Have a nice ceramic holder and a stand, I really liked the look of the glass if nothing else.

[oatmeal69]

"THEY" say something about PTFE leeching in plastic containers... but we've already been over what I think about what "THEY" say.

[38onTRT]

$250 RO system in my house is the BEST money I have ever spent, period. No more bottled water from the store and I know I am getting clean water.

Did someone say the tanks are too big?? Mine fits under the sink and holds a gallon or so.. I dont see the point in buying someone else's product, making them money while really not knowing if the water is legit or not.. Just my .001c..

[junk2222yard]

$250 RO system in my house is the BEST money I have ever spent, period. No more bottled water from the store and I know I am getting clean water.

Did someone say the tanks are too big?? Mine fits under the sink and holds a gallon or so.. I dont see the point in buying someone else's product, making them money while really not knowing if the water is legit or not.. Just my .001c..

Can you tell me the make and model of it? I am still in the deciding stage.

Did you install it yourself?

[fireeater49]

I'm a big anti fluoride guy. It does serve it's purpose in young children but it is completely unneccesary beyond that. It is banned in most of Europe and is a main ingredient it rat poison.

Are you a brother fireman? The name caught my eye

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

Since this is the subject of "water" I like to add my two cents. I will provide you with some information which is VERY contradictory to what you been drinking your whole life. Alkaline Anti-Oxidant Micro-Clustered 9.5pH drinking water! Ever heard of it? If not, you might want to read the next few lines. For starters, bottled water is very acidic. I know you guys are worried about fluoride and chlorine...but what about acid? MOST bottled water contains a high amount of acid. I will provide you with a chart that has the results of tests done on your favorite liquid beverage. Aquafina and Desani are made from "reverse osmosis" so that will be fun as to see what's actually in it. It will not have any impurities in it, except for the leaching from the plastic, but it WILL contain acid! If you go to alkalineantioxidants with a dot com after it, there are videos that test the most common bottled waters. Now tap water is regulated at a pH of 7.0 or higher which is neutral. Any lower than that it will rust the pipes...but who cares about your body right? Bottled water isn't regulated in pH. The second best thing you can put in your body is tap water, but the best thing you can put in your body is "ionized water." Ionized water is purified "first," then restructured. If you want to know more just ask. Water ionizers are expensive, but worth it! They keep your body clean of impurities. If you don't want to fork out $1000 or more on an ionizer, you can drink tap water, or bottled alkaline water. Aquahydrate is found at your local GNC or you can find Eternal or Essentia. I am NOT a representative of either of those bottled water companies, just an alternative if you don't think the expense is worth the ionizer. Keep your body clean!

[Times Roman]

Since this is the subject of "water" I like to add my two cents. I will provide you with some information which is VERY contradictory to what you been drinking your whole life. Alkaline Anti-Oxidant Micro-Clustered 9.5pH drinking water! Ever heard of it? If not, you might want to read the next few lines. For starters, bottled water is very acidic. I know you guys are worried about fluoride and chlorine...but what about acid? MOST bottled water contains a high amount of acid. I will provide you with a chart that has the results of tests done on your favorite liquid beverage. Aquafina and Desani are made from "reverse osmosis" so that will be fun as to see what's actually in it. It will not have any impurities in it, except for the leaching from the plastic, but it WILL contain acid! If you go to alkalineantioxidants with a dot com after it, there are videos that test the most common bottled waters. Now tap water is regulated at a pH of 7.0 or higher which is neutral. Any lower than that it will rust the pipes...but who cares about your body right? Bottled water isn't regulated in pH. The second best thing you can put in your body is tap water, but the best thing you can put in your body is "ionized water." Ionized water is purified "first," then restructured. If you want to know more just ask. Water ionizers are expensive, but worth it! They keep your body clean of impurities. If you don't want to fork out $1000 or more on an ionizer, you can drink tap water, or bottled alkaline water. Aquahydrate is found at your local GNC or you can find Eternal or Essentia. I am NOT a representative of either of those bottled water companies, just an alternative if you don't think the expense is worth the ionizer. Keep your body clean!

Mate,

I've heard these sales pitches before. And they are all bogus. If you can provide a link to a "credible" source with a peer reviewed article or bona fide data, I'd love to see it. But your colorful charts mean nothing.
I was in the water business before, and heard all about ionized water. Its' rubbish.

Prove me wrong

---Roman

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

Roman...you got a GREAT point! Because ionized water launched in the US in late 2003 there is hardly any "bona fide data." The key word is...launched in the US. There ARE quite a bit of references/resources that are found in books written by doctors in Japan (ionized water has been around mainly in Japan since the 1950's). Japanese people have one of the highest life expectancy rates in the world! Ionized water technology is 1 in every 6 households in Japan. Still not "bona fide"....I know, but wait. Here are the books that I read BEFORE I got the water ionizing system. I too was skeptical...

Books read:

1. Killing Cancer Not People. Bob Wright - Founder of the American Anti-Cancer Institute dedicates a chapter in this book about ionized water and what it does to cancer patients.

2. Reverse Aging. By Sang Whang. A scientist and an inventor. Book was published in 1991 and he talks STRICTLY about reverse aging from the water you drink. Did you know that h20 is ONLY at a pH of 7.0? Go up or down on the pH scale it is no longer h20. Good read!

3. The Enzyme Factor. Dr. Hiromi Shinya 45 years of medical practice in the US and Japan pioneering colonoscopic surgery without the need for incision. He has some cool pictures of people drinking Kangen Water (ionized water) before/after.

4. Confessions of a Skeptical Physician. Dr. Tim McKnight MD talks about the scientific side of the water and how it interacts with your body. He also gets in depth with how ionized water passes through your acidic stomach without compromising the pH.

So then I went a step further. I started drinking it! That was a life changing decision. Things I noticed with MY body NOT other people's testimony:

1. Eczema went away
2. Recover MUCH faster from workouts. Lactic acid build up neutralized faster. I even got off my supplements because I have so much energy.
3. Energy levels through the roof! Very alert!
4. Coffee tastes better
5. Hardly get sick. IF I do catch a flu...it will only last a few hours. (I up the pH on the machine to flush the virus)
6. Regular bathroom breaks #2. That's NOT normal for me.
7. Had back surgery in 2001. Doesn't feel like it anymore. I still do get flare ups, but go away fast WITHOUT medications.

That's just off the top of my head. I do have video links, but the website won't let me post them. But one fact remains, this water DOES mix with sesame oil...cold! Regular water as you know, doesn't. I have videos of this. If the combination of this material along with trying the water for a week doesn't convince you, then you have no business drinking this stuff. Stick with regular water. I hope this generates more skeptical responses.

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

I noticed you have some experience with RO systems...Did you know how acidic RO water is? And do you know what "dead" water does to your body? Dead water meaning the lack of minerals in the RO water will pull the good minerals from your body. Is that good to pull minerals from your body by drinking RO water? Just the Acid part is a deal breaker. What are your thoughts?

[oatmeal69]

I've heard these sales pitches before. And they are all bogus. If you can provide a link to a "credible" source with a peer reviewed article or bona fide data, I'd love to see it. But your colorful charts mean nothing.
I was in the water business before, and heard all about ionized water. Its' rubbish.

Ditto.

[Moparman]

Sorry but this is definitely a sales pitch.

[oatmeal69]

Agreed. Reported.

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

I'm not going to lie, it is a sales pitch and a very good one! Will be extremely hard to prove me wrong and explain how ionized water mixes with oil. I apologize if I offended anyone here. I just hope everyone here will at least be educated on what's really in bottled water and reverse osmosis. Filtered tap water in my opinion is far more superior than bottled and reverse osmosis.

[Times Roman]

I'm not going to lie, it is a sales pitch and a very good one! Will be extremely hard to prove me wrong and explain how ionized water mixes with oil. I apologize if I offended anyone here. I just hope everyone here will at least be educated on what's really in bottled water and reverse osmosis. Filtered tap water in my opinion is far more superior than bottled and reverse osmosis.

again,
you seem to be a nice guy,
but you are making some spectacular claims....
....and with spectacular claims, we need spectacular "proof"

anyone can write a book mate. A book is NOT proof! - shit, i can show you plenty of books that claim the religion of dienetics, or whatever they are calling it today, they claim this fraudulent religion actually helps people. I personally think it just helps them out of their money. Oh, it's called Scientology today.

what I want to see, again, is the clinical data that supports your claims that, well, any of your claims.

so the next thing I hope to see from you is a link to a "reputable" source providing clinical data or peer reviewed articles that back up any of your claims.

I'm willing to bet $1 you will not comply as per my request, as the data does not exist.

We get a lot of blokes coming here selling supps, (claiming not to be reps) and a variety of other things.

Water ionizers can be purchased out the back of popular science.

There have been many articles exposing ionized/alchaline water as nothing more than a fraudulent scam. I found this in only 20 seconds:

http://www.chem1.com/CQ/ionbunk.html

The bottom line
Here, in a nutshell, are a few basic facts that I believe anyone with a solid background in chemistry or physiology would concur with:

"Ionized water" is nothing more than sales fiction; the term is meaningless to chemists.
Pure water (that is, water containing no dissolved ions) is too unconductive to undergo signficant electrolysis by "water ionizer" devices.
Pure water can never be alkaline or acidic, nor can it be made so by electrolysis. Alkaline water must contain metallic ions of some kind — most commonly, sodium, calcium or magnesium.
The idea that one must consume alkaline water to neutralize the effects of acidic foods is ridiculous; we get rid of excess acid by exhaling carbon dioxide.
If you do drink alkaline water, its alkalinity is quickly removed by the highly acidic gastric fluid in the stomach.
Uptake of water occurs mainly in the intestine, not in the stomach. But when stomach contents enter the intestine, they are neutralized and made alkaline by the pancreatic secretions — so all the water you drink eventually becomes alkaline anyway.
The claims about the health benefits of drinking alkaline water are not supported by credible scientific evidence.
"Ionized"/alkaline water is falsely claimed to be an anti-oxidant. It is actually an oxidizing agent, as can be seen by its ability to decolorize iodine (see video)
There is nothing wrong with drinking slightly acidic waters such as rainwater. "Body pH" is a meaningless concept; different parts of the body (and even of individual cells) can have widely different pH values. The pH of drinking water has zero effect on that of the blood or of the body's cells.
If you really want to de-acidify your stomach (at the possible cost of interfering with protein digestion), why spend hundreds of dollars for an electrolysis device when you can take calcium-magnesium pills, Alka-Seltzer or Milk of Magnesia?
Electrolysis devices are generally worthless for treating water for health enhancement, removal of common impurities, disinfection, and scale control. Claims that "ionized" waters are antioxidants are untrue; hypochlorites (present in most such waters) are in fact oxidizing agents.
Claims that "water ionizers are approved for use in Japanese hospitals" are misleading: these "approvals" merely attest to the machines' safety — that they will not electrocute you! My understanding is that the Japanese Health Ministry is highly critical of therapeutic claims made for alkaline water.

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

Anyone can write a book? Anyone can write an article! The article you found in 20 seconds is worthless. Stephen Lower is a retired chemist that wrote an article explaining his OPINION of what he THINKS ionized water acts on the body.

1. He is not an antioxidant expert.
2. He didn't back up any of his claims with clinical trials or even actual studies.
3. He tried to back up some of his claims with other articles which again...no studies were done! No evidence!
4. He's not a medical doctor only a chemist.
5. Did he have an ionizing machine to TEST his claims? Or did he just use formulas that are familiar to him to conjure up some "facts?"

So the article you back up your so called "opinions" are nothing but worthless as a person writing a book! You're right, anyone can write a book, but have you ever tried the water for a week? I had a professor at a University that I approached with the water. He said the same thing Stephen Lower and you said,, a bunch of crock. So I challenged him. I only gave him a gallon of this so called Kangen Water®. He took me up on this offer knowing he will have more proof! Low and behold, a week later when he saw me, he had a few words with me. He said and I quote..."I'm done with this." I asked him, what do you mean? He said again, "i'm done with this." This is a chemistry teacher with a PHD teaching students for a living. So I asked why? He said...this stuff is crazy. It did so many things to my body and I'm scared to drink it. He said there is truth in this water, but I'm not messing with it. I left him alone after that.

Now because I'm still a rookie here, my hands are tied on posting links. I'm already on the verge of getting kicked out from all the "bogus" claims I been making.
Now about the stomach...regular water will make it to the stomach and then the intestines and then "pass through." Ionized water will start to absorb while making its way through the esophagus. Yes, I will find you some evidence on that which you will again say is bogus and that the person offering the study is not "credible." These studies are from Japan so I will need to put them on a pdf and clip art it to this site. I have numerous video links of what doctors in the US are saying about this water and using their years of experience with their patients. Again, my hands are tied because of my rookie status on this site. So you and I can go back and forth about this like a tennis player or even two boxers. We both BELIEVE in what we currently drink like its a religion. Have you ever approached a Muslim and tried to convert them to Christianity? You worked for Culligan for like 10 odd years...of course I am not going to convince you. You been sold on what you have been doing for your whole life. The proof is in the pudding...I will not change what you believe in.

You still didn't answer the question about lack of minerals in RO water. I asked that for shittzz and giggles...

[lovbyts]

I was just reading the filtration system where I refill my 5 gallon water bottles for $1.50 a bottle and not only do they do the charcoal and UV light but also reverse osmosis. Not bad for $1.50 for 5 gallons.

[oatmeal69]

I concur with everything T.R. just said.
""Ionized water" is nothing more than sales fiction; the term is meaningless to chemists. "

Lovbyts - I used to get my drinking water just like that when I lived in L.A. It's probably the most economical way to get pure water, if you don't mind the time taken to go get it every month or so.

AlkalineAntioxidants - I think you ought to move on to more susceptible prey... You aren't going to sell anything here, my friend.

[38onTRT]

I purchased it from Amazon.. http://www.amazon.com/Watts-Premier-...Osmosis+System

and yes I installed it myself. It took me a few days to get everything together as I have Granite counter tops so I needed to cutout a hole for the faucet however that was very easy for me.. Once that was done, I was drinking RO water within 24hrs after flushing the tank 4 times.. Let me know if you need any help as I can walk you through the installation process..

Can you tell me the make and model of it? I am still in the deciding stage.

Did you install it yourself?

[AlkalineAntioxidants]

All,

I understand why you dislike ionized water. I obviously went to the fire station to sell firefighters water guns...uh----ooops!! lol. I also know why there are so many different types of water available. Everyone has different opinions just like there are so many different religions. I really appreciate the feedback I received...even though it wasn't good. If you're scratching your head why I enjoyed getting such bad feedback, well...lets face it...bad feedback is far better than no feedback. My journey is over...it was a fun ride.

[gatchaman]

Dammit. I am new here and my post with links and references was deleted because of my newbiness. Anyway here are my two cents.

There was a study done by Minnesota called MDH Evaluation of Point-of-Use Water Treatment Devices for Perfluorochemical Removal
Final Report - Summary, which essentially stated that home RO systems are great for removing dissolved solids (arsenic, minerals, etc...due to the Reverse Osmosis Membrane) and other contaminants in the water (flourocarbons - due to the numemerous charcoal filters) utilized in point of use systems before and after the Reverse Osmosis membrane. The downside is they require periodic maintence to make sure they are operating in peek operating condition.

My personal experience with RO systems, I have had many due to moving (Watts, Generic, Named brand etc...), is that I prefer the generic or the RO system that can utilize standardized RO membranes and cartridges because there are so many options to customize a system.

THe RO Membrane is the heart of hte system and there appears to be two distinct manufacturers. One being DOW chemical with its brand FILMTEC, and the other being GE DESAL. Based on my own personal research on multiple water forums and aquirum forms is that the nod seems to go with FILMTEC for its high rejection rate (the spec sheets and rejection rates can be found online). There is a company called spectrapure which sells pre-tested cherry picked membranes which boast RO membranes with very high rejection rates for a premium. THe higher the rejection rate, the better the RO membrane is at filtering out the dissolved solids in the water.

THe other half of most RO systems are the charcoal filters. I am partial to a brand called Matrikx cto/2 standard 10" filter due to its NSF water rating and other anectdotal water/aquarium comments.

Finally, some RO Systems also utilize a granulated inline activated charcoal filter before the final spigot. I am partial to the OmniPure inline granular activated charcoal filter because they are made in the USA and NSF rated.

Sidenote, even though I have been drinking filtered RO water at home, my mineral blood test panel on my most recent blood test has been normal since I appear to get plently of essential electrolytic minerals from supplements and food. Yes, the RO system does filter out essential mineral such as magnesium, sodium, potassium etc., but I supplement with Magnesium nonetheless.

[mg_srt]

I just purchased a RO system from Water Treatment Products & Water Purification Systems From US Water Systems and am very pleased. I spent $180 on a 5stage system, 5micron sediment filter, two carbon filters (1/10,000micron) the RO membrane, and a repolisher. I am no handy man and managed to install the system myself in under 2hrs. The company has youtube videos showing you the install. If you are worried about minerals you can get their 6 stage which adds a remineralization chamber adding calcium and magnesium back in.