TDS Meter

If you have a swimming pool in the Los Angeles area or anywhere in the Southwest United States, it’s pretty much assumed that you should be familiar with the term Total Dissolved Solids (TDS). TDS is best described by, “the total amount of mobile charged ions, including minerals, salts or metals dissolved in a given volume of water, expressed in units of mg per unit volume of water (mg/L), also referred to as parts per million (ppm).” In the swimming pool industry TDS is directly related to the actual purity of water and usually a number that is referred to when it’s time to change out the water in your swimming pool. A majority of swimming pool stores that test pool water will use TDS as a measure to signify you if your water should be changed out. If you have an opportunity to have your swimming pool water tested at a pool store, please also ask them to check calcium hardness too!

As for Total Dissolved Solids, they come from organic sources such as leaves and silt, they can also come from fertilizers and pesticides too. Dissolved solids also come from inorganic materials such as rocks and air that may contain calcium bicarbonate. But, the most common place that these dissolved solids come from is our water. The water picks up many of these metals because of where it is sourced which over time causes numerous problems to the surface of the swimming pool, the decorative tile, spillways, water features and pool equipment.

As water evaporates, the minerals remain in solution and slowly destroy the surface of the swimming pool but can also make it harder to handle your water chemistry as well. The general rule of thumb is to change out the water every two years. If you take a water sample into a pool store they will usually recommend changing out your water when TDS levels climb above 3,000 parts per million (ppm). At that point you have two options:

• Drain and refill with hard water from the tap (we don’t recommended this)
• Reverse Osmosis Mobile Filtration (recommended for reasons listed below)

Our mobile filtration trailers are equipped with high pressure Reverse Osmosis (RO) membranes that can lower TDS, calcium hardness, cyanuric acid (CYA) and other hardness minerals while conserving up to 85% of the water in the swimming pool. Not to mention they also remove waterborne diseases as well. There are many areas in the United States including Southern California, where we are located, where drought conditions are extreme and water conservation is in the news. Our mobile filtration trailers have the ability to conserve a lot of water and this process is a solid reason to never drain your pool again.

If you have any questions about how this service works, contact us today!