# Humidifier question



## RNCollins (Mar 15, 2014)

Hi! 
I've been using distilled water for my in-room humidifier. What would happen if I used R/O water instead?


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## mrhappyrotter (Mar 15, 2014)

The water would continue to evaporate and raise your humidity.


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## TyroneGenade (Mar 15, 2014)

Find out what the tds is of your RO water. If it is zero (and it should be close unless your RO unit isn't working properly) then there shouldn't be any issues.


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## ALToronto (Mar 16, 2014)

Depends on the humidifier. If it's a consumer-grade product, RO should be fine. Some commercial humidifiers must have distilled, 0 ppm TDS water. You'd have to have a major greenhouse operation to justify one of those.


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## RNCollins (Mar 16, 2014)

*Humidifier*

It's a single room humidifier I got at RiteAid. My TDS of the R/O water is 0 ppm. I have about a dozen orchids so it is sufficient at raising the humidity. I just wasn't sure about the R/O water causing problems with the humidifier.


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## eteson (Mar 16, 2014)

No problem at all. I even use a ultrasound humidifier with water of about 50ppm and works fine.


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## gonewild (Mar 16, 2014)

The only problem with using your RO water is that the 99 year old store owner you have been buying the distilled water from will not have enough income and will have to miss one night of bingo.


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## gonewild (Mar 16, 2014)

The guy that has a shop next to ours has been running a RiteAid humidifier for several years constantly using tap water, no problems.


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## keithrs (Mar 16, 2014)

I have ran tap water (TDS +/- 300) for 2 years in my rite aid ultrasonic humidifier and have had no problems. Don't let it run dry.... That when the minerals will build up.


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## Rick (Mar 16, 2014)

Distilled and RO are fully equivalent (as long as the RO is working).

The only downside of using pure water (instead of a chlorinated tap water) is that you will eventually get a lot of biofouling on the pads or wicks.

I think most pad or wick type humidifiers recommend adding a drop or two of bleach to the sump periodically to kill any biofilms (that will shorten the life of the wicks).

Using a crusty tap water or well water will generate some pretty crusty wicks in short order. So I also use RO in my humidifiers 99% of the time then occasionally run some chlorinated tap water through to kill the slime.


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## Ray (Mar 17, 2014)

Tyrone - Depending upon the membrane used, the output from an RO system will contain from roughly 1%-7% of the incoming TDS. Rarely will it be zero.

Keith - if you are using 300 ppm water in an ultrasonic unit, aren't the minerals carried in the droplets depositing a white film throughout the room?


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