Heya!
I'm looking at filtering options, and I'm leaning towards going for a simple 10" cartridge filter housing with a Geyser hybrid, conocut shell activated carbon block / catalon cartridge.
This mainly to remove any chlorine purely to discourage and chlorine induced corrosion in the machine (taste doesn’t bother me) and reduce the slightly high CaCO3 content of my tap water.
However, magnesium and calcium in the water is relatively low, and I'm worried catalon might reduce it further.
Catalon is supposedly designed to "reduce hardness while maintaining natural mineralization level" ? ok, but how? does it remove CaCO3 but not magnesium for example? they don't explain. My guess is it is has a weak ion exchange effect so it filters some, but not all.
Anyway:
Based on the municipality data, the pertinent concentrations in mg/l (or ppm, it's the same) are
CaCO3: 143
Magnesium: 12
Calcium: 37
Chlorine: 0.38-0.46 (NO chloramine)
I have a custom-modified EC685. I've installed an OLAB 22001-15, with a delonghi membrane pulse absorber (delonghi calls it a "pressure regulator"),and a brass adjustable OPV, so there's a significant amount of brass in the machine (no brass is electrically coupled to the stainless thermoblock). (also an IMS DL200NT shower-head and I'm using an IMS DL2TH26E basket but I don't think that's relevant)
I've been using it un-modified (no brass) for about a year, and modded it last month. When I stripped the original pump (an Aimega K315 unit) no visible pitting or corrosion was detectable in any of the components. Especially the solenoid armature was like it just left the factory. Shiny and perfect.
also, Delonghi claims 143ppm CaCO3 is considered "soft" (puts the limit for soft at 180ppm) And in that reminder setting I end up descaling before the machine warns me, every... couple of months? maybe 3. Not becasue anything tells me I need to but I just feel weird not doing it after a while. No visible evidence of residue issues where seen when I disassembled it for the mod.
So all that said, what do you think about the catalon filter? does that water have enough magnesium and calcium to remain adequetly buffered? Is the CaCO3 content low enough that I can just use an activated carbon block for the chlorine and not remove any hardness?
I've looked at BWT pitcher-filter combo but running costs seem... unappealing. The Catalon hybrid filter will be ~27€ shipped yearly, the straight carbon will be ~17€ for half micron or ~12 for 1 micron. Both significantly cheaper but catalon is acceptable for yearly replacement. (the geyser filter also contains silver which inhibits biological growth, making more likely to last the 12 months considering the low use it will see)
Do i just skip and go on using tap? 0.4ppm chlorine seems... not very high. I CAN smell it if it's sitting around for a while in a container, but taste hasn't been an issue (I also have a ridiculously sensitive sense of smell)
Sorry for the very long post. I'm into the rabbit hole...