Better drinking water at the kitchen sink, on town water or a private well, with iron, sulphur and hardness handled upstream so the membrane lasts.
Under the sink, a reverse osmosis (RO) unit sends water across a very fine membrane that rejects dissolved minerals, softener sodium and the metallic edge other cartridges miss. It feeds its own small faucet: a drinking water filter for your East Gwillimbury kitchen.
Where a Sharon, Queensville or village-core home is on the municipal supply, the water arrives already treated and RO is mainly about taste. We check hardness at the tap first; if it is hard, a softener ahead of the RO protects the membrane.
Properties on private wells across East Gwillimbury, including around Mount Albert, start with a raw water test. Iron, sulphur and hardness all foul a membrane, and RO is no substitute for a bacteria test.
Hardness and iron are a membrane's worst enemies. Whatever the water test finds, the fix belongs in the basement before the kitchen.
We confirm town water or well, note what already treats it in the basement, and take a before reading at the kitchen tap.
Unit, tank and any fridge line are laid out with you so cartridges come out without emptying the cupboard.
The faucet uses a spare sink hole or one drilled through the counter, with its own shut-off on the cold supply and the reject line on the drain above the trap.
We flush the membrane, check fittings under pressure and compare a reading at the RO faucet with the before reading, then date-label each cartridge.
Homes here on town water get a treated supply, so RO handles taste and dissolved minerals. We test hardness at the sink, and if it is hard with no softener upstream, we say so, since hardness wears membranes out early.
Century homes in Holland Landing, Sharon and Mount Albert can still have galvanized supply pipes whose rust plugs pre-filters, so we check the line to the sink first.
Any iron or sulphur the raw water test finds is treated at the main, ahead of everything. Left untreated, it fouls a membrane, and the rotten-egg smell comes from a dissolved gas RO is not built to remove.
Well pressure rises and falls with the pump, so we gauge it at the sink before suggesting a booster. Reject water drains to the septic tank.
Drinks lose the chlorine note of town water or the mineral taste of a treated well, and a connected ice maker gets the same water.
Pitcher filters and cases of bottled water drop off the shopping list.
The RO faucet pours more gently than the main tap, and the tank takes a while to recover after a big pot.
An air-gap faucet may gurgle for a moment as the system refills. That is the drain line working, not a fault.
Sediment and carbon cartridges are changed on the schedule set at installation, sooner on a gritty well.
When the faucet slows or readings drift toward the before figure, the membrane is wearing out.
If orange staining or scale shows up elsewhere, have the iron filter or softener serviced before it costs you a membrane.
A tank that sputters halfway through a jug has lost its air charge, which we restore at filter changes.
Start upstream. A Queensville home with a working softener often needs only the RO unit; a well near Mount Albert with untreated iron, sulphur or hardness may need those stages first, quoted separately. Then come the number of stages, an optional remineralizing cartridge, tank size, distance to the fridge, drilling a stone or quartz counter, and a booster pump for weak well pressure. You get a written price before any work starts.
RO treats only drinking and cooking water. It does not stop scale in showers or the water heater. That is a water softener's job; see water softener installation in East Gwillimbury. Whole-home water filtration handles grit, chlorine taste and odour at every tap. On a well the order runs sediment, then any iron, sulphur or hardness treatment the water test calls for, UV if it is chosen as the long-term bacteria safeguard, then RO; see well water treatment.
Questions homeowners on town water and on wells ask before choosing a system.
Each of these is handled by AquaTec Plumbing from our shop on Grist Mill Road.
Call the Holland Landing shop. We check what treats your water now and quote in writing.
