Whenever a plant has the potential to be in the same soil for 2 or more growth cycles, I use the gritty mix. I no longer have much interest in growing what we would think of as typical houseplants. Almost everything I now grow is either a woody plant that can be manipulated, or a succulent, though I do practice bonsai techniques when the whim strikes, on plants like coleus, snapdragon, or anything else, the looks of which can be enhanced by a variety of techniques commonly used in bonsai. Many bonsai techniques are very easy to learn/apply, and can be seriously effective tools you can use to keep plants healthy and looking good - no matter whether you have an actual interest in bonsai or not. So, as things are now, everything you might think of as a houseplant is in the gritty mix; but, if I was growing gobs of plants like pothos, croton, pilea (the more herbaceous stuff), I'd have a lot of them in 5:1:1. FWIW - oxalis really loves the gritty mix, as do almost all succulents. How I judge what soil to use: If it grows very fast or has a very enthusiastic root system and needs repotting every year w/o fail (if they are to perform well), I'd choose the 5:1:1 mix. Plants like datura, brugs, hibiscus ...... go in the 5:1:1 because they almost always need an annual repot. I can't see much reason to put plants like that in the gritty mix unless they're to be grown in rather or very shallow pots where perched water would be especially ruinous of potential, even if you CAN squeeze a fair amount of additional potential from plants in more carefully-structured soils. Al

We have the same setup, RO water in the kitchen (via special faucet), softened water in the rest of the house, plain old city water outdoors. I've been using a sinkful of a combination of kitchen RO water supplemented with half outdoor tapwater when I water/feed my indoor plants (mostly phals and African violets). No problems so far. We just had the soft water system tech out for a checkup of the system (replacing cartridges, checking the softener, etc.) and during his instruction on how to backflush the kitchen RO system, he mentioned about not doing something in particular that would add the softened (salt) water back into the system. He even tested the output RO water, and it was pure as it could be. I'm convinced it's safe to use the RO on your plants (sure does drain the little RO tank fast, though!). Might want to consider getting a small container of MSU fert designed for RO water use, in order to put all the "good" chemicals back into the water for the plants. Easy way to test your outdoor water to see if it's conditioned--get a tender houseplant like an African violet and use that water only for a couple of months. Softened water will kill it off in short order (speaking from experience here). Of course, if your outdoor water is very hard (as ours is), you'll also get a ton of mineral buildup on the plant. Worth a try. Sharon

Not sure how to rate this product. WARNING - DANGEROUS Purchased this to use in my WATER SOFTENER. It was recommended to use as a iron remover treatment for water softener and water softener resin. The back of the bottle gives directions on this use and I followed the directions EXACTLY. I am convinced this use poisoned myself and my dog and possibly other household members. Dog was throwing up daily and I had terrible headaches and nausea. Other family member had lesser symptoms. Since dumping entire salt/brine tank, washing thoroughly and regenerating the softener multiple times - slight chemical smell has gone, headaches have ceased and dog is no longer vomiting. We had to switch to bottled water until I cleaned out our softener system. Trying to warn others of this possibility. After using the recommended mix of Super iron Out and water and adding to the brine tank, I performed a recharge on my water softener system as directions stated. The next morning I noticed a somewhat chemical-like smell from the water while taking a shower. Didn't know if this was a new shampoo my kids were using or other smell as it was faint and hard to detect. My thinking was perhaps it was the Super Iron Out bleeding into the water but thought "No, they would never give instructions to use this in your water softener with ANY possibility of ingestion if there was ANY slight chance of it being harmful would they? ... no way ... there has to be some oversight, or maybe they are overstating the danger for legal purposes?" So I didn't assume it was the Iron Out (and if I did, I thought .. "this must be normal as the resin must be now cleaned and maybe this is the by product of the process?"). I was trusting the directions. Couple days go by and smell subsides. I am waking up with terrible headaches but no symptoms of flu, cold, etc. one child is saying he is "a bit tired lately". Dog is vomiting multiple times a day (just small bile regurgitation's - when and if he ever throws up, it is rare but it is usually throwing up with something ... food ... chewed item, etc). Wife also said, his stools in the yard were mostly white in color. Not a panic because we through he was just sick or had something. Dog is rarely ever sick and I am rarely sick but the headaches were odd - like a migraine upon waking (which I never get). Dogs and humans don't get sick from same things and dogs are usually much more durable and you don't really ever notice them with symptoms like humans have - so when both of us were ill I was wondering if it might be something we are both ingesting (like tap water). Not everybody was impacted so i thought it was nothing. Kids did mention water looked like it had almost invisible particles in it but it didn't taste too "weird". After about 3 days, I started wondering and went to the salt tank and smelled - it had a strong "cleaning agent odor", i smelled the Super Iron Out bottle and it had same smell. Probably not the best idea since so many on here warn of this being a very NASTY chemical and caustic. At that point, I was not taking any more chances. I dumped the salt (all 120 lbs of it $$$) and pulled the salt tank off line took it outside and washed it thoroughly. I reattached it and put new salt and ran the regenerate about 4x. Smell is gone and no more headaches and dog stopped vomiting. Thinking dog drinks only water and alot of it (and is only 75 lbs) so maybe he was affected worst. This in no way a scientific conclusion, only my experience. I cannot comment on using this as a cleaning agent only but I would be very careful where you have ANY chance of indigestion no matter how great your water softener is working. I am thinking of a RO system for drinking water from now on - here we are, adding all this salt to the water, etc and even though they say it washes out of the softener - I am not so sure. this incident has me rethinking the whole issue of water safety for my family. You can never be too safe with something so key to your health and well being.

Hey Jake maybe I can be a little more clear on the Pure Water Appliance, and a little more helpful as I am more technically involved with the system and its design. First off there is no "magic sauce" or even a one size fits all approach with our unit. The machine is 3 compartmented so we can use a multitude of medias inside of our unit for different purposes. For instance in the state of Texas we use 85 different configurations of medias in this unit depending on the water it will be treating. When you ask what medias we use in the system the answer is quite a few of them. This solely depends on where the machine is going, and what it will have to remove to make drinking water in the whole house. That being said there are instances where the machine will not function 100% and in those instances we either add peripheral equipment to ensure the water quality going into the home. I.E a bad sulfur well, or a high TDS situation, or we simply will decline the use of the Pure Water Appliance. We DO NOT put the unit anywhere it will not function properly. That is why in the 4 years this thread has been operational it has not been flooded with bad reviews, and horror stories. Quite simply put if there is a problem with our unit it is simply fixed at no cost to our customers in any fashion. We actually guarantee our unit for 10 full years, and that covers everything on or in our unit including medias. So if our machine has a failure at 9 years 11 months, lets say either the second compartment, or third and the medias are no longer viable, then we simply replace the unit free of charge. No trip fee and no labor charge at all. Just to be clear the cost of replacing the unit at 9 years 11 months and 30 days is $0.00 usd . There is no company in the United states that can say that at all. Another thing I would like to add is that of course we design each compartment with proper space to expand and clean the medias properly. We actually use some ingenious flow screens that lift the beds evenly allowing us to clean more efficiently with less space. If you can lift a resin bed evenly you can reach your needed expansion in a smaller space. Also we use almost every media there is in the book redox, absorption, Ion exchange, filtration, you name a media that actually does what it is designed to do and we have probably used, or at least tested it's viability for use in our system. The way we build our units is off of proper testing of the water we will be treating, in all cities in Texas it is mandatory that they send water analysis reports to the state twice a year from multiple points of use in their water systems. We simply look at the water analysis reports for the last 20 years, make a projection of how we see the water changing, and design the system to the best of our ability for the next 20 years. We also recommend to our well customers that they have a full analysis done from a third party laboratory so we can build them exactly what they need, we offer our own base line testing, but anytime any one has their own well we always recommend labs off the TCEQ approved testing facilities. Does this machine work in every situation? absolutely not that's why if the machine wont work properly we either give an alternative set up that will take care of our customers problems, or recommend companies in their local area that can take care of them properly. We just design a system as bullet proof as we can, and back it with a non prorated warranty to protect and take care of our customers. No magic, no gimmicks just honest over the phone pricing, and proper service for our people. I'm sure this post wont be sufficient for you as I'm almost convinced you are a competitor hell bent on bashing our company. That is fine we know the warranty we have, we know the service we provide, and we will always take care of our customers, and even take care of customers that have been abandoned by shady inexperienced companies. We have been here for 37 years and will continue to be here for the foreseeable future.