wow, 17! Some reefers in the US have 10ppm coming out of their RO units!

i wouldnt use the tap water if the tds was 0. i have to much invested in my corals and setup to risk a tank crash on shitty water.

especially for the $200 an RO Unit costs..

This is a tank with just $h!tty tap water!

http://totm.aquariumpros.ca/index.shtml

:rolleyes:

I agree with DirtyReefer. TDS is about 17, and on 3 start ups in my aquarist Career , all have lead to hair algea and or cyno when I used tap water. RODI I had vertually none.

I guess it just depends on your tolerence level for algae.

Thanks all for you comments and suggestions! I think I will just have to make the time and make the RO water. I think it can probably be done with tap water, but this is my first saltwater tank and don't want to push my luck! hehe

Bud

Well tapwater in Surrey runs about 10-50 ppm TDS, Alkalinity 30ppm Calcium 30 ppm and the pH runs 7.2-7.5 when we test water for people. We use the AP tapwater filter and get a TDS of 0-2ppm. Have had no problems to date. Also making 38 gallons of water goes pretty quick - like coming to the kitchen for a snack only to step in a puddle.

Doug

Neither do baby elephants, but when they do you should see the sparks fly!

Just a correction, the water coming out of the AP Tap Water conditioner is DI water and NOT RO water.

DI is stripped of more than RO I believe. People use RODI because using just DI would deplete the DI media really quickly, and it is more expensive to replace than the RO membrane, carbon and filter media.