Water purifier
 

Can anyone tell me what to look for, which is a better brand.
Thanks.


Marcus

Are you wondering about RO unit's or underthe sink single chamber carbon type units?

RO units, I have a under sink filter that I have been using for tank water that has a Charcoal cartridge and a Micron(25). I am having green water problems in my tank that I think may be a result of the tap water. The water did turn cloudy shortly after a 10% water change. I did another water change with RO/DI water that I bought last night. Hard to say if it has helped any yet. I go throught 3 18L water jugs that I fill at Safeway every week and a half that the Dogs and Cat drink so it would pay for its self in the long run.

I bought my RO/DI from Aquasafe Canada on Ebay.. Works great.. the support is wonderful.. Here is a link to their ebay store

http://www.stores.ebay.com/id=70548722&ssPageName=L2

Well I got my RO/DI unit from J/l

It's a Kent maxxima 60gpd RO/DI unit. I got the ro/di unit for the purest water possible. I use this unit for drinking water as well by just Ting off the water before it goes into the DI cartridge.

I know there are many diffrent brands out there and I'm sure you can't go wrong with any of them. I am happy with my kent unit.

cheers

Thanks for the info, would I need to add any elements to the water or does the Salt take care of that? Thanks again.

Marcus

Salt takes care of that. If your using the water for drinking you would want to get it before the DI cartridge. I have heard that drinking
DI water is not good for you and Yes I have tried it and it doesn't taste too good either :rolleyes: :lol:

Thanks Jonathan, I may try the Aguasafe, seems to be a good price and Canadian. :biggrin:

I dont understand what is wrong with DI water for personal consumption?

absolutly nothing.

Steve

If I forget to close the lid the dogs like to drink the filtered water from the bowl that my toilet tank makes. I don't understand their choices.

:mrgreen:

Marcus
 

I installed a Aquasafe RO/DI about 2 weeks ago. Great product for the price. We bought one for two reasons. The first was for tank water(which isn't set up yet), but we were also paying 85 bucks every 6 months for a charchol filter in our fridge. It is going to be way cheaper for us to use this system. This made it an easy sell to the wife. A point of interest, when I tested the water out of our tap we had 183 TDS. out of the filtered fridge 176 TDS, and out of the RO/DI 0-1 now. Took about a week to get to 0. And yes we are DI'ing all our water.

Hope this helps

Al

Other thank taste I guess it would be fine. Didn't we have a big discussion about this some time ago :lol:

I musta missed it, my bad.

Carry on! :)

I believe DI is not usualy used for "drinking" water because the thought goes if you drank 100% pure water you are depriving your body of some essential minerals. This is just what I have learned from a person who does our water system at work. I've heard this is very important in the "asian" community (or atleast I am told by a fellow co-worked who is always preaching to me the chinese ways).

I personaly just used the RO/DI for my reef tank and I used Bottled Spring water for my own personal consumption.

Chad

But Chad! Chinese people also drink warm water! Wth is up with that? Whats wrong with a nice, cool and refreshing glass of water? :)

PS - I'm not racist, I'm dating a chinese girl and have first hand experience with the warm water thing.. I asked for a glass of water at dinner with her parents and got warm water... I was told it is better for my health then to drink cold water... doesnt make much sense to me :)

Hehe, I get told all the time what is best for my body from my chinese friend, like this fruit is for cold bodied and this is for warm body... blah blah.. I tune it out now :)

I have two Dalmations and a cat. We started buying filtered water to help prevent Stones as Dals are prone to get them. They wont drink tap water if I run out. Don't ask, my wife can't figure out how we run out with three 18L bottles. The cat drinks more water than I do, I know this as I have to clean the litter box now. :eek:

Marcus

Just for starting out, with my first cycle, must I have filtered water? Should I just buy some from safeway?

Yup, great plan.

I don't know much about water purifiers, so maybe someone can answer an ignorant question for me:
With these RO/DI units, do you need a water outlet to dedicate to them? Or can you take them on and off a sink that you use for other things? I live in an apartment, and I'm just wondering if an RO/DI is even an option for me.

Thanks! Another lame question, should I have the tank filled right to the top, or does it really matter (as long as the live rock is covered)

Gujustud, are you just curing the rock and tossing the water later? If so, you could likely use tapwater. If you're filling the tank and the water will mostly stay there, use filtered. If the former is the case, you could probably just cover the rock. What size tank is it?

I just got a 38gal tank. I'm picking up 10lbs of LR today, maybe a little more for now. Its the first time I using this tank, so i'm not sure if I'm okay using normal tap water with the LR and sand, or if I should be using filtered from safeway.

The idea that DI water isn't good for you is based on the belief that you're body gets essential minerals etc from our water, this is not true

"The human body gains the minerals necessary to good health primarily through eating foods, not through drinking water. The body may absorb or use the minerals in water but, in most cases, the amount would not be significant. In order for a person to obtain sufficient minerals from water, it would be necessary to drink many gallons daily. In general, neither a water with a high mineral content, nor a fully softened water, could be considered a significant source of minerals. In contrast, one glass of milk provides the mineral equivalent of multiple gallons of ordinary well water.

Note: Certain trace elements, such as fluoride, iodine, etc., may be obtained from water. However, these would not be removed through common household water softening."

That's a quote from the North American Water Quality Association.
http://www.wqa.org/sitelogic.cfm?ID=360

Doug

Basically, if you're going to keep any of the water in the tank after cycling, you'll be better off with filtered. Generally tap water is OK if you're curing rock in a tub or something, but unless this is really stinky rock, I'd fill the tank with RO water and this will be the initial setup. The rock will cure in this water and when the levels are normal, you can start adding things (slowly)

I picked up 12lbs of live rock. I also picked up a tap water filter. I filled up about 14 gal of filtered water in the tank, and i've cleaned off my LR with a toothbrush, and i added it to the tank. I also put in my 30lbs of sugar sand.

The tank is REALLLLY cloudy right now. I've got my powerhead running, but mainly because I've added salt to the mix as well, as i'm trying to get the salinity right.

Should I turn off the powerhead once the salinity is right, and let the cloudyness die down?

Btw, I've also got my heater running as well.

I remember a thread along time ago on another board that said the extact same tihing. But another reason not to drink it is because the DI product tastes like crap unnless you add another carbon filter after the DI :)

Cheers,
Vic

that is it on the barrel head.. nothing wrong with DI at all for drinking, infact some small waterless countries use DI to make there drinking water. but it doesent taste like crap it has no taste. The problem is it tends to taste dry. I was drinking it all the time for 2 years (because I was to cheep to put a "T" in to be able to take the water off befor my DI, but now I have the "T" but I did it not because it isn't good to drink but rather so I wouldent shorten the life of my DI cartrage by using it for both drinking and fish. I can say now that once my DI is done I will not buy another. the PPM out of my RO is 0 and the PPM out of my DI is 0. I have been using it for 2 years almost and I have not yet exzausted the resin so that tells me there is no need for it.

Steve

Yeah Steve our water here on the mainland is pretty good as well. When I was breeding discus a friend who lives in downtown Van sent off a water sample to Mike Wells (a well known and respected Discus breeder) he ran a ton of test on the sample she sent him. His conclusion was, our water is to soft to support life, There is, nothing in it to speak of. I still feel better filtering it though, especially in the spring/summer when pesticides are being sprayed and the air can get heavy with smog.

Doug

Steve, I find the same thing. My unit has been putting out at least 5g per day for the last 1.5 years, and the TDS still = 0.

oh yes filter definatly but with a RO. if you have to make one investment that would be it. I think for our water a DI is a waist of money. the one thing we do have in our water is a high algae count because of our year round mild temps.

Steve

It's not too bad if you know how to recharge the DI resins. That is if you are comfortable working with the chemicals needed to recharge :)

Cheers,
Vic

Veng, Yeah I've got the link someone else posted, it looks easy enough and I've got both the chemicals needed, I just need to buy some rubber gloves, and wear out my resins..they sure last a good long time.

Doug

I get around 300 gallons for resins the since of the Aq Pharm Tap water filter DI resins.

Cheers,
Vic

BCorchidguy......... a bit off topic.......... did you ever mail order discus? I was just wondering which companies are good ones to order from. I've always wanted a Discus tank but I have never gotten around to it.

But since there is room in the living room for it......... I just may set up a 90 gallon discus tank :)

Cheers,
Vic

Veng I ordered a couple times from Mike Wells, always got bigger fish than I ordered and usually a back up fish just incase something didn't make it. Jack Wattley is also considered one of the better ones.

http://www.wattleydiscus.com/
http://www.adiscusdream.com/index.html

looked into that also, it realy isn't worth the chemicals, time, and effort to do one at a time. if you had 5 and did 4 at a time it might be different.

Steve

How was your order? Any DOA's? They gave extra fish....... wow. That is so cool.

Cheers,
Vic