reverse osmosis
 

Hi guys,

I'm new to this group and new to the reef hobby. I'm currently setting up a 86 gal reef at this time. I've been reading about R/O water and its importance to the success of reef keeping....in your opinion is it necessary if your municipal water is from underground wells and is of such a good quality that it doesn't have to be chlorinated.....

Hope to hear from you soon on this, and looking foward to discuss more the hobby

best regards

Marco

reverse osmosis
 

Hey Marco, welcome to the board.

The best advice for using tap water is to test it. Test it for all the things that will be harmful to your tank, especially chlorine, ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, phosphates and metals (copper kills inverts).

Our municipal water is pretty clean here as well, registering only 17ppm on my TDS meter, but contains chlorine and phosphates, so I bought an RO/DI unit which gives me ultra-pure water at 0ppm.

If your tap water tests out ok, great. If not, then invest in an RO/DI unit as it's much cheaper in the long run than buying RO water from the supermarket or water delivery companies.

reverse osmosis
 

given that we don't have the gear to test the tap water, we called the regional district who supplies (sells) us water and they came out and ran the analyses on a sample. if you call your water supplier i understand by law that they have to provide detailed analyses. worth a try. shane

reverse osmosis
 

what was the results from your sample Shane?

Steve

reverse osmosis
 

I did not have my water tested before I got a ro/di, but it tastes like it's fresh from the hot-tub compared to my filtered water! [img]images/smiles/icon_eek.gif[/img]

reverse osmosis
 

Cyano seems to have disapeared too... knock on wood

reverse osmosis
 

can post the test results here if ya like...

reverse osmosis
 

Well I say everyone needs an RO/DI system. Why worry about all the problems that come with fouled water. You end up buying water from the fish store make your own for pennies a gallon plus its fun and feeds my children. lol

reverse osmosis
 

Reefmaster, can you post your water test results?

Andrew, what is a TDS meter? Do you use your RO unit for your drinking water too?

reverse osmosis
 

Hey Sam,

A TDS meter is a device that measures Total Dissolved Solids. Basically it tells you how pure your water is. A reading of '0' means you have no impurities of any kind in the water (which is what you get with RO/DI water)

Anything can cause dissolved solids. From metals, to phosphates to the chlorine in our drinking water. I use one to test my RO/DI water for purity, and as soon as I get a reading, I know it's time to change my DI filter. It's also a good way to check the efficiency of your RO membrane, so you know when it's about time to change that too.

As for using it for drinking water, no I just use the carbon-filtered water from the water dispenser in my refrigerator. Seeing as my tap water only reads 17ppm on the TDS meter, I suspect that it's not too bad. Once the dispenser filter system removes the chlorine and smells from the water with the carbon filter, it actually tastes pretty good.

There are some doctors that recommend that people shouldn't drink RO/DI water because it is too pure, and our bodies need some of the metals and minerals that are present in the drinking water. I'm not a scientist or biologist or doctor, so I can't comment either way on that one.

Besides, if I use it for drinking water as well, it just uses up the filters that much faster, which ends up costing more money so I take the "scraps" from the fridge and leave the "good stuff" for the fish! [img]images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]