DIY RO Unit (inexpensive option?)

[Aquattro]

The thing with RO is it's like insurance. Sure, maybe tap water is fine. Here in victoria, we're about 7 TDS, really good water. My LFS uses tap water and his corals are nice. But...what if that changes one day? Something contaminates the water, broken main and sludge creeps in and you do a water change and kill all your corals. It can happen. One year in Kelowna, their water was discovered to be contaminated with agriculture runoff, and everyone had to boil water for a month. What if you did your water change then? If I somehow got copper in my water and lost coral, that's thousands of dollars lost. Sure, maybe unlikely, but with everything we work so hard to maintain, do you want to risk it over a hundred bucks?? I know i don't. I bought my unit for a couple hundred bucks 10 years ago, and I figure I got more than my money's worth from it.

[sphelps]

Car washes and smaller drug stores often have cheap RO water for sale, seen signs around town before for $1 or $2 for 5 gallons. Not sure how good the quality is and I know car washes don't have high quality RO water but I'm thinking it's way better than the alternative.

[clowny]

With these 7 stage Ro/Di units can you disconnect 1 or 2 of the 2 di stages i am sure you dont need 3 stages of di resin working, or will it last just as long as using each one seperate? also he has 1 for $101. buy now