Tank Startup water?
- Thread starter dwall2011
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_Alex_
Valuable Member
RO water woudl be your best option if u can get ahold of it, tap water has alotof minerals and metals in it and can cause problems like excressive algae bloom and other probelms if wanting to have coral and inverts
when i first started out i used tap and had a really bad algae problem intill i converted to rodi water. evevrything has been alot better since switching
dechlorinated is your next best option over ro
when i first started out i used tap and had a really bad algae problem intill i converted to rodi water. evevrything has been alot better since switching
dechlorinated is your next best option over ro
Russellaqua
Coral Junkie
+1
RO is definitely the best IMO. If your tap water has extra phosphates or other nutrients in it you'll be battling algae for a while to come. Many LFS sell RO water, and sometimes you can get it in 5 gallon jugs at grocery stores. It'll cost a little extra to start with, but it's well worth the investment in the long run.
RO is definitely the best IMO. If your tap water has extra phosphates or other nutrients in it you'll be battling algae for a while to come. Many LFS sell RO water, and sometimes you can get it in 5 gallon jugs at grocery stores. It'll cost a little extra to start with, but it's well worth the investment in the long run.
FishyFarr
Active Member
RO as much as possible
if you use tap water to fill the tank get ready for algae bllooms
I had this problem as well.
However if you consistently change out your first tank of water with RO water the algae blooms will go away pretty fast.
you will still have algae blooms they will just go away.
I had a 55 and changed out 20 gallons a week and after about 2 weeks the algae was bad but liveable.
after one month all was well. The live rock will also soak up some of nasty stuff that comes in our tapwater.
if you use tap water to fill the tank get ready for algae bllooms
I had this problem as well.
However if you consistently change out your first tank of water with RO water the algae blooms will go away pretty fast.
you will still have algae blooms they will just go away.
I had a 55 and changed out 20 gallons a week and after about 2 weeks the algae was bad but liveable.
after one month all was well. The live rock will also soak up some of nasty stuff that comes in our tapwater.
If you are getting into this hobby and going to get into corals RO/DI is a must, so do it right from the start and buy a RO/DI unit up front, it beats hauling water from the store or LFS. Thinks of it as a esenrtial piece of start up equiptment.
TopNotchCorals
Valuable Member
Reverse Osmosis/Deionized Water
TopNotchCorals
Valuable Member
If I were to use just one of the two filtered waters it would be RO instead of Deionized
kellyjn
Active Member
Yes you can use deionized water.
If it is deionized water, it has most likely already been through a Reverse Osmosis filter also, so it would be RO/DI water.
The process works like this.....
Tap water - 200ppm.
It goes through the RO membrane and gets cleaned to about 15-5ppm
It than passes by DI resin which absorbs all other impurities and should come out 1-0ppm.
You can use DI resin on straight tap water. However it uses a ton of DI resin.
Hope that helps
If it is deionized water, it has most likely already been through a Reverse Osmosis filter also, so it would be RO/DI water.
The process works like this.....
Tap water - 200ppm.
It goes through the RO membrane and gets cleaned to about 15-5ppm
It than passes by DI resin which absorbs all other impurities and should come out 1-0ppm.
You can use DI resin on straight tap water. However it uses a ton of DI resin.
Hope that helps
Here is the process of Ro DI water.
Quoted from Buckeye Field Supply.
A good rule of thumb is to replace your sediment filter and carbon block after six months. A more precise way to maximize the useable life of these two filters is to use a pressure gauge to identify when pressure reaching the membrane starts to decline. This is your indication one or both of the filters is beginning to clog.
Also be cognizant of the chlorine capacity of the carbon block. A good 0.5 micron carbon block for example will remove 99% of chlorine from 20,000 gallons of tap water presented at 1 gpm. Some original equipment suppliers commonly provide carbon cartridges rated at 2,000 to 6,000 gallons.
Regarding your RO membrane and DI resin, use your TDS meter to measure, record, and track the TDS (expressed in parts per million) in three places:
1. Tap water
2. After the RO but before the DI
3. After the DI.
The TDS in your tap water will likely range from about 50 ppm to upwards of 1000 parts per million (ppm). Common readings are 100 to 400 ppm. So for sake of discussion, let's say your tap water reads 400 ppm. That means that for every million parts of water, you have 400 parts of dissolved solids. How do we go about getting that TDS reading down to somewhere near zero?
If you do some experimenting with your TDS meter, you'll note that your sediment filter and carbon block filter (collectively called “prefilters”) do very little to remove dissolved solids. So with your tap water at 400 ppm, you can measure the water at the “in” port on your RO housing and you'll see it is still approximately 400 ppm.
The RO membrane is really the workhorse of the system. It removes most of the TDS, some membranes to a greater extent than others. For instance, 100 gpd Filmtec membranes have a rejection rate of 90% (i.e., they reject 90% of the dissolved solids in feed water). So the purified water coming from your 100 gpd membrane would be about 40 ppm (a 90% reduction). Filmtec 75 gpd (and below) membranes produce less purified water (aka “permeate”), but have a higher rejection rate (96 to 98%). The life span of a RO membrane is dependant upon how much water you run through it, and how dirty the water is. Membranes can function well for a year, two years, or more. To test the membrane, measure the total dissolved solids (TDS) in the water coming in to the membrane, and in the purified water (permeate) produced by the membrane. Compare that to the membrane’s advertised rejection rate, and to the same reading you recorded when the membrane was new. Membranes also commonly produce less water as their function declines.
After the RO membrane, water will flow to your DI housing. DI resin in good condition will reduce the 40 ppm water down to 0 or 1 ppm. When the DI output starts creeping up from 0 or 1 ppm, you know that your resin needs to be replaced. Sometimes people complain that their DI resin didn't last very long. Often the culprit is a malfunctioning RO membrane sending the DI resin “dirty” water. This will exhaust the resin quicker than would otherwise have been the case. Sometimes the problem is poor quality resin – remember that all resins are not created equal!
Quoted from Buckeye Field Supply.
A good rule of thumb is to replace your sediment filter and carbon block after six months. A more precise way to maximize the useable life of these two filters is to use a pressure gauge to identify when pressure reaching the membrane starts to decline. This is your indication one or both of the filters is beginning to clog.
Also be cognizant of the chlorine capacity of the carbon block. A good 0.5 micron carbon block for example will remove 99% of chlorine from 20,000 gallons of tap water presented at 1 gpm. Some original equipment suppliers commonly provide carbon cartridges rated at 2,000 to 6,000 gallons.
Regarding your RO membrane and DI resin, use your TDS meter to measure, record, and track the TDS (expressed in parts per million) in three places:
1. Tap water
2. After the RO but before the DI
3. After the DI.
The TDS in your tap water will likely range from about 50 ppm to upwards of 1000 parts per million (ppm). Common readings are 100 to 400 ppm. So for sake of discussion, let's say your tap water reads 400 ppm. That means that for every million parts of water, you have 400 parts of dissolved solids. How do we go about getting that TDS reading down to somewhere near zero?
If you do some experimenting with your TDS meter, you'll note that your sediment filter and carbon block filter (collectively called “prefilters”) do very little to remove dissolved solids. So with your tap water at 400 ppm, you can measure the water at the “in” port on your RO housing and you'll see it is still approximately 400 ppm.
The RO membrane is really the workhorse of the system. It removes most of the TDS, some membranes to a greater extent than others. For instance, 100 gpd Filmtec membranes have a rejection rate of 90% (i.e., they reject 90% of the dissolved solids in feed water). So the purified water coming from your 100 gpd membrane would be about 40 ppm (a 90% reduction). Filmtec 75 gpd (and below) membranes produce less purified water (aka “permeate”), but have a higher rejection rate (96 to 98%). The life span of a RO membrane is dependant upon how much water you run through it, and how dirty the water is. Membranes can function well for a year, two years, or more. To test the membrane, measure the total dissolved solids (TDS) in the water coming in to the membrane, and in the purified water (permeate) produced by the membrane. Compare that to the membrane’s advertised rejection rate, and to the same reading you recorded when the membrane was new. Membranes also commonly produce less water as their function declines.
After the RO membrane, water will flow to your DI housing. DI resin in good condition will reduce the 40 ppm water down to 0 or 1 ppm. When the DI output starts creeping up from 0 or 1 ppm, you know that your resin needs to be replaced. Sometimes people complain that their DI resin didn't last very long. Often the culprit is a malfunctioning RO membrane sending the DI resin “dirty” water. This will exhaust the resin quicker than would otherwise have been the case. Sometimes the problem is poor quality resin – remember that all resins are not created equal!
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