Reverse osmosis unit

[ravenfan8705]

I just bought a RO unit from lfs. The guy really suggested I use one when starting up my new tank. My question is, do you really think its neccesary? I use well water from the house and my 55g has been fine for 8+ months? I don't mine using it but the 50g a day unit seems to be producing about 25g a day and this thing is going to take way to long to fill my 150. Can I skip this unit and use straight well water again?

[Bifferwine]

Depends on the quality of the well water. Well water is usually high in minerals and can be high in heavy metals too, all of which are bad for reef tanks. If I were you, I'd test the phosphates and nitrates of the well water (to see if it has the potential to contribute to nuisance algae growth) and if that checks out okay and your tank has been fine using well water all along (no coral or invert deaths), then I'd say it's okay to continue using the well water. But I still think RO water would be better.

[ravenfan8705]

Thanks Biff. The tank will be fowlr, will that make a difference. I am currently running the RO water into a storage container, it's been running for about 14-15 hours and I have about 10 gallons. This thing is not what I expected. I'll test my water and then compare it to the RO water and see how much better it really is (hopefully my tests will show all the important things that I'm looking for).

[Piggy]

If you got the one that makes 50 gallons in 24 hours you should be getting at least 2 gallons a hour. Could be your water pressure is low.

[ravenfan8705]

Yea, I think its the pressure and also the temp. It will probably take 7-10 days to fill my tank and the rate its going.

[Keaton]

What type of well do you have? If it's an artesian well I wouldn't reccommend using it at all. Artesian wells are like underground rivers flowing for miles. Long story short...If the guy 5 miles down the street has been dumping his old motor oil in the backyard it will leech and might end up in your water supply. The same goes for everyone else around. Also, mineral deposits frequently break loose and you will have a high mineral con tent for a few days. It's a total crapshoot as to the quality of water you'll get and for organisms as fragile as coral it's just not a viable source of water for your reef. Hope this helps.

[Keaton]

Biff's right use RO water even if you have to buy it. It's cheap at Wal-Mart.

[fatman]

I would try to be patient. Purchased RO water can get to be expensive and inconvienient to boot. Low water pressure and low water temperature both lower the output and efficiency of a RO filter. What I would do is set the RO water to running in a five gallon bucket and the drain water from the RO filter into a trash tote or other large container. Let the unit run untill you get around two gallons of good RO water in your bucket. Then measure the amount of RO water you got versus the amount of waste water. Here in Alaska RO water runs around 50 cents a gallon. Tap water runs 2.5 cents per gallon. Which means if I do not count in the cost of the RO filter or the replacement cost of filters into the water costs I can allow 20 gallons of waste water for each gallon of good RO water produced. I get a 1 to 5 ratio now , but I spent, with booster pump and solenoid valves, around $200 for that efficiency, however my RO water now only cost 15 cents per gallon. I also added a pressure tank and sink faucet and DIO filters but that was later. Before I got only 8 to 9 gallons per day with 20 gallons of waste water for each gallon of good RO water produced. At the RO filters worse it cost me more to produce the water than to purchase it. But even with very cold Alaskan tap water and water pressure at half the RO filters recommended water pressure it only cost 2.5 cents more to produce the RO water at home. However, the cost of tap water and RO water differs every where.

[Awol]

A great work-around for the temperature that I've read in a few different places is to get an extra 25' or so of tubing and extend the "RO in" water line and coil it in a 5g bucket. Throw some plain ol tap water in the bucket
with a small heater. This will raise the inbound temp and should get better output from your RO unit.

[ravenfan8705]

Thanks Awol, I'll give it a try