Ryan Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 I have been using a RO/DI filter for a year now. I have been thinking about replacing the RO membrane & DI resin, so I decided to get a TDS meeter to determine how well my current membrane and resin is working before I replaced them. I was shocked to find out that the water GOING IN TO my RO/DI unit is only at 7-9 TDS!!! This seems really low to me, does Portland have really clean water or something? How are your TDS? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
albertareef Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Hey Ryan, I installed a new RO/DI a couple months ago and was surprised to see that the water out of my RO (before going through the DI) was running at zero so I think we do have a pretty clean water source most of the year. My experience at work, however, tells me that can change pretty dramatically on a seasonal basis... seems we had a lot more organics in fall. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CA2OR Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 I was going to ask something about this. I tested my tap water the other day and found only a little amonia (which is bad but removable) and that the PH was low. I was going to ask about whether or not you could use tap water to mix salt if you remove the amonia and raised the PH? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
albertareef Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 I was going to ask something about this. I tested my tap water the other day and found only a little amonia (which is bad but removable) and that the PH was low. I was going to ask about whether or not you could use tap water to mix salt if you remove the amonia and raised the PH? I definitely wouldn't recommend that Eric. There are probably plenty of things in there that would not be good for your tank that you probably aren't testing for (silicates?) that will be removed by the RO/DI. It is reassuring to know we have pretty good quality water to start with but I certainly wouldn't trust just treating it. Just my opinion of course... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Krux Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Bull Run put out the cleanest tap water in the nation 3 or 4 years ago when last I checked the statistics, if it isn't still the best, it is way up there. I had 6tds from my circa 1960's pipes at my old apartment. A friend who is a hydrologist for the state of California almost had a heart attack when he took a sample of water back and ran it through their mass spectrophotometer. He had never seen municipal water from any of his test sites down there (ten years of testing) that came up with as many zeroes across the board on all their tests. That said, I still ran ro/di for the added assurance since the water system is open and prone to accidental contamination at any time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spectra Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Feel lucky my tds reads 100 plus out of the tap:eek: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePremiumAquarium Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 My TDS read about 7-9 here in Salem last time I checked it. It is important to remember that TDS is not all that is removed from your RO/DI systems. There are alot of other things, some of which we do not even test for that are in our water and purified by our RO/DI systems. I will say however that I have run many tanks without even using an RO/DI system here in South Salem and have had excellent results. When I run carbon I seem to see even better results than what I see when using just RO/DI water with a 0 TDS readout. Running GFO seems to really help color up SPS and I also notice that I can go longer without water changes when running both carbon and GFO. Water purity is important and in a perfect reef I think that an RO/DI unit, carbon, and GFO should be used but in my experience it certainly isn't necessary if you have a good water source to begin with. Here in Salem(where I live that is) for example running carbon and GFO works wonders and an RO/DI unit isn't even necessary. Part of the reason I have decided not to use RO/DI water in my system, is the waste water produced. I know there are many ways of capturing waste water and using it to flush toilets, water plants, etc. I just don't have any good way of using waste water created by a 300-400g system. For me there just isn't enough benefit for the cost incured in both replacement cartrigdes and water itself. Plus filling up a few rubbermaid trash cans with tap water is far faster than waiting for them to fill with RO/DI water. Garrett Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryan Posted April 24, 2009 Author Share Posted April 24, 2009 More info on Portland water: http://www.portlandonline.com/water/index.cfm?c=48904 It looks like they add ammonia & chlorine, two chemicals we do not want in our tanks... Even if our water tested out at zero TDS, I would still use a RO/DI unit for added insurance... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePremiumAquarium Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Good call Ryan. Both of those chemicals are easily taken care of by our salt mixes and/or declorinators but it is always better to be safe than sorry. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Krux Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 More info on Portland water: http://www.portlandonline.com/water/index.cfm?c=48904 It looks like they add ammonia & chlorine, two chemicals we do not want in our tanks... Even if our water tested out at zero TDS, I would still use a RO/DI unit for added insurance... These are the primary reasons we age water, they go away on their own Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CA2OR Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Jeez, this proved to be an active thread....good job Ryan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Posted April 24, 2009 Share Posted April 24, 2009 Feel lucky my tds reads 100 plus out of the tap:eek: Yep...Im down the hill from you and mine is 120 going in. Does anyone regularly replace their carbon block or that big white sediment block in their RO unit? I never have. Jay Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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