August... come soon!!

[Airborneguy]

I'm going crazy here! I can't buy my RO/DI unit until at least August, but my phosphates are off the chart and I'm going through a pretty bad algae bloom. Cleaned my glass spotless yesterday, and it came back already! Plus, now the sand has some on it. I bought ten turbos today, so hopefully they help, but man, August can't come quick enough... I'd hate to do it, but I might start buying RO water from the LFS for now... it just sucks that by august I probably would have spent enough to get the damn unti by then!

 

[Joe Fish]

Whatcha going to do... What are they going to charge you for it?

 

[MOsborne05]

That's why my tank isn't set up yet! I've spent the past 6 months gathering all of the necessary equipment, including a RO/DI, skimmer, new lights, etc. I've heard alot of people have had bad algae problems using tap water, which is why RO water is so highly recommended for saltwater.

If you can't get the unit yet, then I'd definitely suggest buying RO water from the lfs until then. Unless of course, you want to continuously battle the algae

 

[Airborneguy]

I think I'm gonna start mixing it in, buy like 5 gallons, and mix it with 5 tap gallons. I think it's the part of the island where I live now, because I never had this problem before. The LFS has it fresh or pre-mixed with salt for $1 gallon... but I'm evaporating about 1.5 gallons a day, so we talking at least $70 in water from no until August! I'd actually rather deal with it, save the money, and then buy the unit.

 

[Lorna]

Why don't you contact Culligan or someone like that or at least go to the grocery where they sell it for .25 cents a gallon. It may not be perfect but it probably is better than buying it from the lfs or using tap water. You need to figure out what the tds of your tap water is....meanwhile look into a phosphate remover such as a phosban reactor or something may help also. Diatoms are also part of the maturing process for any newly established tank also.....

 

[Airborneguy]

I'm past the diatoms, it's definately my phosphates. At the LFS today, they told me that tap water here would be perfect for aquariums other than the phosphates. Which water in the gorcery store is RO? I never noticed, I'll have to check.

 

[Joe Fish]

It'll usually be in the culligan type jugs. You could also use distilled, but it's not the best as it removes all necessary minerals.

 

[Stormy2]

i'm in a similar boat as you. I'm waiting on buying a r/o unit due to lack of money, but i'm starting to get a algae bloom i think because of my tap water.

 

[Lorna]

If you are running a sump put some cheato in the sump and it will use up some of the nitrates and phosphates. If phosphates is your only problem then I would suggest that you run some phosban or rowaphos in a phosban reactor which costs about $30

 

[TRe]

u could get an ro unit fer $100 , a phos reactor for $30-40 plus media and pump will prolly be another $30 or so..... most grocery stores have a machine that u could fill yur own jugs (thats what lorna's talkin about) i bought an ro unit back in november and still never hooked it up i still get my r/o from the grocery store for $1.50 per 5g's and do my water changes with NSW from an lfs for .50 a gallon...btw $1 a gallon is a little steap
what type of algae are we talking about if not diatoms?

 

[zoalover34]

I just use water from the store, .25cents a gallon like what was posted above, its not the best but i really don't have many issues with it..

 

[Airborneguy]

Everything in NYC is more expensive, it's a ripoff living here. I'm going to check out the stores tomorrow morning after work, but just in case, I found a guy on a local reef forum who will provide it cheap, he's a bit of a drive though. I'm getting red hair algae everywhere. I meant the brown diatoms everyone gets, I'm past that phase for awhile now.

In the meantime, my super guru (he's getting more like OB1 for me every day!) told me he has a used unit somewhere in his garage he can dig up for me. I didn't know these things waste so much water though (yup, we get raped on water bills here too), so I might have to hold off anyway until I can afford one of these:

Poly-Bio-Marine Kold Sterile 3gpm Kold-Sterile

...which doesn't waste any water and takes out the same stuff.

 

[Lotus]

We bought a Reef Miser unit from The Filter Guys. It has a 1:1 ratio of RO/DI to waste (most units are 1:3 or 1:4). It gives me 0 TDS, but it was a little more expensive than some other units, but it uses less water.

You can use the waste water from your RO/DI for household stuff like watering plants, in the washing machine, etc.