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Wa you really pamper your fish , although distill is cheap but compare to tap water price I think is world of different. If you sell your fish next time dont know weather will your fish will have this treatment or not
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Would this be an effective way to reduce kh and in turn ph? given the decreasing quality and increasing ph in our tap water in certain areas, i'm considering mixing 30% to 50% distilled water (Guardian brand) to tap water during my water changes to ensure sufficiently soft water and low ph for my fish.
is this advisable?
Wa you really pamper your fish , although distill is cheap but compare to tap water price I think is world of different
No Man Plan To Fail They Only Fail To Plan
anyone know?
Let me try....Originally Posted by illumnae
Theoretically, distilled water is H20 in its purest possible form economically. IIRC, it is not suitable for drinking as it will hydrate minerals off you which is why minerals need to be added in before it is put on sales. Distilled water bought off the shelf should be already processed and unless you know how much of what is added in, how would you be able to mix the ratio correctly (other than guessing)?
It might be worth a try though! Keep us posted.
Thanks for the info Billyi guess i'll give it a try sometime when i can set up controls/variables and tests
Illumnae -> Good owner,Wa you really pamper your fish , although distill is cheap but compare to tap water price I think is world of different
If he sells fish better quickly grab it
why keep fish (or any other pet for that matter) if you don't intend to provide well for them? might as well just buy a desk ornament
thanks for the compliment magic4lifez
we're going off topic here haha...let's get back to the topic!
yixiang,
I have seen marine fish owners using distilled water to set up their tank.
Hope this helps.
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Richard
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Marine hobbyist use RO / DI / or distilled water I believe is because they want to have full control of what gets into the water, as in full control of the water parameter in some sense.
I have ever maintained a reservoir of DI water for my planted tank. Using calcium bicarbonate, I maintained the KH at 5. The PH will be constant, hovering at around PH6.4 if I am correct. KH will act as a buffer, so the PH of the water will not fluctuate beyond a reasonable range. TDS readings is pretty low as adding KH will not affect this. I uses CO2 to bring down the PH to 5.5. I am using pure DI water for my fish and there is no issue on health matters, as what I have observed. They are still strong and healthy, though I no longer uses DI for this purpose.
For Yixiang case, maybe the PH of the distilled water can be lowered by soaking the water in some peak moss since pure DI / distoilled water have very low buffering capacity. Thereafter, KH can be raised to 1 or 2 through mixing with the appropriate proportion of tap water. Adding tap water also helps to reconstitute the distilled water.
PS: I am more curious about what does it really means when people talk about soft water. Is it the PH they are referring to? Or is it the TDS or microsiemens readings of the water they're talking about?
Hope you guys uunderstand what I am talking about, becuase I just sneaked out of a meeting to type this...got to sneak back.
Interesting! You distilled your own water?
PS: IIRC, battery water is the purest possible H2O available off the shelf.
Not distill, but DI water, that is going through the resins. Quite pure, but maybe not as pure as distilled water.
May I know what is the cost of maintaining that reservoir of DI water?
Thanks.
My Apisto Keeping Diary
Apistogramma agassizii, Apistogramma bitaeniata "Careiro", Apistogramma brevis, Apistogramma elizabethae, Apistogramma eremnopyge, Apistogramma sp. "Miua", Dicrossus filamentosus
It cost about $22 for the resin. Need to replace once the TDS reads about 5.
I can't remember exactly how many litres of water it can purify before a replacement is needed. Maybe 100 to 200 litres?
This method of purifying is meant for small tank maintenance because if you use it for a big tank, I think it will be very costly. Maybe RO system will be more economical for a large tank. For information, the tank I maintained with DI water as mentioned is a 15 inch cube tank.
mine is going to be a 1ft cube with ~20% water change every 2 weeks or so. so it's about 5 litres every 2 weeks. how does the DI resin work? as this is an office tank, i can't maintain a reservoir permanently and would probably require something to mix up "on the spot" while i do the water change. would supermarket distilled water + bicarbonate or supermarket distilled water + tap water be good? i'm hoping to achieve a ph hopefully in the low 6s or if possble even lower
P.S. i have Sera peat in my filter to lower the ph after the water has been added in
Hey in the office, good. Does your office have any watercooler? I used to use watercooler water for my tank. But I regret to say I did not take any readings of those water. But I reckon it should be soft.
The resin is place inside those water purifying cartridge used by discus breeder for water change. It's those common type. I do not have a picture now to show.
Since it's just 5 litres of water per water change, I wonder if you are able to maintain a small container in your office as reservoir? It won't take up much space. I'm not sure if using distilled water and buffing it up alone can you maintain at PH6.
Why not I try it out with DI water and let you know before you invest in anything.
PS: I tested the tap water yesterday and realised the NO3 readings by Salifert test kit is around 5 - 10 ppm...wow.
we use those large bottled water for our water cooler, i suspect it's distilled water too. i don't think i can afford more space for the reservoir as my desk is cluttered enough with the tank already
thanks for testing out the DI water!
Hey Yixiang, I'm sorry. I am held up by personal stuff these few days.
Tomorrow I'll embark on the experiment...
no worries take your time
Hey Yixiang.
I have completed the trial as of yesterday. Basically, 2 container of 6litre capacity each is used. Each is filled with pure tap water while the other is filled with DI water. The 2 container is circulated with an air pump. The trial started on 28 May and ended on 16 June 2008.
29 May 2008 - Sera Peat is subsequently added to the container at equal quantity. Readinngs such as KH, TDS, and PH is observed.
3 June 2008 - The 2 container is refilled with fresh water as I believe since the Sera Peat is new, it might have 'extreme' reaction on the water. (So for the 1st few days, we will just treat it as for soaking the Sera Peat so as to 'neutralise' it.) By fresh water, I mean totally new Tap water for 1 container, and totally new DI water for another. I have used back the old Sera Peat for both container.
5 June 2008 - Have added in 2 litre of pure Tap water to both container. The purpose is to re-constitute the water with Tap water and to observe the effect. This is more of to observe the changes of the DI water with the addition of Tap water.
7, 8. 11 June 2008 - Sodium Bicarbonate is added to the container with the purpose of raising the KH of each container to KH2. Generally, adding 1/2 a teaspoon of Sodium Bicarbonate to 100 litres of water will raise the KH by 1.
I had wanted to paste the recordings here to share with everyone, but it just doesn't show nicely when I do that.
You got an email address? I have recorded my observation in an excel file. Maybe I could send the file to you instead.
What I have observed is that the water here in North is so soft that it respond much sensitively to the Sera Peat I added in the container than is the DI water. Maybe I don't even need a DI unit.
wow thanks for the detailed analysis carlfsk! i will pm you my email address. greatly appreciate the effort you put in on this!
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