Ro or declorenated tap water?

Pretty much explains itself really. If you have questions about tank set-ups, tank furniture, (caves etc) chuck them in here!

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platty252
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Ro or declorenated tap water?

Post by platty252 »

I was woundering what is prefeared for keeping zebras. Ro water or tap water.
If Ro is used how dose this work. Do you mix with old tank water, tap water or chemicals.
How do you messure the pureity of the water and how pure should it be?
Thanks, Darren in Dublin.
Des
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Post by Des »

platty252,

It depends what type of water comes out of your tap.
Zebras can be kept in any dechclorinated tapwater whether hard or soft.
However for breeding and better breeding success, one need soft water.If you have soft water out of the tap, thats great. If not you can add RO to your dechclorinated tap water to give you the correct parameters.
Some members use 100% RO water ,with added minerals eg. RO Right, to give the right hardness and conductivity.
Purity of water is measured with a conductivity meter.

Regards,
Des.
platty252
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Des

Post by platty252 »

The water from the tap here is as follows.
ph. 7 kh. 0 gh. less than 3 - 6 (veariable)
So i have verry soft water but i had a problem recently were the ph. from the tap was 9 and i did a water change the tank crashed down to 5.
I used to check the tap water erery 2 weeks now i do it weekly.
Luckily i got on top of the situation quickly and only lost 1 frog out of 150 odd fish and some frogs.
Pritty dam lucky i think.
So a conductivity meter is used to mesure purity. I couldent figure that one out.
The reason i asked about the ro was if most people used ro with their zebras and i purchesed some i would proberly have to use ro water.
My fingers are tired from typing so Adios for now and cheers for the info. D.
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Post by Kev »

the water where i am is crap :!: :!: :!: . i have two R.O unit's running all the time so i have enough when i need it. Water company bosses need a pounding :twisted: .

Kev
Im off to the Xingu put my dinner in the oven!!!
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Post by Des »

Hi platty252,

You have ideal zebra breeding water.
The only worry is a Kh( carbonate hardness) of 0.
The KH acts as a buffer to keep the ph stable, as you found out, if this is at zero, you get a ph crash.
There are a lot of KH + additives on the market that you can buy and add to your tap water to give a KH of approx 3 that will keep your ph stable.
A Gh of 3 to 6 is fine.

Regards,
Des.
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Post by Tom2600 »

Hi

Glad your fish escaped the pH crash. As Des has said, the pH is only buffered by your kH level. With low of zero kH your pH will crash no matter how high it is.

I don't mean to insult your knowledge but just incase you aren't aware you should leave your tap water with aeration for a good few hours before testing its pH etc. You will get incorrect readings when testing straight from the tap.

Regards

Tom
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Post by Barbie »

You can also use shells or large pore crushed coral in your filter to ensure you don't have a sudden crash of your pH in soft water. Until the water is acidic very little of the carbonate is actually released, and once it's gone acidic you don't mind if it melts a bit faster, as it then attributes to keeping the tank parameters stable.

My zebras personally spawn in water with a pH of 7.8 and a hardness of 150-300ppm TDS.

Barbie
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platty252
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Post by platty252 »

I leave my water sitting for 3 days min. and airated before useing it for water changes. Its just the routine i keep.
I was testing before i airated the water but i will change that now.
Thanks for the tip Tom.
I have heard about putting shells or coral in your filter before but i have never tried it. Are we talking small or large amounts of shells or dose that depend on how hard you want your water?
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Post by Andrew C »

Bi-Carbonate of Soda is fine for raising your your KH, you should be able to get it from a Supermarket and it is cheap.

Adjust the KH in your holding taken, try one teaspoon full first, leave for half an hour and then check the KH level.
You will then have an idea of how many teaspoons of Bi-Carbonate you need to add to your holding tank to raise its KH to 3.
It is trial and error in the beginning to find out how many teaspoons you need to get your KH to 3, but once you know, just add the same amount each time you fill your holding tank and the KH should remain pretty constant.

If the KH of the tanks with fish in it is low, do daily partial water changes to get the KH up in them, you don't want to raise the KH by more than one each day.

Raising your KH will raise your PH :roll:
It is the down side of having very soft tap water, but i think its better to have higher PH water with some KH in it, than have low PH water with no buffering in it (JMO).
platty252
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Post by platty252 »

Unfortunitly i dont have a holding tank, i'm using buckets for my water.
I've try'ed a ph buffer from a bottle but it had no effect.
I have just added some crushed shells to a canaster filter on 1 of my tanks and i will see how i get on with that.
Thanks for your help everybody. :)
platty252
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BAD WATER? BAD WEEKEND.

Post by platty252 »

Ok i know this is proberly not the place to post this but its only an update of what i have posted above.

I decided to set up a holding tank for my water and i have put some coral sand in it to try and increase my KH.
The water is been passed through a 4 stage water filter for drinking water but works the same as an RO unit (i will get it tested properly on tuesday) and it is been airated. With a bit of luck this will solve part of my problem.

Now, in the mean time i bought a diffrent test kit for KH and GH. and this is giving me a reading of: KH. 80 mg/l =4.5 dh and GH. 100mg/l =5.6 dh. Previously i was getting a reading of 0 mg/l of KH. Why do the test kits differ so much. I have experienced before with ph test kits and in the end i sent 4 diffrent brands off to be tested and they were all wrong, but thats a tale for anothed day. Back to the problem.
With this new test kits readings i have yet again experienced ANOTHER crash: PH droped to 5 in less than 24 hours since my last test. It killed my filter and the tank has jumped in to cycle mode with all the bad things that go hand in hand, amonia, nitrate, nitrites all going through the roof.

You may be reading this and saying to yourself "the poor so and so" but here is the dagger in the side to top off my weekend.
I have plagued my local fish shop (about 10 miles away) for some 6 months now for a pair of L200 green phantoms which he finaly got for me, a beautiful smooth female about 3" and a rough looking high fin male about 4"
When the tank crashed the male died. :( Since i chose to put a holding tank in for my water i had to remove my spare/hospatal tank so i had no were to put the fish untill i straightened out the tank that crashed.

All in all a bad weekend. I wil be on the phone tomorrow to see if i can order another male L200. Water seems to be my down fall, why cant i keep my fish in a cage? :(
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Post by Andrew C »

Platy
Please read this Water Chemistry

There is a good section in the article about stabilising PH.
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Post by Des »

Hi platty252,

Sorry to hear of your problems.
The only way forward is finding out what is causing your ph crashes. In my view ,it is due to the kh being zero or near zero, irrespective what the test kit says.
platty 252 said
The water is been passed through a 4 stage water filter for drinking water but works the same as an RO unit
Please can you provide details of this 4 stage water filter.
An RO unit removes all kh(carbonates) and GH (magnesium etc)amongst many other things.If your unit works the same as an RO unit, does this mean that the effects of your unit are the same?
If your unit works the same as a RO unit, you have to add mineral salts and ph/kh plus to the water.
What are the water parameters (conductivity, kh,gh and ph)between your tap water and the water coming out of your filter.

Regards,
Des
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