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RO unit worth it?

Brad123

Brad123

Member
Joined
24 Jan 2013
Messages
127
Location
Oxfordshire
I live in Oxfordshire lovely hard water is it worth buying a ro unit? I like the idea of 1 but will it help or make things complicated?
 
Brad123 said:
I live in Oxfordshire lovely hard water is it worth buying a ro unit? I like the idea of 1 but will it help or make things complicated?
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I’d recommend to try Spotless Water. I’m personally using it for about 1.5 years, consistent 0 TDS from their hose and haven’t encountered any issues so far. The price depends on the location but in Bournemouth the cost is 1.5p per litre.
PM me if interested. I think if I’d recommend someone we both would get about £20 credit each.
 
My RO unit has dual membrains and has a waste to production ration of around 1.5:1, still some waste but not 90%.

Produces water with tds of 12
 
All depends what fish you’d like to keep, size of the aquarium etc. If you had a Malawi cichlid tank or rainbow fish for example it would be useless. An aquarium with wild caught South American species then it would be a differrent story.

cheers

Conor
 
papa_c said:
My RO unit has dual membrains and has a waste to production ration of around 1.5:1, still some waste but not 90%.

Produces water with tds of 12
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My RO system with a single membrane is claimed to be 1:5 (5 liter of waste to 1 liter of "pure" water) @ 25C (77F) and 60 PSI of water pressure.... However, at lower pressure and lower temperature the efficiency goes way down... right now (spring in Minnesota) I am probably getting somewhere around 1:8 ... in the depth of winter it's more like 1:12... so it really depends. TDS however, is constant... with a brand a new membrane I'm getting 2-3 TDS ... right now my RO water is around 4-5 TDS regardless of water temp.

Cheers,
Michael
 
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I would say depends on why you want one? If it’s for plant growth I would say not. I would say much more important is optimising Co2. You will likely use more co2 with harder water but the vast majority of plants won’t care on the hardness of the water.
 
Cheers all for the reply’s. should of explain a bit better was thinking more on the water quality side. To get the right GH and KH is that worth it for the plants.
The tank is only a 65ltr at the moment doing daily water changes(tank 2 weeks).
I work at a power station so can get 0 TDS water but it’s a pain to get home. That’s why I was looking at ro units.
 
Tom Michael said:
I would say depends on why you want one? If it’s for plant growth I would say not. I would say much more important is optimising Co2. You will likely use more co2 with harder water but the vast majority of plants won’t care on the hardness of the water.
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Ok thanks that’s what I was after
Cheer Brad
 
I have a 60L tank which is filled with rainwater. I have 2 20L jugs which I fill either in my garden or at the allotment, to do a 30 - 50% change a week (I don't use CO2, so each jug lasts me a week). My plants do grow pretty well in it, but not as well as tap water and CO2. I use rainwater because I like to keep softwater fish, I have another tank with tapwater and shrimps and the plants grow just as well. If you want a really amazing hightech tank with loads of fancy Dutch-style stems then I think softwater does help. You'd only need 1 big waterbutt to collect enough water weekly for it, if you have a garden and a roof of any kind it's really easy to do!
 
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Seriously, you don't need to use RO water even in hard water areas. Most plants really don't care. @Aquarium Gardens in Huntingdon use super hard tap water, the plants are all very healthy and the tanks stunning.

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I agree with Tim. It is absolutely pointless to worry about "right" GH/KH as this has nothing to do with plant health and has no effect on ability to inject CO2.
These plants were grown in typical hard water in excess of GH 26. What plants and fish care about is clean water.
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Cheers,
 
Like Clive mentions, clean water is paramount. What usually happens when using RO is water changes become a PITA, and they tend to become less frequent. And the tank suffers. Better to use good old tap water and change it frequently.
 
Aqua360 said:
Why just a touch, it's pretty fundamental that water hardness plays a large role in fish health.
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As I agree about plants but about the fish 👍
 
Alrighty, here is the hill I die on.

I believe fish suffer when they’re at an extreme, my way the water is very very hard, you can’t enjoy some F1 discus, they all wither away, especially true for the wild neons and smaller Ls - of course they live, in some cases for a handful of years, but not 10 like a happy discus in that sweet soft water, it’s not a full life. On the flip side, lamprologus in some soft water and they’ll be slowly dying too - I don’t know why that way round. There’s a few reasons in hard water why soft water fish suffer, primarily it’s internal organs aren’t used to all those minerals in the water and kidneys fail. Eggs can’t break down their membrane.

Of course, spawning can be seen as benchmark for fish health, but saying only match water requirements if you want them to breed is cruel.
 
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