Soft Water

[addboy]

Does anyone know what effect a water softener has on RO/DI water. I run my RO/DI off of my watersoftener, which hasn't been working for the longest time. We just got it fixed and it is producing really soft water and I was wondering if that is good or bad for a reef??? Anyone???

[RayAllen]

Im not sure, but have to use it anyways. My wife and I spent $4500-5000 or so on a water refining system which covers the entire house and exterior faucets as well. We now have great water for bathing, cooking, washing, drinking etc, but im not sure what this does to my aquarium. All the contaminants/toxins are gone, but my water is to soft(lower PH) now. So with that said I have to raise my ph via chemicals or substrate.

[addboy]

PH !!!....Good to know. Thanks, I will keep an eye on it.

[caferacermike]

I'm not to sure but have this to add. I once took a water sample from a tank to Aquatek for a monthly test. After swirling it around with a few chemicals the guy doing the test looked right at me and told me I have a water softener. We did at the time. I asked him what that was supposed to mean, mentioning it to me, and he did not have a real answer. He implied it was bad but would not commit to anything.

[bigmoe21]

does it have to do anything with silica? i heard this once.. im wondering too

I'm not to sure but have this to add. I once took a water sample from a tank to Aquatek for a monthly test. After swirling it around with a few chemicals the guy doing the test looked right at me and told me I have a water softener. We did at the time. I asked him what that was supposed to mean, mentioning it to me, and he did not have a real answer. He implied it was bad but would not commit to anything.

[RayAllen]

Soft water isnt a bad thing. Soft water will have chlorine removed as well as many metals and contaminants. People with South/central American tanks even brakish water tanks strive to have soft water because thats what is in South/central america. Hard water has a higher Alk level simply meaning more metals and solids are preasent in the water, not to mention City water has many other contimanants in its extremely hard water. Soft water is either Neutral meaning nothing is present or acidic. So for those aquarist like myself with a home water refining system or just a plain softner simply have to introduce what our salt water aquariums need to thrive. I can use straight tap water because my water contains no chlorine or harmful contimants, but will need chemicals to raise certain levels which I prefer to not knowing whats in my water. I basically have a huge RO/DI system on my entire house with a softner.

[MissT]

Every time you buy a new bucket of salt, run a full line test (or bring it up to the store), and check it's buffering capacity. You'll know if/how much buffer you need to add for that bucket.
FWIW, pure RO/DI water will not usually register a true pH, KH or GH value, and salts that are made to be used with RO seem to take that into account and put more buffer in the salt mix.

[RayAllen]

Great Advice MissT

[addboy]

Wow!!...Okay. What do you know about regular Tropic Marin??

[captexas]

I know the fancy water systems have DI tanks on them and some of the other water softeners have actual water sediment filters on them that have to be replaced every so often. BUT, I thought basic water softeners didn't actually remove anything, they just changed some ions into different ions or changed their charge.

Also, there are a few products on the market to add back certain elements to RO and softened water for aquarium use.