# RO and EI



## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

Well, I got an RO/DI unit. I got it for my Angels and Apistos, but I would like to start using RO water for my display as well:









Now, I have been told that if I want to use RO water I have to reconstitute it with minerals or a commercial product like Equilibrium. However, I remember that I once compared the ingrediants in a commercial product (GLA's I think) and the stuff in my fert package (EI with extra iron) and I thought they were about the same.

So here's my questions -

1 - If I use RO water with EI dosing, will I be deficient in anything? 
2 - Would it be better to use Flourish Comp because it has more elements than EI for new water I add to the tank, or at W/C?
3 - Would it be better to use 1 part tap with 4 parts R/O than any of these options?
4 - Is there another option to go soft that will not limit the plants and fish I can keep too much? If it is helpful, I can provide a species list, of course!
5 - How does using RO water affect the needed KH, or what KH do I need to avoid dramatic PH swings? This question applys to my soft water fish as well as the planted display.

Thanks for your suggestions!!


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## timbruun (Feb 23, 2010)

I actually use distilled water in one of my tanks. I had a source of RO and a source for distilled. I found that the RO system I was getting it from wasn't actually making the water as soft as I thought. The pH, GH and KH were all the same as tap. While the distilled had KH and GH of zero and pH was very low also. 

Depending on how much you plan on using, I've tried seachem equilibrium since it adds most what the water needs to be back to what it was. You just add according to what GH you want. It's actually not that expensive considering how little you use of it. Then use common baking soda to make the KH what you want. 

Another option is using MgSO4 along with CaSO4 to raise GH. Which is epsom salt and calcium sulfate. For calsium sulfate I'm using DAP Plaster of Paris. You can also substitute the CaSO4 with CaCl2 which is calcium chloride if you can find it or order online. You should use use it at a ratio of 1:3 or 1:4 of MgSO4:CaSO4. Now since I'm still fairly new at using MgSO4 and CaSO4 I'm still working on finding how much I need to raise my water by 1 dh.

The EI trace should be fine instead of flourish comp. Alot of people do mix their tap with RO so they don't have to deal with messing with the water as much. It's entirely your choice. Just test your water before and after and see what ratio you come out with compared to what you want. 

Actually what are your tap parameters right now? GH, KH and pH.


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Bunnie1978 said:


> 1 - If I use RO water with EI dosing, will I be deficient in anything?


Yes, you'll be deficient a number of trace if you use 100% RO.



Bunnie1978 said:


> 2 - Would it be better to use Flourish Comp because it has more elements than EI for new water I add to the tank, or at W/C?


Yes, definitely dose it. Push yourself to .1ppm Fe with comprehensive then take care of the rest using CSM+B and perhaps some chelated iron. You'll need to supplement Ca and Mg too.



Bunnie1978 said:


> 3 - Would it be better to use 1 part tap with 4 parts R/O than any of these options?


I'd do it in addition to using Comprehensive.



Bunnie1978 said:


> 4 - Is there another option to go soft that will not limit the plants and fish I can keep too much? If it is helpful, I can provide a species list, of course!


A list would be good. If it's a South American fish, odds are it won't care even if you drop down to 6pH/<1KH



Bunnie1978 said:


> 5 - How does using RO water affect the needed KH, or what KH do I need to avoid dramatic PH swings? This question applys to my soft water fish as well as the planted display.


Don't worry about it. KH-pH stability paranoia is an old myth that needs to be taken to the shed out back. Fish care about KH because of osmotic pressure; they want it stable. A soft water fish will love no KH; some fish won't spawn unless it's absurdly low. pH change happens all day long independent of KH in any compressed CO2 tank, and yet no stress. Even at that, the pH doesn't tend to fluctuate that rapidly; there are more buffers at work than just carbonates.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

I only had the dip test strips thing and I only ever tested the water in my display - PH 6.5 (that's with CO2) KH low, GH hard (150ppm I think) That's with my dosing and 50% W/C per week. Other than that I don't really know what the parameters are out of the tap. The water quality report says that the PH is 7.1, but I tested the water out of the tap, not aerated or aged and it was 6.5.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

I have in the display:
Cardinal tetras
Lots and lots of bushynose plecos
SAE
AES 
Cories
Otos

Plants:
Stargrass
african water fern
java fern
anubias
limnophila hippuroides
e tenellus reg and narrow
ludwigia repens
rotala rotund
ludwigia peruensis
baby tears 
various crypts
4 leaf clover
amazon sword
ozelot sword


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

So, Ca and Mg are really the things I'm not dosing now with EI, right? 
Flourish comp has both of those, so if I add comp to my RO water, is that sufficient to reconstitute the water? 
Then of course, I would also use my EI+Fe like I am already for everyday dosing.

Does that sound like an adequate plan? Will that be problematic for any of the fish/plants I have listed? 
Is that also the best plan for my planted Angel and Apistos tanks?


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Flourish has very little Ca or Mg to it; it's so little that I don't even bother calculating it in with my dosing. GH booster may add some, but not enough if you're going heavy RO. I find it easier to manage the entire thing working from CaCl2 and MgSO4.7H2O in stock solutions. CaSO4 would be better if you're dry dosing. For MgSO4.7H2O add 9.14mg to raise 1L by 1ppm Mg that you want to increase Mg by (5ppm should be good). Increase calcium through CaSO4.2H2O using the same method except at 4.3mg for every 1ppm/L of Ca, head for 20ppm there.

All your fish should be just fine, if not happier than you were. If you haven't seen spawns yet, your angels should and your apistos may as well.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

Ok, Dan. You're great thanks! 
However, I didn't understand anything you just said. 
Can you break that down into laymans terms? I have epsom salt, I think that's one of them right?


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Sorry for the jargon and such. I'm too used to working with scales and liters from mixing stock solutions.

Ya, use epsom salts; the kind you buy from any grocery store pharmacy. Add 1 teaspoon for every 15 gallons of tank water per week.

For calcium, aquariumfertilizer.com carries CaSO4.2H2O (listed as Calcium Sulphate); order some. 1lb will be fine, though I like to order whatever else I'm short on to make 4lbs because that's the max amount for $6 flat rate shipping. Anyhow, dose that at 1 teaspoon for every 10 gals per week.

You can break either up to dose over the week however you like, or do it at weekly WC time.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

OK, so I got the stuff. I also took a look at PPS. I think I like that better, though I don't have the ability to do the testing that is required to make it perfect, and I know that as plants grow the demands change, so there's no magic number that will always work. But, I made a trace mix, a macros solution and a ca/mg mix. Now, this is what I'm doing, I'm adding the RO water, and dosing with Comp right away, but making sure that the hardness (measured as TDS) isn't too high - shooting for 100-125, but haven't gotten down quite that far yet with w/cs. Plus, I have an apisto/krib tank now, so I'm shooting for 50-80 in that one. Then each day, dosing with the mixes.

What do you think?


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Outside of plants, my focus is spawning apistos. I find they enjoy frequent water changes, and that doing them weekly allows the easier species to spawn about as fast as they can. Extra water changes are nice once the eggs are laid; it increases viability. In short, for apistos I'd do EI.

What's your lighting/CO2 like in the non-apisto tank? Nutrients are dead easy to keep non-limiting at lower light levels. How often do you plan on changing the water? You can reduce dosing and do fewer water changes with low light and still not have to test. Testing means calibrating your test kits, which means making calibaration solutions as well; often it's faster to just hook up the python once a month.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

In my display tank, it's 3.5-4 wpg pcf mixed with 6700 and 10000k. In the apisto tank (which I've just been told to remove the kribs, so it'll be apistos and rams) it's 2 wpg T5HO. I don't know the spectrum of one of the bulbs. It's the odyssea 2 bulb fixture with the one bulb called "freshwater" looks pink, the other bulb is 10000k. The exact same fixture is also on my angel tank - also running soft, basically doing the same thing with the Angel and Apisto tanks, then I have the display, which I'm going soft, but not very soft.


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## Bunnie1978 (Sep 29, 2009)

I have a billion foot python!! hehe.

I would like to learn how to keep things well without having to do tons of huge water changes, but I don't mind doing them on these tanks. My concerns with water changes are more about the rest of the tanks. Really with these tanks, I'm trying to learn how to manage the hardness parameters without huge changes. That's what I'm really worried about. 

By the way, I can test for GH, KH with that combined test which is not very precise, TDS which is precise, PH, ammonia, and nitrate. 
Can you give me target levels for these? It's so confusing around because GH and KH are different than TDS, but there is no consensus on target for the way that I can measure them. Alot of sources list hardness as dH - but I don't know what that is!!


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

3.5-4wpg is complete overkill. I've got HC sitting alive and very happy with 54w of T5HO over 50 gal experiencing two 1 hour bursts at peak CO2 times. This would be like having about 1.5wpg of CF over a tank, with a little time at 3wpg that isn't even necessary besides my own viewing pleasure. By contrast, any time I've seen someone run the 3-4wpg range, they end up fighting algae all day because the CO2 can't go high enough without gassing the fish. You might find an exception or two if you look at people who have very good CO2 distribution equipment and knowledge, but that's about it.

If you lower the light, you can also slack more on water changes by far. Try running the 1.5-2wpg range if it's an option. Water changes can happen every 2 weeks for a start, and once you get to know your tank you can wait on it for a month or more. It all depends on how much time you spend learning the details and observing.

Water hardness is something people worry about WAY too much with planted tanks, same goes for pH. Most plants will be happy with 6 KH or less (all the way down to as low as you like), pH that goes along with that range (if it's above 8, check your ammonia perhaps), and that's about it. If your tap water is spitting out hard stuff, either consider investing in ADA aquasoil or master the art of peat bottoms and learn to tolerate some tannin stain. RO works great too. If you don't feel like fighting hard tap water, just look to plants that can take the hardness.

Either way, it looks like you've got hardness under control. Once you've got stable nutrients (doesn't take too long) then what you'll spend most of your time doing is worrying about CO2 levels and distribution. Most people fear sinking money here, I've found that it's the one place where it should go if you want a packed out high tech show tank.


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## Brilliant (Jun 25, 2006)

Bunnie1978 said:


> Now, I have been told that if I want to use RO water I have to reconstitute it with minerals or a commercial product like Equilibrium.


That is not correct. Makes you wonder why you are striping everything out just to put it back in again. 

No, fish will not disintegrate in ro water.
No, plants will not die in ro water. That includes all types of plants from crypts to stems.



Bunnie1978 said:


> 1 - If I use RO water with EI dosing, will I be deficient in anything?
> 2 - Would it be better to use Flourish Comp because it has more elements than EI for new water I add to the tank, or at W/C?
> 3 - Would it be better to use 1 part tap with 4 parts R/O than any of these options?
> 4 - Is there another option to go soft that will not limit the plants and fish I can keep too much? If it is helpful, I can provide a species list, of course!
> ...


1- No. I use fertilizers just like EI calls for. See my feedback everywhere for all the healthy plants I've sold.
2- I use N,P,K and trace mix like flourish. 
3- If you ask me its better if you remove the ro membrane and use filtered tap water. Unless you have off the charts liquid rock.
4- I grow all plants in soft water. Some plants require lower kh. I havent seen any that require higher.
5- Soft water will swing up leaving you with undesirable alkaliine pH so do not add kh.

Do you understand any better now?


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Brilliant said:


> That is not correct. Makes you wonder why you are striping everything out just to put it back in again.
> 
> No, fish will not disintegrate in ro water.
> No, plants will not die in ro water. That includes all types of plants from crypts to stems.
> ...


So where are you getting your Ca and Mg from? CSM+B, Flourish and TPN don't have enough. High nutrient substrate?


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## Brilliant (Jun 25, 2006)

Philosophos said:


> So where are you getting your Ca and Mg from? CSM+B, Flourish and TPN don't have enough. High nutrient substrate?


Yes and no. When I was using only eco complete I thought it must have been the substrate. Now that I have aquasoil I know its not the substrate.

Go figure I get better growth with aquasoil. I say ca and mg are overrated in planted tank and undesirable in apistogramma tank altogether.

Perhaps that little trace of tds getting by 3 stage ro is ca and mg. If that small amount is all it takes to get by its not critical like the other four which my tank cannot live without.


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

EC is pretty much iron and a touch of magnesium. It's getting hardness from some kind of carbonate, but I'm not sure if it's just Mg or if the Ca exists as CaCO3.

On the other hand, the only analysis for ADA AS is on barrreport.com. I'm looking at it, and it covers NPK, Fe and Cu; nothing else. There may be Ca and Mg in there as sulfates or otherwise.

I have to say that adding Ca from CaCl2 and Mg from epsom salts hasn't hurt my apisto spawning; they're at it all the time.


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## Brilliant (Jun 25, 2006)

Philosophos said:


> EC is pretty much iron and a touch of magnesium. It's getting hardness from some kind of carbonate, but I'm not sure if it's just Mg or if the Ca exists as CaCO3.
> 
> On the other hand, the only analysis for ADA AS is on barrreport.com. I'm looking at it, and it covers NPK, Fe and Cu; nothing else. There may be Ca and Mg in there as sulfates or otherwise.
> 
> I have to say that adding Ca from CaCl2 and Mg from epsom salts hasn't hurt my apisto spawning; they're at it all the time.


Thats sorta why I suggest skipping ro stage if tap water is already ideal.

You might even want to wean yourself off the ca and mg and see for yourself. Off topic but have you ever spawned any dicrossus or taeniacara?


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

I've tried foregoing Ca and Mg with RO early on, it didn't turn out well for me. That was with 65w of CF over a 20 gal with compressed CO2. Old EC that had never seen nutrients beyond fish food for substrate.

Taeniacara is a fish I dream of spawning. I've heard it can be a nightmare to keep alive, or relatively easy. If it ends up being a pain, long-term daily water changes aren't my thing, so I'm waiting until I've got an automatic WC system going. I think I'd keep these as show fish and maybe move them to spawn.

Dicrossus spp. used to hold more of a fascination for me than they do now. The super low pH egg viability range makes it something I can't spawn in planted tanks, and I don't have enough breeder tanks set up right now to dedicate the right space for fry grow-out.


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## Brilliant (Jun 25, 2006)

Philosophos said:


> I've tried foregoing Ca and Mg with RO early on, it didn't turn out well for me. That was with 65w of CF over a 20 gal with compressed CO2. Old EC that had never seen nutrients beyond fish food for substrate.
> 
> Taeniacara is a fish I dream of spawning. I've heard it can be a nightmare to keep alive, or relatively easy. If it ends up being a pain, long-term daily water changes aren't my thing, so I'm waiting until I've got an automatic WC system going. I think I'd keep these as show fish and maybe move them to spawn.
> 
> Dicrossus spp. used to hold more of a fascination for me than they do now. The super low pH egg viability range makes it something I can't spawn in planted tanks, and I don't have enough breeder tanks set up right now to dedicate the right space for fry grow-out.


I am curious as to what went wrong. That 65w PC is a great deal of light to handle with a 20L or 20H. My eco is about 4 years old and the tank is still growing everything I can throw at it. I change water & keep co2 , npk and trace ferts consistent.

A while back I managed to some "pairs" Taeniacara candidi. I was not happy with the quality of the male. I did spawn them but ended up killing them all with co2. I probably dont have any proof in form of photograph so its just my word. A fish with such great expectations is sure to let you down. Thats why I will not get elizabethae...at least not at $60+/pair. So far I've got the best pleasure from a a fish that was sold to me as one thing and ends up being another. Go figure you know. 

I spawned all my fish in planted tanks. Not Dicrossus...


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## Philosophos (Mar 1, 2009)

Brilliant said:


> I am curious as to what went wrong. That 65w PC is a great deal of light to handle with a 20L or 20H. My eco is about 4 years old and the tank is still growing everything I can throw at it. I change water & keep co2 , npk and trace ferts consistent.
> 
> A while back I managed to some "pairs" Taeniacara candidi. I was not happy with the quality of the male. I did spawn them but ended up killing them all with co2. I probably dont have any proof in form of photograph so its just my word. A fish with such great expectations is sure to let you down. Thats why I will not get elizabethae...at least not at $60+/pair. So far I've got the best pleasure from a a fish that was sold to me as one thing and ends up being another. Go figure you know.
> 
> I spawned all my fish in planted tanks. Not Dicrossus...


65w over a 20H was insane as a first high tech venture. Inch per day growth on stems, narrow line between BBA and dead fish.

I don't think I'd keep any of the really rare apistos in a CO2 tank. Planted at very most, low light, take them to their own tank for peat bottom spawns.

T. candidi is getting a little too much attention. It's very nice, but it's not the sort of fish most people should be trying to keep. When people speak of difficulty spawning apistos and getting egg viability, I think a lot of it is the fact that people either don't want to put the work into dropping the pH low enough through tannic acids (yay for peat shoveling), or their afraid to follow in the footsteps of thekrib archives with nitric/phosphoric. Either way, you've got to dedicate a tank to the pair and change the water every day for reliable results.


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