Reverse Osmosis Question

[mgiammarco]

I am having a major problem with algae in my 75 gal Reef Tank. I have tested my water and PH and Salt looks fine, but it looks like the phosphates are high. Have had a cleaning crew in the tank for over a month, but I think they can't keep up. Went to the local fish store and he recommended a RO system. I have no problem with buying it, but was interested to know what the difference is between an RO system and one of those tap water filters you can buy in a hardware store for drinking water.
I did a 10% water change early this week with my tap water filter and there seems to be an improvement, but not great. How often should I do water changes to bring these phosphates down? Every 7 days? 10 days? etc..

Thanks for your help.[/code]

 

[lando]

To get rid of PO4, you are actually going to want to go a step further and look at an RO/DI system. The DI portion is what is responsible for taking out the PO4. As far as tap water filters go, they are better then using straight tap water but will still do nothing for PO4 removal.

 

[tripper]

The problem you will find is that the phosphates are probably coming out of your tap water. If you continue to do water changes with that water, your algae problem will continue. One solution is to get a phospate sponge and use that in your tank. It absorbs phospates, and should help your algae problem.

For a permanent fix I would suggest getting an RO/DI filter. My advice would be to buy one on ebay (approx $110). The seller "filtersdirect" is very reliable, that's where I got my unit. This will save you a lot of money instead of buying from a LFS. HTH

tripper

 

[skennelly]

The faucet type filters use carbon to remove chlorine, sediment, and things that make your water taste funky, however many impurities don't get removed from charcoal alone. RO units on the other hand are much more advanced and filter out all the impurities in the water giving you essentially perfect water. The RO units uses a membrane that is so fine that it filters at the molecular level and only allows certain molecules to pass through the filter. RO units are slow and have a certain amount of waste water associated with them. For instance for ever gallon of RO water produced you get 5 gallons of waste water. Many people use that waste water to water plants or even do laundry....the waste water is still better quality then ordinary tap water or well water.

For a more insightful look into RO do a search on google or yahoo and you can get very detailed explanations.

 

[mgiammarco]

Everyone thanks for all your help