High PH - Lower With RO Water?

[coxyhammer]

Hi everyone!

Grateful for anyone's opinion on this.

I want to start up a new soft water set up and house some tetras and angelfish.

My PH tap water is about 8.5 and hard.

My local aqarium shop has advised me that all the tetras I see in their tanks are kept in pure RO water which they sell very cheaply.

Should I mix the RO water with my mains water 50/50 or should I do what they do and use pure RO water? I won't be keeping live plants opting for plastic instead as I know pure RO water is no good for plants. The shop has advised me that I purchase a bottle of this special liquid (can't remember the name) which I add to the RO water to replace lost minerals, is this necessary?

Thanks

 

[mfdrookie516]

If you acclimate the fish properly, you probably wont have any problems. Is your ph stable at 8.5? Is that the same as your tap? RO is alot of trouble really, especially if you have a constant ph. If you were keeping discus or sw, you would probably want to go with RO, but I dont think I'd even worry with it for your setup

 

[adeebm]

Yeah, I have the same water params with you and tried many things to change the pH. In the end, it's just too much trouble. I have a bunch of tetras and a discus and they've been fine for 6mo now. With the buffers in your water, using 50/50 won't make any difference to the pH, only lowering th hardness. So it's either pure RO with synthetic buffers, or just sticking with your tap water.

Most likely, the angelfish and tetras you buy will have been breed in hard water anyway, and will be fine.

--Adeeb

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

I don't know why the LFS would keep all their fish in RO water. It's highly unstable since it is essentially stripped of everything, so then you have to add a buffer and minerals back in for FW keeping - which is probably what they do.

My tap water is 9.8 out of the tap and hard, although we just replaced our softener so time will tell as to how if affects my tanks. The pH stabilizes out around 7.8 by the next PWC. I keep community fish also. No problems, 2 years running. Keep it simple, just detox/dechlor your tap water (I use Prime)

 

[Bigzmey]

I would not be concern about pH 8.5. You need to check GH and KH of your tap water and if GH is very high - dilute with RO. Using just RO is bad for fish.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Have you tested your pH of your tap water about 4-5 days after your water change?