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Re: KillieTalk Digest V2 #972 (RO units)
Matt Kaufman wrote:
>
> >
> > A local wholesaler set up an RO unit for some discus he was playing around
> > with (not to be immediately sold...). He piped the "waste" water to the Rift
> > Lake cichlid tanks as something of an on going water changing system. The
> > beauty of it was that the chorine was removed already and it was ready to
> > go.
> >
> > I would assume that much of the ammonia put in by some municipalities would
> > also be removed. Does anyone know for sure?
Yes, at least at first. I read zero ammonia from both tap filters and RO
water, when the input water actually has about 1ppm of chloramine.
Unfortunately my tests don't read low enough.
I worry about a few ppb of ammonia, so I add "Amquel" to take care of any
that might get released if any ammonia ions are disconnected from the
chlorine in the carbon filter and passed on to the outlet.
>
> Dunno about the ammonia, but does this work if you've got really foul
> tapwater (lead, iron, etc.)? Isn't the wastewater from RO 'concentrated
> tapwater' so you'd have higher levels of the nasties? Of course, at a fish
> wholesaler, only the strong fish survive anyway, but I'm not sure I'd
> advocate this for the more delicate rift lake fish (yes, there are some).
The *increase* in those products is only by the ratio of RO to waste water,
so the outlet of the waste line is barely stronger than what comes in. Even
at 5:1, the output waste water is only 1.17 times as high in tds as the
input. I used to have the outlet permanently hooked into my patio
drip-irrigation tubing. The plants loved it.
>
> I use my RO waste water to water plants and to rinse tubifex worms, I try
> to time my worm purchases to 'RO water making day.' Likewise blackworms.
> I found hatching baby brine shrimp in it didn't work as well as straight
> tapwater or waste water from brackish tanks (which works very well).
I found big improvement in hatch when I stopped using tap (with chloramine)
and switched to my carbon-filtered tap water, which has no ammonia at all.
Apparently a few (killed by a tiny bit of ammonia or chloramine) decay, and
that kills more in a cascade. Stinky and poor hatch was the result.
Wright
--
Wright Huntley, Fremont CA, USA, 510 494-8679 huntleyone at home dot com
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"LIBERTY" is a well-armed lamb denying enforcement of the vote.
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