Pure Water

[xxamyxx85]

Sorry to hear your local water is so bad you can't use it for your aquariums. I am lucky that I have really good water and don't have to do anything thing to it. I wished I could help you but others have already given you great advice, so good luck, and hope it all works out for you.

You are lucky to have good water. I only moved a year ago, my water before was much better, should of tested the new place beforehand. If I ever plan on moving again the water will be the first thing I test. Thank you for your kind words

 

[mbsqw1d]

7 GH is upper level of soft..

Ive just copied this across from one of @Essjay 's posts, Essjay was explaining how water companies say the water is hard, but that compares differently to what an aquarist considers to be hard/soft..

GH	ppm	Water company	Fish keeping
0 – 2.8	0 - 50	soft	very soft
2.8 – 5.6	50 - 100	moderately soft	soft
5.6 – 8.4	100 - 150	slightly hard	soft
8.4 – 11.2	150 - 200	moderately hard	soft to middling
11.2 – 16.8	200 - 300	hard	middling to hard
over 16.8	over 300	very hard	hard to very hard

The KH of your water is a measure of how well it can keep the PH stable.

With a low KH (less than 4), when acid builds up in the aquarium, whether its tannic acid or nitric acid, your PH will drop slowly and accordingly to the KH, as the acids 'eat' away at the KH. Once the KH goes to 0, then the PH starts to drop dramatically (or swing) to acidic levels.

With RO water, you're starting off with 0GH, 0KH and base (7.5?) PH

If you were to start adding acid (nitric acid comes from nitrates, or tannic acid comes from things that leach tannins like bog wood and leaf litter), then the PH would drop straight away and you'd be quickly down between 3 - 6 PH

Some fish are very happy in these soft water/acidic conditions. However, the challenge is to match the water at water change time. As a jump in PH is harmful to fish. That is why someone may wish to raise the KH of the water, in order to stabilise the PH, but its a balancing act.

Anything is possible, its just a bit more of a faff at water change time, where temperature matching isnt the only consideration.

 

[xxamyxx85]

7 GH is upper level of soft..

Ive just copied this across from one of @Essjay 's posts, Essjay was explaining how water companies say the water is hard, but that compares differently to what an aquarist considers to be hard/soft..

GH	ppm	Water company	Fish keeping
0 – 2.8	0 - 50	soft	very soft
2.8 – 5.6	50 - 100	moderately soft	soft
5.6 – 8.4	100 - 150	slightly hard	soft
8.4 – 11.2	150 - 200	moderately hard	soft to middling
11.2 – 16.8	200 - 300	hard	middling to hard
over 16.8	over 300	very hard	hard to very hard

The KH of your water is a measure of how well it can keep the PH stable.

With a low KH (less than 4), when acid builds up in the aquarium, whether its tannic acid or nitric acid, your PH won't drop accordingly straight away, because the acids need to 'eat' away at the KH first. Once the KH goes to 0, then the PH starts to drop ( or swing) to acidic levels.

With RO water, you're starting off with 0GH, 0KH and base (7.5?) PH

If you were to start adding acid (nitric acid comes from nitrates, or tannic acid comes from things that leach tannins like bog wood and leaf litter), then the PH would drop straight away and you'd be quickly down between 3 - 6 PH

Some fish are very happy in these soft water/acidic conditions. However, the challenge is to match the water at water change time. As a jump in PH is harmful to fish. That is why someone may wish to raise the KH of the water, in order to stabilise the PH.

Anything os possible, its just a bit more of a faff at water change time, where temperature matching isnt the only consideration.

Ok so this explains a lot, I have mopani wood in one of my tanks and the ph has dropped slightly so I was adding Indian almond leaf extract to my water change water so it matched but I was wondering what would happen later on if it keeps coming down, I will test the kh in the tank in a mo to see where it’s at. How can I adjust kh and just out of interest when doing a water change with ph’s that don’t match, what is a safe percentage to change.?

thank you so much for all the info above, and explaining it in so much detail for me, it’s a real help.

 

[mbsqw1d]

Ok so this explains a lot, I have mopani wood in one of my tanks and the ph has dropped slightly so I was adding Indian almond leaf extract to my water change water so it matched but I was wondering what would happen later on if it keeps coming down, I will test the kh in the tank in a mo to see where it’s at. How can I adjust kh and just out of interest when doing a water change with ph’s that don’t match, what is a safe percentage to change.?

thank you so much for all the info above, and explaining it in so much detail for me, it’s a real help.

I probably didnt explain it perfectly earlier.. the KH and PH are linked.. the PH can still drop when KH is above 0, but its linked. As KH drops, the PH drops. But when the KH is 0, PH swings and drops dangerously fast.

The more acid there is in the system, the more KH is used up and the PH will lower by decimals. This is ok over an amount of time, but a change of 0.3 PH in a day is dangerous. Thats why frequent water changes of a sensible amount are important. To replenish the KH and work towards resetting the system before things get out of hand.

To increase KH you need to add more carbonate to the system. Some people use crushed coral which does this gradually. Others use products like Seachem's Cichlid Lake salts.

Conversely, adding carbonates to a system that already contains acid, will raise the PH back up

 

[xxamyxx85]

I probably didnt explain it perfectly earlier.. the KH and PH are linked.. the PH can still drop when KH is above 0, but its linked. As KH drops, the PH drops. But when the KH is 0, PH swings and drops dangerously fast.

The more acid there is in the system, the more KH is used up and the PH will lower by decimals. This is ok over an amount of time, but a change of 0.3 PH in a day is dangerous. Thats why frequent water changes of a sensible amount are important. To replenish the KH and work towards resetting the system before things get out of hand.

To increase KH you need to add more carbonate to the system. Some people use crushed coral which does this gradually. Others use products like Seachem's Cichlid Lake salts.

Conversely, adding carbonates to a system that already contains acid, will raise the PH back up

Yep, very confusing, so with using ro and adding equilibrium would this adjust kh? And if the ph of the ro water is neutral which would be perfect when I add what’s needed to bring kh up does this mean the ph will come up too? have a feeling that my tap water is going to cause more problems than I first thought and the pure water is definitely the way forward. I’m not sure of the changeover either, how much of a water change etc to transition over to pure water?

 

[mbsqw1d]

Yep, very confusing, so with using ro and adding equilibrium would this adjust kh? And if the ph of the ro water is neutral which would be perfect when I add what’s needed to bring kh up does this mean the ph will come up too? have a feeling that my tap water is going to cause more problems than I first thought and the pure water is definitely the way forward. I’m not sure of the changeover either, how much of a water change etc to transition over to pure water?

I'm pretty sure RO is "base" PH, so, 7.5 ish? Someone may correct me.
Adding equilibrium which increases KH and GH shouldn't do anything to the PH. You're just back in the position you would be with your tap water minus the nitrates and phosphates.
So tannic acid from your mopani wood, carbonic acid from co2 and nitric acid from nitrate will start working on lowering your KH and PH.
You just need to make sure that when you do a timely wc, you're consistent with the water chemistry.

To be honest.. with RO water, you can make up any water you want. If you had enough reliable test kits
Say if I wanted to do a 90% water change and id not done a wc in a month. Id be in trouble because im stuck with whatever my tapwater is. And at that point, it could be quite different from the tank water. Whereas if I had some RO water, a KH test kit and some Equilibrium to hand.. I could make some water to match the tank and avoid any problems.

 

[xxamyxx85]

Thank you, thank you, thank you! I’m gona get some pure water and have a play around until I feel confident I know what I’m doing, all the advice is much appreciated!!

 

[seangee]

With a low KH (less than 4), when acid builds up in the aquarium, whether its tannic acid or nitric acid, your PH will drop slowly and accordingly to the KH, as the acids 'eat' away at the KH. Once the KH goes to 0, then the PH starts to drop dramatically (or swing) to acidic levels.

Actually its not that dramatic. I have 0 KH in 3 tanks and my pH is stable between 5 and 6. It varies by tank because these have differing amounts of wood, plants and tannins. As long as you keep up with weekly water changes its a non issue.

Thank you, i find it all so confusing! So my GH is 7 and KH is 3, not sure if this is hard?

That is fine for soft water fish, including bettas (you don't say what you keep). IMO the easiest way to get back to that is to use one level scoop of Salty Shrimp GH/KH+ for every 10 litres of water you add. That is what I use in my fourth tank and it has KH=3, GH=6, pH=7. If you do use Amazon check the pack size. The pictures all look almost identical but the "cheaper options contain much less.

 

[xxamyxx85]

Actually its not that dramatic. I have 0 KH in 3 tanks and my pH is stable between 5 and 6. It varies by tank because these have differing amounts of wood, plants and tannins. As long as you keep up with weekly water changes its a non issue.

That is fine for soft water fish, including bettas (you don't say what you keep). IMO the easiest way to get back to that is to use one level scoop of Salty Shrimp GH/KH+ for every 10 litres of water you add. That is what I use in my fourth tank and it has KH=3, GH=6, pH=7. If you do use Amazon check the pack size. The pictures all look almost identical but the "cheaper options contain much less.

I really didn’t realise the science involved with fish keeping!
yes bettas and setting up a community tank in the near future.
I will invest in some salty shrimp gh/kh+ for my stock cupboard, I did a water change 3 days go on the tank in question and I’ve just tested the water, the kh has remained the same even though the ph has lowered again slightly. I will keep an eye on the kh anyway until I change over to the RO. Thank you

 

[hansgruber7]

I would just buy an RO Buddy, get some Seachem Equilibrium (I use the Aqualine and Acid buffers to stabilize PH). Then get an extra API Testing kit and experiment testing the water until you get what you need. Then just go with that and make adjustments as you need to. The tricky part I find is if you have things in your tank that change parameters (like PH), then you can run into difficulties matching your parameters at water change time. But if you don't do large water changes at once, and keep it to 20-30 percent changes at a time, it reduces your risk I think. Good luck. It can be complicated, but once you figure it out, it's pretty straightforward. Requires some trial and error in my experience.

 

[xxamyxx85]

I would just buy an RO Buddy, get some Seachem Equilibrium (I use the Aqualine and Acid buffers to stabilize PH). Then get an extra API Testing kit and experiment testing the water until you get what you need. Then just go with that and make adjustments as you need to. The tricky part I find is if you have things in your tank that change parameters (like PH), then you can run into difficulties matching your parameters at water change time. But if you don't do large water changes at once, and keep it to 20-30 percent changes at a time, it reduces your risk I think. Good luck. It can be complicated, but once you figure it out, it's pretty straightforward. Requires some trial and error in my experience.

It does become very confusing and there are so many different aspects to the hobby to learn and get right, it’s the trial and error part that worries me, I just don’t want to hurt any of my little fishy buddies lol I’ve grown quite attached! Honestly can’t say thank you enough to everyone for their expertise, it’s priceless! I will have a look at the ro buddy system now. ?

 

[hansgruber7]

You can do most of the trial and error before adding the water to the aquariums. Just test the parameters of the RO water and the aquariums before you add it each time at the beginning. If you keep the water changes relatively low percentage each time, it gives you a little more room for error.

 

[xxamyxx85]

Do fish get shock from GH or KH differences? Sorry probably a stupid question.

 

[Essjay]

Changing GH by a large amount can shock a fish; changing KH doesn't affect them as much, just as part of changing the whole water chemistry.

 

[xxamyxx85]

If my tank has a GH of 7, would putting water with a GH of 6 in a 50% water change be too much?