1st time saltwater mix help please

[khoivo1]

i never mix saltwater before so this is my first time mixxing it,,,i just want to know if i can just get tap water from my house to mix it ,,my house doesn't have wholehouse fillter but we do have water softener,,or what would be the best water to mix with aquarium salt?? or should i install wholehouse fillter ?/ plese help thanks

 

[Nano Chris]

I would recommend RO/DI water if you use tap you don't know what you are putting in your tank, copper silicate and other stuff. I use RO/DI and mix my salt with it that way i know what i put in my tank.

 

[old salty]

At the very least, you need an RO/DI unit and a refractometer.

 

[FullPull]

Yes, please listen to the above posts...do yourself a favor and buy atleast an RO unit. I've heard of people using regular tap water with no ill affects, but it's one heck of a chance. The odds of you ending up with a hair algae outbreak due to phosphates is much greater, and it's a real pain to deal with. And as stated above, the unknown metals and minerals you would be putting in would scare me. This is an expensive hobby...An RO or RO/DI unit is going to be cheap in comparison to your ongoing grand total.

 

[taillonjohn]

If you can't buy yourself an RO/DI unit today, you can use bottled distilled water, or you can buy bottled RO water, or you can buy RO/DI water from your lfs. suggest you do research before using tap water.... it can be done, especially if you wanna do fish only, but really look into it first can it can be bad long term for your tank, depending on what you eventually wanna put in your tank

 

[Shagsbeard]

Tap water is random... area by area and even hour by hour. There's almost no way to tell what's going to happen when you use it.

 

[khoivo1]

there are so many RO unit i don't know which one that i should get ,i have an 90gal tank,,,should i get the 35g per day unit ? or 50 gl perday?what brandname and where should i install it?? any idea ,,??i am very new to this hobby ,,still learning alot here,thanks for reply ,

 

[papagimp]

Re: 1st time saltwater mix help please

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9808290#post9808290 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by khoivo1
what would be the best water to mix with aquarium salt??

You probably know this, but being your first time and all, I'll specify just to be on the safe side, aquarium salt is different from sea salt or salt mixes for a marine/reef tank. Please don't buy up alot of aquarium salt and use that. You won't like the results.

 

[Euclid537]

Pick up some "purified water" from the grocery store or your LFS. Reverse Osmosis and you can get it with Carbon Filtration as well if you'd like. It's cheap, less than $0.50 a gallon.


As far as mixing goes, I usually stick a powerhead and a heater in a bucket then poor in the water and salt and the heat/flow helps to mix it together pretty quickly

 

[Euclid537]

That's one question that I've got.
Once salt and water is mixed up, is it alright to sit for a while?
I'd like to mix up my water in bulk instead of having to mix it up immediately prior to each waterchange.

Thanks!

 

[markzfishn1]

As long as the water is moving, it doesn't hurt to keep it a while before you use it.

 

[alexb518]

i agree with euchlid. you dont' have to wait until you buy an ro/di filter. you can purchase RO water from many grocery stores. it's 98% purified and really cheap. you can also buy ocean water from most lfs's for about $1 a gallon. pretty cheap if you ask me