low maintenance re-mineralisation ?

[Shay]

Here's where I'm at right now. 125 will be done filling this evening with RO water. No fish yet, of course. Set up for daily, automatic on a timer, water change (25 gallons) from a storage tank.

Looking for the easiest way to buffer the RO water in the storage tank. I have built a T into the RO waste line with one end of the T going into the drain and the other to a ball valve in the storage tank. My plan is to re-mix, by trial and error with the ball valve, some of the RO waste into the pure RO/DI water.

Good idea? I've also considered using the RO water with some coral sand in the storage tank. Open for any suggestions. Don't want to rely on scooping in minerals every day, as I leave town for the weekend at least once a month. The tank was set up for Altums and plants, but the lfs killed the Altums before I had a chance to buy them. Going with red melon discus now, no breeding.

-Shay

[wildy]

Funny enough i was thinking about a similar system but would this be stable as the tds would not stay the same as the filters age......
I was looking at a float valve that shuts off the whole unit when water height is reached, im new to RO i dont own 1 as yet but im thinking of breeding discus, and i dont think my water is up to scratch
So a ball valve would adjust the ammount of water alowed to flow to the storage tank, sending the rest to the drain, and testing over time and adjustment of the valve :would get what you want tds 150 , sounds like a great idea , i think ill steal it...

:P

[Shay]

The ball valve is working great. With my tapwater, using almost equal parts RO and waste (as judged by looking at the flow) work out about right. The whole thing is a bit ugly, however, as the T in the waste line has to be kept well about the ball valve in order to get any flow at all through the valve. I am going to put in a second, inline ball valve on the drain side of the T to make this system less dependent on gravity.

-Shay

[wildy]

ive ordered my 100gallon a day system today and was speaking to the guy and he said not to restrict the waste water as it would foul the membrane and cause damage and shorten its life.....he recommends kent ro,, but if you need loads of water....

[Cosmo]

Shay,
very interesting as I've been thinking about doing the same thing, and, one of my concerns was possibly damaging the capillary tube with any added pressure. Guess you could run the waste up over the top of the storage tank and T it down to reduce that, but then that would really be ugly.

Had thought of a Kent gravity doser (they're cheap) and getting the mix right thru trial and error but am thinking that would really be lucky to hit it to the point it stayed right all the time.

Coming to the conclusion an electric doser is the only way to go... just don't want to spend that much money right now.

Let us know how things work out.
Jim

[wildy]

Ive got my system up and running im doing roughly a 50-50 mix to achieve a tds of around 150 bit messy to start but it can be done , well i wasted 20 quid on a tub of RO right..