# RO makers



## duckyser (Oct 4, 2009)

What exactly are RO filters, what do they do and are they required for spawning fish?


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

What are R/O filters is too long an explanation. Google. 

What they do is reduce water hardness to zero via very tight mechanical seperation of the water molecule from any other dissolved solids attatched to it. Additional cartridges like a fine sediment cartridge and a deionizing cartridge are typically used.

They aren't required for anything. It's just practical for a lot of situations.


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## duckyser (Oct 4, 2009)

i once had angels that spawned but the eggs bever hathed, would an ro water have helped the eggs spawn?


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

duckyser said:


> i once had angels that spawned but the eggs bever hathed, would an ro water have helped the eggs spawn?


Not really.

Clean water and a bit of current over the eggs, as well as an anti fungal agent- like alder cones can all aid in getting eggs to hatch.


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## duckyser (Oct 4, 2009)

well at one point i put them in a one gal jar with heater, air bubbles, distilled water and methlyene blue and none hatched...

i also saw the parents laying the eggs and the male fertilizing.


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

The one gal jar doesn't sound like it would work out. No need to remove eggs from cichlids or gouramis they will rear the young to a certain age. If they eat the eggs its because there's an issue like fungus or dead eggs. 

Don't do any water changes while eggs are present. Keep current over the eggs. If you want you can get an egg tumbler but always handle eggs carefully and try to keep them under water because the change in pressure can damage or destroy some fish eggs. I've had things hatch with no anti fungal agent. Not everyone uses one.


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## KhuliLoachFan (Mar 8, 2008)

To go back to the original topic...

What do folks recommend as far as WHAT R/O unit to buy? Let's say you want anywhere for 30-60 gpd capacity.


W


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

I don't know if that was the original topic but apparently the Kent ones are excellent.


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## KhuliLoachFan (Mar 8, 2008)

Well it was what I want to discuss. So it must be that, then. ;-)

I shall check out the Kent ones.

And to be relevant to the original question; It depends on the fish.

For my Apistos, the answer is "yes, most likely, you need to add some R/O water to reduce your pH, and reduce the hardness, to condition your fish to spawn".

Almost every salty fish keeper uses R/O these days, or an alternative way of producing water without the mineral hardness that tap water
has, because their tanks turn into algae-filled swamps, if they don't use pure R/O or DI water, to mix with their marine salt mix, to produce their artificial seawater. Some people are using resin based ion-exchange systems, and if I remember correctly, I heard someone sling around the term "cati-ani" in reference to this. Cati-Ani is a short form reference to the terms "cation anion". 

There's some kind of a resin filter for sale at Big Als Scarboro for about $50 that promises to do at least part of the R/O style removal of hardness from water. I wonder if it would work well enough for me to get my apistos breeding.

W


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

KhuliLoachFan said:


> Well it was what I want to discuss. So it must be that, then. ;-)
> 
> I shall check out the Kent ones.
> 
> ...


Deionization resins reduce ionization. They don't actually reduce hardness. They reduce 'perceived hardness'.

Essentially the way that works is this-

Let's say you have 100 parts per million of X. Because 90ppm of X are ionized, the fish more readily senses X's presence and feels uncomfortable. By deionizing (removing the positive charge) or X by running it through a deionizer and getting down to say 15ppm of ionized X, the fish senses it less and is more comfortable. This is, of course, not as good as actual R/O. Nowhere near.

With an actual R/O system, typically you will pass through a very fine cartridge, then the membrane, then the deionizing cartridge. Cation and aneon resins are two seperate resins as I recall and are recharged differently. Therefore using a mixed resin is not economical. The more efficient thing to do is run two Deio cartridges in your R/O system and fill them with two resins seperately so you can charge them.

KENT is the brand that was suggested to me by Harold as being the most high quality. When I did R/O a few years ago I used Kent R/O right to remineralize. It's excellent stuff. Their trace elements are great too. If you've got the funds to throw around something like a four stage R/O, TDS meter, some almond leaves, R/O right and Discus trace (Kent) would probably get you some baby apistos pretty fast .

Chris has bred a few apistos now and then and can probably help you. Someone I spoke to once who had a whole basement of apistos and had been breeding them for decades said he swore by simulated rain via sudden addition of cooler, softer-than-tank water.


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## KhuliLoachFan (Mar 8, 2008)

Here's where I think you might be a bit off on your chemistry (re: "Perceived hardness")

Deionized water (DI Water) as we understand it at the laboratory where I work, means it is purified water, with mineral ions (salts) removed. Check it out on wikipedia, if you like.

We measure the purity of the water after the ions (salts) are removed (not converted) by measuring the total dissolved solids (TDS) in the water, which we sense by the conductivity of the water. A reading of 5 meg ohms, for instance is much more pure (more water molecules, less ions, that is, salts) than the tap water that goes in. When our membranes are worn out, we get a lower resistance reading on the water, and that tells us that some of the ions are still in there.

Ions refer to the count of electrons versus protons, and thus a charge. We are not removing the charge by changing the NaCl molecule to another NaCl molecule with a net neutral charge, but rather removing the Ionic compounds. That is, when you ionize sodium (Na), using available Chlorine (cl), you end up with NaCl (table salt), which is an ion, also called a salt, dissolved in the water.

Let us quote the WikiPedia:



> Deionization
> Deionized water, also known as demineralized water[2] (DI water, DIW or de-ionized water; can also be spelled deionised water), is water that has had its mineral ions removed, such as cations from sodium, calcium, iron, copper and anions such as chloride and bromide. Deionization is a physical process which uses specially-manufactured ion exchange resins which bind to and filter out the mineral salts from water. Because the majority of water impurities are dissolved salts, deionization produces a high purity water that is generally similar to distilled water, and this process is quick and without scale buildup.


Nevertheless, if the tap-water-filter at $50 from Big Also does NOT remove the solids, but rather further reacts with them, to change the pH without lowering the TDS, then, as you said, it might be lowering the 'perceived' hardness. Or is that what you meant in the first place? 
Warren


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

KhuliLoachFan said:


> Here's where I think you might be a bit off on your chemistry (re: "Perceived hardness")
> 
> Deionized water (DI Water) as we understand it at the laboratory where I work, means it is purified water, with mineral ions (salts) removed. Check it out on wikipedia, if you like.
> 
> ...


TDS meters measure ionized particles. A particle can be deionized but still be present and not be detected by a TDS meter.

You can call it water purification if you want. A heavy metal that's deionized is going to do a hell of a lot less to a biological system than one that is-- hence Seachem's cupramine being a fully ionized form of copper.

It's 'deactivated hardness'. That's the best way to put it.


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## KhuliLoachFan (Mar 8, 2008)

RO units that contain membranes do not "deactivate" anything, they remove it.
They are a membrane, a semi-permeable surface with microscopic holes. Some of the h20 molecules can pass through the holes, but much of it does not pass through, and is called the "rejected" water. This rejected water, containing almost 100% of the dissolved solids, does not get into your final RO water. Thus, nothing is deactivated by a membrane, it is removed.

However, some of the ion-exchange-cartridge water filters function as you have mentioned, and "deactivate" the solids, by replacing one, with another. 

Warren


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

KhuliLoachFan said:


> RO units that contain membranes do not "deactivate" anything, they remove it.
> They are a membrane, a semi-permeable surface with microscopic holes. Some of the h20 molecules can pass through the holes, but much of it does not pass through, and is called the "rejected" water. This rejected water, containing almost 100% of the dissolved solids, does not get into your final RO water. Thus, nothing is deactivated by a membrane, it is removed.
> 
> However, some of the ion-exchange-cartridge water filters function as you have mentioned, and "deactivate" the solids, by replacing one, with another.
> ...


Exactly.


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## bae (May 11, 2007)

Deionizers don't change the charge on ions. They exchange one ion for another. They use ion exchange resins. A cation exchange resin exchanges one cation for another, and an anion exchange resin exchanges one anion for another.

Home water softeners replace Ca++ and Mg++ with Na+, which makes hard water better for washing. The resin is a cation exchange resin that is recharged with salt. Hardness and softness describes amount of calcium and magnesium ions. Water from a water softener will be soft, but will still have a high conductivity due to all the sodium.

Deionizing devices like the Tap Water Purifier use both anion and cation exchange resins. The cation resin replaces cations with H+ and the anion resin exchanges anions (carbonate, sulfate, chloride, etc) for OH-. You recharge the cation resin with strong acid like HCl, and the anion resin with lye. In the TWP, the resins are mixed, but you can separate them by differential density and recharge each separately. The manufacturer, of course, prefers that you just buy another cartridge instead.

From what I've heard, you get 50 to 100 gallons of DI water from a TWP unit before you have to recharge or replace the cartridge. It may be cheaper to buy RO water at the supermarket if you don't need a lot.

RO units don't get everything out. The amount depends on how you adjust them. They waste a lot of water to purify a smaller amount. To get lab grade extremely pure water, comparable to distilled water, tap water is run through an RO unit and then a DI unit.

Many Apistogrammas will breed in Toronto tap water. These include A.borelli and A.cacatuoides, as well as many other common species. It's only the black water species that may need softer, more acid water. Peat acts as a cation exchanger that exchanges H+ for other cations, so circulating tap water through some peat may soften and acidify the water adequately. Unfortunately, this complicates water changes because you want to avoid abrupt changes in pH or hardness, so you have to prepare the water in advance and measure the prepared water and the tank water before the change. So it's really worthwhile to just use tap water unless you're having a problem of all the eggs being infertile after the pair have several tries at it, although water hardness is not the only cause of infertile eggs.


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## KhuliLoachFan (Mar 8, 2008)

Ah, well, then, my A.cacatuoides WILL breed in Toronto tap water?  Good news!

W


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## bae (May 11, 2007)

KhuliLoachFan said:


> Ah, well, then, my A.cacatuoides WILL breed in Toronto tap water?  Good news!


According to Linke And Staeck's book, the places thay found this species had: "always soft to moderately hard water with a pH between 7 and 8". Sounds like what comes out of your tap, eh?

Good luck. Let us know how it goes.


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

KhuliLoachFan said:


> Ah, well, then, my A.cacatuoides WILL breed in Toronto tap water?  Good news!
> 
> W


Oh yeah. cacatuoides, bitaeneata, sometimes borelli all breed in TO tap water no problem. I though you had like viejitas or something


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## duckyser (Oct 4, 2009)

Anyone Here know someone or have bred cardinal tetras in Toronto tap water?


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

That's apparently one of those inside secrets. There's a guy north of Toronto that pumps out neons and cardinals like it's going out of style but he isn't about to tell anybody how he does it from what I hear. And people have asked


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## matti2uude (Jan 10, 2009)

I have A. Veijita gold and A. Hongsloi formII spawning in TO tap water. Feeding them live blackworms seems to help condition them to spawn.


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## duckyser (Oct 4, 2009)

what is the name and contact information of this breeder?


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## AquariAM (Jan 28, 2010)

Good luck with that


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## bae (May 11, 2007)

matti2uude said:


> I have A. Veijita gold and A. Hongsloi formII spawning in TO tap water. Feeding them live blackworms seems to help condition them to spawn.


Matt, where do you buy live blackworms?


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## matti2uude (Jan 10, 2009)

I usually get the live blackworms at Dragon Aquarium in Miss. and I get them From Aquapets at Midland/Steeles.


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