Distilled water for water changes?

[mrmaroon]

I want to know if I can use distilled or some other form of bottled water for water changes as my tap water is not the best.
Thanks

 

[templar]

Distilled water is good, if your buying it at a grocery store also check if they have one of those water machines where you fill your own bottles with. That's what I use now its RO water and its less expensive then the distilled and better.

 

[rdc30-06]

Distilled water does work. I used to have bad well water and bought it at a water refiner near by. Much cheaper than the grocery. Used the 5 gal water bottles that are used for drinking fountains. They sold the old ones and the refiner. Watch your PH as it may drop. Also, reverse immosis water also works. Ran a salt AQ for several years with lots of success, but not until after I quit using well water. RDC

 

[mrmaroon]

My ph is a little low. Around 7.8 to 8.0 If it drops any more, how can I raise it?
Thanks for the reply

 

[templar]

At 8 you should raise it now until you get to 8.2-8.4. You can use any number of PH Boosting products, I like to use Seachem Marine Buffer.

 

[javajoe]

I may be in the minority, but I just had a terrible experience using distilled water. I bought distilled water for a water change, and also used some distilled water to top of the tank from evaporation, and within hours, my coraline algae started dying like crazy-- within 24 hrs, 25 percent of it turned pure white! I did an 80% water change using DI water, and all has been fine since- the white stopped spreading, and i think some coraline alge is growing back already. Doing a little saerching online i found that depending on how distilled water is made, it CAN be fine, but it can ALSO be done wrong and contain impurities. some things that have a lower boiling points than water turn to steam and if the proper setup is not used, these condense and end up back in the water. ALSO-- if the distilling company using COPPER tubing for the distillation process, it can pick up traces of copper- so make sure to test your disitlled water for copper befire using it. I just read this part now- and plan on testing the last gallon that i have for copper-- i'll post my findings.
So be careful!

 

[javajoe]

Took some of the distilled water i had left to the LFS to test for copper- and it DID test positive. thankfully, the water from my tank did not. Glad i did that 80% water change... so i vote against distilled water, unless you test it for copper first-- i learned my lesson!

 

[royce]

I have been buying bottled RO water from Walmart - got that tip from my lfs guy and from this board. It may cost a little bit more in the long run, but I'm not too enthused about using up 4 gal of water to make up 1 gal of RO, as I would with a home unit.

 

[mrmaroon]

Does the Wal-mart water have a particular name/label? How much is it a gallon?
thanks for the info

 

[royce]

It has a green label & lid, and it says "reverse osmosis" in very tiny letters on the lable - their other types of water, distilled, baby drinking (don't wanna know about that one) have different color labels. I get it for 0.58/gal, although I think that some people on this board have found RO water for much less than that. With just a 55g, it isn't all that expensive until you get into large and frequent changes.

 

[mrmaroon]

I appreciate your help.

 

[royce]

Just be ready for the funny looks from the cashiers - I'm setting up a new 55g tank and have been buying the stuff by the cart-full!

 

[lm]

[ December 05, 2001: Message edited by: LM ]