distilled water ok?

[huckleberry]

is it ok to use distilled water for my water changes? or shouild i use the RO water my LFS sells?
waht's the difference between the two?
which is better?
thanks

 

[searcher]

It's OK. That's what I use. However, RO is generally cheaper. Additionally, you should search the board for more info, some distilled water may have copper in it. So you should test a brand for copper and if it doesn't have any then stick with that brand.

 

[blue dew]

I've been using distilled water since the beginning without any problems. It was cheaper at Walmart (58 cents/gallon) than the 75 cent/gallon RO water that my LFS occasionally sells. So far no problems with it. Phosphates have remained at O with only marginal algae outbreaks. I learned my lesson from my first tank (FW) where I used about 50% Tap water and the rest distilled. I'm still fighting more types of algae then I ever knew existed with that tank.
Dew

 

[slick]

IMO RO/DI water is the best and you should use it if you can. This hobby is expensive and if your trying to save pennies on your water then maybe this is not the hobby for you. I don't mean this to sound mean or rude.

 

[blue dew]

Point taken...
Walmart also happens to be a lot closer. Eventually, when I'm not living in an apartment, I'd love to have my own RO/DI unit.
Dew

 

[jackdp]

If copper was not used in the distilling process then the water is great for salt tanks...better than RO water, it will contain less contaminants.

 

[slick]

Originally posted by jackdp
If copper was not used in the distilling process then the water is great for salt tanks...better than RO water, it will contain less contaminants.
If distilled water was better than RO/DI water then why dosen't everyone use it? Also RO/DI water is 99.9% pure I highly dought distilled water is 100% pure.

 

[fshhub]

Originally posted by slick
If distilled water was better than RO/DI water then why dosen't everyone use it? Also RO/DI water is 99.9% pure I highly dought distilled water is 100% pure.
the statement mentions RO, NOT RO/DI. Tehre is a big difference between the 2.
Distilled and RO, IMO are equally as good, but RO/DI is far better. AS mentioned earlier.
You used to be able to get RO/DI units that attatch to teh faucet, instead of hard plmbing them. Look around, the may stillb eo available.
The rpoblem, with straight RO, is it does not remove some things, and the problem with Distilled, is its distillling process. Both are Generally safe and normally better than tap water.

 

[wrassecal]

I'vew always used distilled from Wal Mart for top off and DI (deionized) from the lfs for water changes. My lfs doesn't use the RO portion, just the DI. HTH