My family isnt too pleased with buying filtered water from a store.
For your 72, if you buy 36 gallons of water from LFS at 40 cents a gallon, that's an investment of $14.40. That's less than you will likely pay for any fish in the tank. For water changes of 7 gallons a month plus topoffs of maybe another 7 gallons, that's $5.60 a month to maintain your tank's water parameters. Actually, probably the cheapest way to ensure the overall health of your livestock.
at what time can i add the salt?
As I posted earlier, mix your water in a bucket with the salt and put a powerhead in to aerate overnight. Never add salt directly to your tank without mixing and aerating.
or what if i added hose water from outside? is that better or worse then tap?
Hose water = tap water. It's the source of the water that counts.
say u added salt to tap watter is there any way to make it beter concidering that salt is so expensive
Once you have your tank set up, you will only need the salt for water changes. Top-offs are done with fresh water (salt doesn't evaporate). Get a 200 gallon bucket, it should last you a while. There really isn't any way to make tap water perfect.
But yes, even though you seem to find it hard to beleive, our country well water is very very clean.
What did they test for? Phosphates, silicates, nitrates, ammonia? You might have wanted to mention that in your original post... if you're comfortable with it, go for it. Do realize that the makeup of your tap water can change from day to day.
Look you guys... you come here asking for our advice and we give it to you. It is the opinion of the vast majority of the experienced SW aquarists on this forum that RO or RO/DI water is clearly superior to tap water. With RO water you KNOW you are not introducing certain harmful elements into your fragile ecosystem. With tap water, it's like playing Russian Roulette.
We aren't telling you to use RO water because we all secretly have stock in an RO factory... it's because we want you to succeed and we want your animals to be healthy.
Katie