Phosphate Testing

[snowslide]

Does anyone have a phosphate test kit?

If so, could you bring it to the next COMAS meeting, in July?

I am fighting a serious case of cyano, and I am wanting to test my RO unit to see if it needs a filter change...

[rbb213]

James, Do you have a TDS Meter?...To test your water, a Phosphate test will work, but IMO if you you use a TDS meter, it will pretty much do the same, but TDS meter will definetly let you know if your Membrane is shot. Also, a good rule of thumb is if you make over 500 gallons of RO water, inturn that could possibly exhausted your sediment and carbon filters....

Here in Lawton, I run about 1500-2000gal before, I swap out all my filters. I get a constant reading of 0.


Remember, for every 1gal of RO/ RO/DI water made, you actually ran about 3-5gal of water through the system.

HTH...

If you need more information, look on the COMAS's website, there is an excellent article on RODI.

ROCKY

[luvabunny]

Try a product called chemi-clean. It will get rid of your cyano within 24 hrs and not harm any of your corals or inverts.
I bought my expensive little vial at Reef Shop, but have only had to use a tiny amount 1 time in each of my tanks, and never had a problem with cyano again.

[snowslide]

Luvabunny: Thanks I tried it once, but at the time I had a piece of LR curing in the tank (that I was told was CURED....) so it had zero effect. I may try it again later... but the rule of thumb is its only a short time cure... I have to find the real culprit or it could return.... although it sounds like you had fantastic luck in all your tanks! Congrats!!! Its definitely not fun to contend with....

Rocky: Yeah, if I had the money I would have picked up a TDS Meter quite some time ago... but working with limited funds, I never had the chance. Besides, the Phosphate test kits are cheaper then the meter and I really don't want to have to run out and order one of these.... just really need a single test to see if my make water is the real culprit to deal with....

Since its a nano tank, I will probably run down to Wal-mart and pick up some distilled water and try a few water changes with that to see ....

Does anyone know if Wal-mart's Distilled water should work? All it says is it was ran through IO and UV.... I thought RO was the most important part?