Tap water to start??

Is it really that bad to cycle a tank with tap water? I have started with tap water and am running a activated charcol filter on it, I have the salt added and it has been de-clorinated. I plane on letting it run with the filter for 72 hours before placing any base rock in the tank. I am going to be only using 1-2 pieces of "live rock" along with 50/50 live sand/non-live sand. I am planing on going reef after I get the tank cycled and have some good clean up crew going.

Should I clean out the tank and go with RO water or should tap be fine?

I took my tap water into the LFS and they tested it with a simple strip test and said it was really good for tap.

I trust you guy's alot more than the LFS they are there to make money.


Thanks in advance,

beamerhack

 

Clean it out and use RO. Unless you want a battle with all kinds of algae that will deface the beauty of your reef.

 

Hey!

What tests did you run ?! You should have checked against: silicates, phosphates, nitrates, general hardness dGH, carbonate hardness dKH! I'm also using tap water, however before doing so I've asked my water-supplying company to send me chart with above parameters. Pollution norms are very strict here in the Netherlands. Literally speaking water out of tap is ready for consumption without boiling!

 

I use well water in my tank and don't have an algae problem, or any water chemistry problems for that matter.

 

I started mine with tap water when I didn't know any better. Later I switched to RO water. I think you'll be fine. If you already have everything in there, I would just let it ride, especially if your tap water has checked out "better than most".

 

NEVER use tap water.

 

I also started with tap water. My water was high in nitrates, 20ppm. I did have an algae bloom and cyno problem after cycling but it cleared up. I did buy an RO/DI unit. I think you should invest in one, but you should be ok for now.

 

Reason being ?

 

Are you confused yet Beamer?!!!!!!!!;D Lots of different opinions on this one.

 

Check the TDS of tap water and that will answer your question. Way too many minerals in the water that will cause algae problems later on.