well water good or bad

[jabaar]

i'm out in the country so we are useing well water, do i need the chlorine elliminator cause it's not treated water. i'm getting live sand and rock today, i have a ge f20t12 pl-aq wide spectrum light. i will upgrade to a better one but for now is that ok. thanks for all the help cats

[BoomerD]

You shouldn't need a chlorine eliminator since your water isn't treated, but without water testing, there's no way to know what is in it...Most well water contains lots of things you don't want in your tank...nitrates, phosphates, etc. RO/DI may still be the best choice for your tank water.
As for your lights, that really all depends on what you want to keep. It's doubtful that you'll like the color of your tank with that bulb, (things will look greenish-yellow) and it's not going to be enought light to keep any kind of coral.
How big is the tank?

[saltwaterfarm]

Ditto... I had a nitrate issue early on because of my well water.

[jabaar]

30 gal. tank

[Cougra]

You definately have to have your water tested at a lab to see what you have in it. Some well water is really hard and others are really soft. Without a lab test done on a regular basis you wont know what you are putting in the tank. There are a couple potential problems with using well water.

1. Well water contaminants change throughout the seasons as the ground water changes. In the spring you are likely to have higher salt, nitrate and phosphate content from the spring melt if you live in an area that gets any snow acculumation.

2. Well water is not treated therefore it can contain paracites, bacteria etc. While these may be safe for humans to consume in small doses and will probably be killed off in your tank once the marine salt. Many filter manufactures do not recommend that you use their products with well water because there is a very serious risk of having harmful bacteria colonizing on the filter media and making the water toxic to drink. I'm not sure if this will be a problem after the RO stage though so it's something you'll have to look into.

[jabaar]

i did the four test on it. my ph. 8.4, nitrate 0 ppm, ammonia 0.5, nitrite 0 ppm. i live in florida if that matters .

[BoomerD]

I'd contact the good folks at :
http://www.spectrapure.com/index.htm
to ask about using a RO/Di system on well water before I spent any money. IIRC, it CAN be done, but has to be done right to avoid problems.
The hobbyist tests you did give some indication as to water quality, but unfortunately, don't tell you if there are any heavy metals, phosphates, or other undesirables in your water. You MAY be able to have your water tested at the local county water district (by any other name), either for free as a public service, or for a (not too) nominal fee. No way for us to even begin to guess how good your water actually is. It could be as pure as laboratory grade water, (highly unlikely) or it could be so polluted that it borders on toxic waste... The simple hobby-grade kits won't tell you everything you need to know...

[Cougra]

Originally Posted by jabaar

i did the four test on it. my ph. 8.4, nitrate 0 ppm, ammonia 0.5, nitrite 0 ppm. i live in florida if that matters .

Seriously, the only way you will be able to tell if you can use your tap water is to have it tested, and it needs to have regular tests done on it.

To give you an idea on how variable water can be, when I lived on a farm in Northern Ontario, our well was literally 34m from a natural spring fed creek. Due to the proximity of the well, the creek and the fact that we lived on a working farm, we had to have our water tested quarterly to see of one water source contaminated the other. The water samples were taken from the closest points to do the water comparisons.

Our well was an artesain well (tapped into an underground aquifier) while the creek was spring fed but the primary source was about 4 Km away (along the stream bed). The water coming out of the well was generally very soft slightly acidic (pH 6.8 -6.9) water with very few trace elements, while the creek water was very hard, slightly alkaline (pH 7.5-7.7) with large amounts of phosphates, nitrates and heavy metals. The two bodies of water were fairly close together in nature yet had very different water chemisty. One body of water was still underground in a relatively inert area, the other flowed through and over lime stone before coming to the surface.

If water coming out of the ground less then 4 Km apart from each other can have such variable chemistry, there is no way for any of us to guess what it's like where you live, especially when the only hint we have is an area as large as Florida. It really does need to be professionally tested.

[PhilOlsen]

I would suggest getting water from a LFS that is run thru a RO/DI before using well water, well water may change its parameters many times throughout the year causing issues. I have a frien who attempted using well water, he had it tested and it came back OK, then 5 months later he had all kinds of nitrate and ph issues, he had the water tested again and it was horrible for tank use, due to drought the water was completely different and not nearly as dilutted.

[jabaar]

thank you cats for the info!

[lcstorc]

Usually in FL the well water is high in sulfer. I know many people with the yellow/orange on the bottom/outside of their house from sprinklers run from well water anywhere from South to Central Fl.