distilled or r/o water?

[Dr. VanNostrin]

would anybody recommend one over the other? i use distilled, just wondering if r/o would be better to use

[the image reaper]

either way, you need to add Cal-Mag+ type of minerals, or you will have deficiencies ...

[chongman420]

I buy gallon jugs from walmart of distilled water. The label says its filtered by reverse osmosis, microfiltration, distillation, and ozonation whatever that is

[the image reaper]

remember to always pH your water ... RO and distilled water are NOT automatically 'pH neutral' , as some are led to believe ... :smokin:

[GreenToe]

remember to always pH your water ... RO and distilled water are NOT automatically 'pH neutral' , as some are led to believe ... :smokin:

Reaper, I am new to this Board here. But isn't PH neutral 7.0? I grow Hydro which is 5.2-6.2 or something like that, (I stick with 5.8). Which is not PH neutral, either as I understand.

Thanks GT

[the image reaper]

correct, 7.0 is 'neutral-pH' ... lower is 'acidic', higher is 'alkaline' ... :smokin:

[Cyclonite]

Pure water is PH neutral, now does pure water exist...only for seconds in lab conditions. Pure water has no buffering capabilities so any tiny amount of impurities will throw the PH.

Most common is co2 gas in the atmosphere....upon contact with "pure water" carbonic acid will form in the water lowering its PH some.

[420plants]

I just got an RO/DI system and don't know how I did without it for all that time. Either way you always want to adjust your PH AFTER you add nutes. I learned the hard way by adding a single drop of PH down to 5 gallons of watter and watched my PH constantly plummet to 2.0. Adding nutrients will help to buffer your PH. I know that Advanced Nutrients has buffers built in and Barricade is made to just such a thing. Plain 0ppm waters PH will dance all over the meter without anything to hold it.

[Illusion]

slight hijack:

how much cal-mag do y'all usually use per gallon? each application? only on res changes?

[the image reaper]

I use 10ml/gallon, was advised that from the local hydro shop ... I add it also at top-offs, the strain I'm growing likes magnesium :smokin:

[the image reaper]

double-post, sorry

[scagster]

Someone's probably gonna bash me for this, but I don't use any cal-mag, I buffer my res by using about 80% RO/DI, and 20% tap water. Works for me, just needs a little fine-tuning for the pH.

[the image reaper]

no reason to be bashed ... every water system varies ... you possibly have a high level of minerals in your water, enough to get by on ... I would suspect AZ would be a high-alkaline source, but who knows ?, you may be highly acidic only a mile away ... that's why we all need to test :smokin:

[iniganja]

Top-off ( not to change the subject) is when you add water without nutes to adjust ppm? Am I way off?

[Illusion]

top off is when you add water back into the reservoir to bring the level back where it should be

it can be with nutrients or without

or if you add no nutes it'll bring it the ppm down

if you add the same ppm back, it'll be the same, etc...