Show me your RO systems

[Tony_S]

Getting to the final stages of my shopping list of things I want or are going to need. I live in a small city and have pretty good/clean drinking water. So I do not have a whole house water filter in my home. Seems like with fogging, misting, dripping, and cleanings, I'll be going thru a lot of water. I don't see myself getting gallons and gallons of distilled water jugs from the grocery store like I'm a doomsday prepper getting ready for the worst. So I'm looking into getting a RO system just for my chameleon setup. What systems are people using?

Doing a quick search I found this online and wasn't sure if it had everything I'd need for my chameleon setup.
https://www.chewy.com/aquatic-life-...-O8H4wiUdytl9VxZ40LS1IzvlkX6l61RoC7lkQAvD_BwE

Thanks,

Tony

 

[Rst_Cham]

I have almost the same one, but the 3-stage instead:
https://www.chewy.com/aquatic-life-ro-buddie-three-stage/dp/146151

I also got a TDS tester on amazon, so that I know when it needs to be replaced.

I go through a lot of water between my cham and my frogs, highly recommend, so far (6 months) it works great! I keep it hooked up to a sink in my laundry room.

 

[Daesie11]

I have almost the same one, but the 3-stage instead:
https://www.chewy.com/aquatic-life-ro-buddie-three-stage/dp/146151

I also got a TDS tester on amazon, so that I know when it needs to be replaced.

I go through a lot of water between my cham and my frogs, highly recommend, so far (6 months) it works great! I keep it hooked up to a sink in my laundry room.

Can you explain how it works?
Do you just hook it up to a sink and itll clean the water for you? For only 50 bucks I would totally want that lol it's such a hassle to get the jugs lol

 

[Rst_Cham]

Can you explain how it works?
Do you just hook it up to a sink and itll clean the water for you? For only 50 bucks I would totally want that lol it's such a hassle to get the jugs lol

There's a faucet attachment that attaches a hose from the faucet to the input of the system. So, the water travels from the faucet through the RO cartridges. Then there are two output hoses, one is waste water, so I just have that one pointed at the sink drain (though some people catch the waste water into a bucket for watering plants and such.) Then the second output hose is outputting RO water, so I have that feeding into a 2.5 gallon bucket, or even just filling up empty gallon jugs.

Here's the thing, it produces a lot of waste water. The water coming out of the waste water output hose exceeds the amount of water coming out of the RO output hose. And it's slow; it takes a long time to fill a 2.5 gallon bucket with RO water, like at least 30 minutes for me, but this is dependent on the water temperature, your home's water pressure, and how new the cartridges are. The warmer the water, the newer the cartridges, and the stronger the water pressure, the faster it filters.

Also, they do make replacement cartridges, but the cost of replacing all 3 is pretty much the cost of getting a new system. That's why I got a TDS tester to test the water periodically to see where I'm at. From what I've been told, under 5ppm is good for Chameleons. I've been running my system for 6 months and at first I was at 0ppm, now I am at 2ppm, so hopefully I've got another 6 months left before I replace. For reference, our tap water here in Denver is over 50ppm.

All that said, I still highly recommend as a very affordable RO solution. Water here in Denver is cheap, (about $3.00/1,000 gallons), so even though I filter about 1-3 gallons per day (for cham and frogs), I havent seen any real increase in my water bill (even though the amount of waste water WAY exceeds the 1-3 gallons of filtered RO water I'm actually getting, by a lot.) I do plan to start catching some waste water for plant watering, since I hate seeing it go down the drain.

 

[Daesie11]

There's a faucet attachment that attaches a hose from the faucet to the input of the system. So, the water travels from the faucet through the RO cartridges. Then there are two output hoses, one is waste water, so I just have that one pointed at the sink drain (though some people catch the waste water into a bucket for watering plants and such.) Then the second output hose is outputting RO water, so I have that feeding into a 2.5 gallon bucket, or even just filling up empty gallon jugs.

Here's the thing, it produces a lot of waste water. The water coming out of the waste water output hose exceeds the amount of water coming out of the RO output hose. And it's slow; it takes a long time to fill a 2.5 gallon bucket with RO water, like at least 30 minutes for me, but this is dependent on the water temperature, your home's water pressure, and how new the cartridges are. The warmer the water, the newer the cartridges, and the stronger the water pressure, the faster it filters.

Also, they do make replacement cartridges, but the cost of replacing all 3 is pretty much the cost of getting a new system. That's why I got a TDS tester to test the water periodically to see where I'm at. From what I've been told, under 5ppm is good for Chameleons. I've been running my system for 6 months and at first I was at 0ppm, now I am at 2ppm, so hopefully I've got another 6 months left before I replace. For reference, our tap water here in Denver is over 50ppm.

All that said, I still highly recommend as a very affordable RO solution. Water here in Denver is cheap, (about $3.00/1,000 gallons), so even though I filter about 1-3 gallons per day (for cham and frogs), I havent seen any real increase in my water bill (even though the amount of waste water WAY exceeds the 1-3 gallons of filtered RO water I'm actually getting, by a lot.) I do plan to start catching some waste water for plant watering.

Oh so it's not even something that's connected to the plumbing under the sink?? Do you have to keep it connected all the time or can you just connect it when you need water??

 

[Rst_Cham]

Oh so it's not even something that's connected to the plumbing under the sink?? Do you have to keep it connected all the time or can you just connect it when you need water??

There are systems that go under the sink that attach to your plumbing but this particular system is more of a portable, part-time system. Yes, you can just hook it up when you need it. Like once a week, fill up 5-10 empty gallon jugs (or however much you need to get through a week) and then disconnect until following week. I have a spare sink in the laundry room so I just keep mine hooked up.

 

[Daesie11]

There are systems that go under the sink that attach to your plumbing but this particular system is more of a portable, part-time system. Yes, you can just hook it up when you need it. Like once a week, fill up 5-10 empty gallon jugs (or however much you need to get through a week) and then disconnect until following week. I have a spare sink in the laundry room so I just keep mine hooked up.

Girl you just saved me so much hassle going to the grocery store lol

 

[Rst_Cham]

Girl you just saved me so much hassle going to the grocery store lol

It's worth noting that it comes with a standard faucet adapter, which, of course, didn't fit my old laundry sink faucet. So I went to home depot and bought one that fits. So just keep that in mind, if your faucet isn't whatever standard sink faucets are, lol.

 

[Daesie11]

It's worth noting that it comes with a standard faucet adapter, which, of course, didn't fit my old laundry sink faucet. So I went to home depot and bought one that fits. So just keep that in mind, if your faucet isn't whatever standard sink faucets are, lol.

Lmao I have no idea. My apartment complex just came around and put new water efficient caps on all of our faucets, but my bf hates them and is going to pry it off lol

 

[Rst_Cham]

Girl you just saved me so much hassle going to the grocery store lol

You could also use this water with your little fish tank, without having to use declorinator.
Here's the TDS tester I got: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B079DN9DRS/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

[Rst_Cham]

Lmao I have no idea. My apartment complex just came around and put new water efficient caps on all of our faucets, but my bf hates them and is going to pry it off lol

The faucet adapter is threaded so in theory it should just screw on/off your faucet. But depends on your faucet.

 

[DonKeesh]

Getting to the final stages of my shopping list of things I want or are going to need. I live in a small city and have pretty good/clean drinking water. So I do not have a whole house water filter in my home. Seems like with fogging, misting, dripping, and cleanings, I'll be going thru a lot of water. I don't see myself getting gallons and gallons of distilled water jugs from the grocery store like I'm a doomsday prepper getting ready for the worst. So I'm looking into getting a RO system just for my chameleon setup. What systems are people using?

Doing a quick search I found this online and wasn't sure if it had everything I'd need for my chameleon setup.
https://www.chewy.com/aquatic-life-ro-buddie-four-stage/dp/146155?utm_source=google-product&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=hg&utm_content=Aquatic Life&utm_term=&gclid=CjwKCAjw04vpBRB3EiwA0Iieao3Et-AsBmPyCn3BFvENtw-O8H4wiUdytl9VxZ40LS1IzvlkX6l61RoC7lkQAvD_BwE

Thanks,

Tony

I have the 4 stage and use it for reef keeping. It has worked great, you can expect to have 0ppm with the 4 stage and around 5ppm with the three stage. I think the three stage is sufficient for chameleons if not preferred, because i'm sure they benefit from some minerals in the water. You can also hook up the filter to any outdoor hose output, and just let the waste water flow outside or on plants.

 

[Tony_S]

I also have a wash sink in my laundry room that I plan on connecting mine to as well. I agree daesie, I can se myself getting a bunch of jugs all the time. A long time ago in my old house I had one for my salt water reef tank that used an auto topoff feature. It was nice