A question on water quality

[Randy19615]

I have been testing my water now for 3 weeks with a test kit I purchased... the one thing that is high is my water hardness.

NH4 =0
NH3 =0

GH
dh 13.44
Ho 16.8
FH0 24
mEq/L 4.8

KH
dh 3.36
H 4.2
fH 6
60 Hrdness
mEq/L =1.2

N02 =0.3

PH = 7.0

How do you control water hardness I am using Aqua plus water conditioner, Prime, and waste control. I have lost a couple of fish the last being a bala shark....  My question is would it be better if I went down to the St Lawrence River and just got my water from there? or would I be opening up a new problem with natural disease that might be in that water? The water I have now is from Prescott from the water treatment  I have noticed a lot of chlorine I can both smell and see it as a blueish colour

[darkdep]

Water Hardness is caused by minerals physically being in the water; in this case Calcium and Magnesium.  There is no chemical way to deal with this; if you need to bring the hardness down you will need either an R/O unit, or a water softener (which will cause you other problems).

You can get an inexpensive R/O unit which will give you practically "pure" water.  You'll then need to add a little bit of stuff to make the water less prone to pH fluctuations, but that's fairly easy.

[Randy19615]

Thank you for your advice I will look into a unit next time I am in Ottawa..

[Glouglou]

You can use water from the inverse osmosis machines that you find in grocery and other spot.
18l for 3$

[darkdep]

That's a great way to test out your methods actually.  Just make sure you add something to it...plain RO or distilled water in a tank by itself is NOT healthy.

[Randy19615]

Thank you for the suggestion, I will try the water, I guess I should let it sit for a few days to help it and use extra Prime?

[charlie]

How do you control water hardness I am using Aqua plus water conditioner, Prime, and waste control.

Randy , why are using both Prime & Aqua plus? , there is no benefit to using both of them, infact it might be a detriment, stick to one or the other, in my opinion Prime is the better one.
Regards

[Randy19615]

Hi Charlie,
I was under the wrong adivce.... I will stick with Prime....
Thanks again

Randy