Ro right and other Ro additives

[valerie]

I have been having some problems trying to get my ph down low enough. I have a 15gal planted tank with rams and cardinals, right now my ph is 7.8 gh11 kh 8. I have been trying to use RO cut with my tap water but my ph is still always too high. I was thinking of jsut using RO and adding some additives to jstu increase the kh and ph to about 6.8. But the proble is i have never tried RO additives(ex. Ro right by seachem) does anyone have experiences with them?

I have also tried peat filtering, DIY co2(still on teh tank) and adding blackwater extract but they haven't helped lower the ph. A lady from my aquariu club says she uses RO/tap with acid buffer added to it and it works for her but i want soemthing simpler(if there is such a thing with fishkeeping).

I want to be able to jsut add the right amount of additive to a 5gal jug of RO to give me the readings i want. Is this how the RO additives work?

[slipknottin]

How much RO are you using with your tap water? You can use like 3 parts RO and 1 part tap or even less tap if you need to.

[valerie]

I have been using about 4 gals RO to 1 gal tap, and this gives me the reading of about what i want(ph 7). Then i would add that 5gals Ro/tap back to the tank water(say less then 10gal since i took out about 30% for hte water change) and the ph would have changed a bit(Still 7.8 like it is straight form tha tap).

I have been doign this weekly for about 2 months hoping eventually the tanks ph would become the ph of the 5gal RO/tap mixture but it never has. I must keep getting buffered up or something.

This is why the Ro additive seemed easier to me, since what i'm doing now isn't working and takes a lot of testign and measuring.

[slipknottin]

If something in the tank is buffering the water, then the RO additive wouldnt help lower the Ph either.

Sounds like you need to start checking the gravel and rock.