Cleaning water containers

[dave]

I have been storing salt-free top off water for my tank in six gallon plastic jugs for the last few years.
Do these jugs need to be cleaned periodically? They only store filtered water.

Thanks!
Dave

[Jim28fl]

if the water your filling them with is straight from the tap, tap water has a bit of chlorine in it which will keep the jugs fairly sanitary if they stay sealed up after filled.

chlorine off gasses at the surface and the more you aerrate it, the faster it off gases. when in doubt bleach it a bit n rinse. when it comes to using it from an rodi filter, the chlorine is removed and the water will get fouled by any organics pretty fast. So keeping it sealed is very important. and when in doubt use the sniff test.

The water butt companies suggest never to reuse them, to send them back where they get disinfected and refilled at the plant.

I let my top off jugs fully dry out and i rinse them with tab before i refill. anything in there would be organic either way but could introduce some micro nutrients if left open to the atmosphere before its used. with rodi thats sealed its very minimal at most even after repeated use since the rodi is so pure and nothing is getting introduced into it to. it is common for it to have etreme PH as well since there is nothign to buffer it. I played with buffering my RODI with a "very" small bit of KALK before adding salt mix and found it gave me an overall higher end PH and after settled i had slightly boosted alk n ca values to my SW mix when i did it. likely because the saltmix didn't have to over come the initial low PH which is most common or RODI water post production and causes the precipitation. most salt mixed are designed to over come this rodi situation though so its very minimal i think.