Why aged water?

[henpecked]

I see a lot of you age and aerate your WC water. I just add from tap(TDS 220) and add prime or other treatment. I do mix with RO to lower TDS to 30-70 for breeding tanks.

I have not had any issues doing it this way. Can someone explain the benefits of aging the water.:confused:

[jimg]

As the water sits and gets aerated it off gasses co2 which lets the ph rise.
If I put tap in my tanks it starts off at 7.5 and overnight it goes to 8.0 that is too much of a swing for discus.
So if you aerate and let it sit for 24 hrs it will pretty much always be the same ph.

[Ed13]

As the water sits and gets aerated it off gasses co2 which lets the ph rise.
If I put tap in my tanks it starts off at 7.5 and overnight it goes to 8.0 that is too much of a swing for discus.
So if you aerate and let it sit for 24 hrs it will pretty much always be the same ph.
Besides this, allows for chlorine to dissipate, although I wouldn't rely on aging for chlorine removal. Also, It's always on hand in case of emergencies, you never now when the water co. is working with their system and you'll be out of water for a while and/or the water is sediment ladden or heavily chlorinated after maintanence work.

There is also those that need to adjust their water to suit their needs, this is perfect time for it. I'm sure there are other reasons.

In closing, is better to know you have good water ready before you drain your tanks rather than find out the hard way. ;)

[Willie]

I only use aged water in the Winter when the tap water has too much dissolved gasses. In my case, I also used the water container as a way to warm up the water up here in Minneapolis. However, I don't aerate or agitate the water in any way. It takes 24 hours to warm up and I'm ready to go.

One trick is to not add dechlor. I add dechlor right into the fish tank only. In the past four years, the insides of my 55-gal plastic drums have had no slime buildup at all.

Willie

[Eddie]

I only use aged water in the Winter when the tap water has too much dissolved gasses. In my case, I also used the water container as a way to warm up the water up here in Minneapolis. However, I don't aerate or agitate the water in any way. It takes 24 hours to warm up and I'm ready to go.

One trick is to not add dechlor. I add dechlor right into the fish tank only. In the past four years, the insides of my 55-gal plastic drums have had no slime buildup at all.

Willie


Ditto, I also do not add dechlor until I start filling.

[ltd]

I'm going to hijack this thread and ask a related question. So you guys add dechlor right into the fish tank.

Lately, I was wondering how it should be done. I was filling up the tank and when it was half full, I added dechlor and then continue to fill up the tank.

How do you add dechlor right into the tank. Do you first fill it up and then add dechlor or do you add dechlor first and then fill the tank up?:confused:

[Eddie]

I'm going to hijack this thread and ask a related question. So you guys add dechlor right into the fish tank.

Lately, I was wondering how it should be done. I was filling up the tank and when it was half full, I added dechlor and then continue to fill up the tank.

How do you add dechlor right into the tank. Do you first fill it up and then add dechlor or do you add dechlor first and then fill the tank up?:confused:

Thats actually very bad, if the chlorine or chloramine is high in your water, you could be killing your fish little by little. :( Always add dechlor before filling the tank. For me its easy, I drain until the fish are flat on their sides, add the dechlor (Seachem SAFE) and then fill the tank. Fish are happier than some hippos. ;)

[ltd]

Thats actually very bad, if the chlorine or chloramine is high in your water, you could killing your fish little by little. :( Always add dechlor before filling the tank. For me its easy, I drain until the fish are flat on their sides, add the dechlor (Seachem SAFE) and then fill the tank. Fish are happier than some hippos. ;)

I thought that if I added the dechlor at the biginning, it was going to dissipate quickly and lose its dechlorimation effect before I was finished filling up the tank.

Happy I asked!:)

[DonMD]

I only use aged water in the Winter when the tap water has too much dissolved gasses. In my case, I also used the water container as a way to warm up the water up here in Minneapolis. However, I don't aerate or agitate the water in any way. It takes 24 hours to warm up and I'm ready to go.

One trick is to not add dechlor. I add dechlor right into the fish tank only. In the past four years, the insides of my 55-gal plastic drums have had no slime buildup at all.

Willie

Ditto for me.

[csarkar001]

I thought that if I added the dechlor at the biginning, it was going to dissipate quickly and lose its dechlorimation effect before I was finished filling up the tank.

Happy I asked!:)


the molecules in the declor are looking for chlorine atoms with which to bond. this is how dechlorinators works. when you add it to tank water just before adding new tap water, the dechlor just sits around waiting for some chlorine atoms to show up. then when you add new tap water, the chorline atoms finally show up in the tank - that is when the dechlor does its thing. by putting the dechlor in the tank a few seconds ahead of time, you will not render it useless.

if there is very little water flow in your tank, however, it is possible that the dechlor could sit in one place and not get a good mix with the new tap water.

[ltd]

the molecules in the declor are looking for chlorine atoms with which to bond. this is how dechlorinators works. when you add it to tank water just before adding new tap water, the dechlor just sits around waiting for some chlorine atoms to show up. then when you add new tap water, the chorline atoms finally show up in the tank - that is when the dechlor does its thing. by putting the dechlor in the tank a few seconds ahead of time, you will not render it useless.

if there is very little water flow in your tank, however, it is possible that the dechlor could sit in one place and not get a good mix with the new tap water.


Thank you for your explanation. I learn something new everyday.

This is the greatness of this forum, there are people out there that know more than others and are willing to share his knowledge and experience so we can learn too.:)

Thanks!

[Jhhnn]

I age, heat, and aerate water 24hrs before adding it to my tanks, and always add prime before filling the storage barrels. It's part of a massively parallel water changing system I developed that saves a lot of time w/o being ridiculously expensive. Pics and explanation here-

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=74240

Click on the water changing system album in the link. I need to update the pics, because there are now 3 storage barrels...

[catgoldfish]

I only use aged water in the Winter when the tap water has too much dissolved gasses. In my case, I also used the water container as a way to warm up the water up here in Minneapolis. However, I don't aerate or agitate the water in any way. It takes 24 hours to warm up and I'm ready to go.

One trick is to not add dechlor. I add dechlor right into the fish tank only. In the past four years, the insides of my 55-gal plastic drums have had no slime buildup at all.

Willie

Great tip. I have always added dechlor into my storage tank then filled. I have to clean the slime off the tank every month. I will try your way.

[hehe]

DO NOT LISTEN TO THESE PEOPLE! DO NOT CUT CORNERS ON CONDITIONING WATER! Let me explain...

Wow this thread completely screwed me over big time. Before you say, "wow this guy is making an a$$ of himself by disagreeing with the pro's", let me explain what happend to me today.

It started yesterday when I saw this thread and how some of you are adding declorinators BEFORE topping off your prep tanks. I have a 65 gallon tank for my fish and also another 65 gallon tank specifically for prepping water. Well, yesterday I did my routine 50% water change and then went to top off my prep tank. Listening to this thread, I added enough declorinator to declorinate the water that I was about to add and then proceeded to top the tank off with tap water. I thought to myself, wow that was alot easier than treating the water prior to adding it to the prep tank.

Today I do my routine water change again and an hour or two later my fish are acting funny. I tested the parameters and what do I find? NITRITES IN MY FULLY ESTABLISHED TANK!!!! :vomit:

Adding the water conditioner to the tank before topping off with the tap water DID NOT WORK. Even though it sat in my prep tank for 24 hours, it still killed some of the benificial bacteria that was in my filter media when I added the "PREPPED" water to my fish tank. Now I'm dosing low amounts of SafeStart trying to eat up whatever nitrites are present. It seems that I should have added enough conditioner to treat the entire 65 gallon prep tank, even though the tank was half way full to begin with. This would be wasteful on the wallet, however (prepping water that was already previously prepped)... I'm really hoping that the tank recovers overnight. It certainly is not worth the shortcut.

Sorry for such a long post but I was PISSED when I discovered nitrites in a fully established tank and I have nothing to blame but this thread. :mad:

[Jhhnn]

Like I said earlier, it seems smart to me to add prime to my aging barrels before I even fill 'em with tapwater. I started doing it that way as a safeguard, a ritual of sorts, so that I'm sure the makeup water has been conditioned beforehand. No prime, no water, and that's that.

As time went by, I noticed some slime in my aging barrels, and investigated. With my microscope, I determined that it's actually bacterial colonies, the same as in my filters. Denver water is really quite low in organics, being diverted and collected at high altitude, but the bacteria are there in the barrels, nonetheless. And they're apparently feeding on prime converted ammonium from the chloramines, changing it into nitrite and nitrate before it ever gets into my aquariums. I figure that's a good thing, that my process actually employs beneficial bacteria as a pre-filter of sorts... helping to avoid any sort of nitrite spike at all...

The slime might be more of a bother for people who have high organics in their tapwater, but I've never cleaned my aging barrels since I started using them over a year ago, and the stuff hasn't interfered with pumping out the water, ever, so I just let it be...

[Eddie]

DO NOT LISTEN TO THESE PEOPLE! DO NOT CUT CORNERS ON CONDITIONING WATER! Let me explain...

Wow this thread completely screwed me over big time. Before you say, "wow this guy is making an a$$ of himself by disagreeing with the pro's", let me explain what happend to me today.

It started yesterday when I saw this thread and how some of you are adding declorinators BEFORE topping off your prep tanks. I have a 65 gallon tank for my fish and also another 65 gallon tank specifically for prepping water. Well, yesterday I did my routine 50% water change and then went to top off my prep tank. Listening to this thread, I added enough declorinator to declorinate the water that I was about to add and then proceeded to top the tank off with tap water. I thought to myself, wow that was alot easier than treating the water prior to adding it to the prep tank.

Today I do my routine water change again and an hour or two later my fish are acting funny. I tested the parameters and what do I find? NITRITES IN MY FULLY ESTABLISHED TANK!!!! :vomit:

Adding the water conditioner to the tank before topping off with the tap water DID NOT WORK. Even though it sat in my prep tank for 24 hours, it still killed some of the benificial bacteria that was in my filter media when I added the "PREPPED" water to my fish tank. Now I'm dosing low amounts of SafeStart trying to eat up whatever nitrites are present. It seems that I should have added enough conditioner to treat the entire 65 gallon prep tank, even though the tank was half way full to begin with. This would be wasteful on the wallet, however (prepping water that was already previously prepped)... I'm really hoping that the tank recovers overnight. It certainly is not worth the shortcut.

Sorry for such a long post but I was PISSED when I discovered nitrites in a fully established tank and I have nothing to blame but this thread. :mad:

Hey, ever heard of the phrase, if it ain't broke, dont fix it. Why change something that was working for you? So sorry, this thread is not to blame.

Eddie

[Willie]

If you're losing your biological cycle, don't blame it on tap water. Biological cycles are extremely robust. Bacterial populations don't get destroyed by water changes, whether you add Prime before or after. If this really does happen, you could sterilize your tank with tap water.

Many of us do 100% water changes, rinse out the sponges, wipe down all surfaces including heater tubes, heater cords, etc. and go in straight with tap water with no effects.

I'm also very skeptical that SAFESTART does anything but extract $$ from hobbyists.

Willie

[hehe]

Willie- you must have misread my post. If you run straight tapwater with chlorine and such through a biological filter, it will kill everything. I am confused about why you are telling me to sterilize a tank that has been established for 3 years by running pure tapwater through it. :confused: Never did I say that properly conditioned water changes would have any negative effect on a biological filter. My point is that the method described in this thread is not the proper ways to condition water....

I have done 95% water changes before without a problem. The issue I had was that when I added the conditioner before adding the tap water to my prep tank, the tap water did not get 100% conditioned. There was chlorine still in my prep tank even after 24 hours of aeration. It was not until I added this "prepped" water to my established tank that the chlorine had an obvious effect on my biological system.

Eddie- You're right- if it ain't broke, dont fix it. I'm just posting in this thread as a warning to other users, such as "catgoldfish" who are thinking about trying this method. I have a feeling that you are adding the conditioner to an EMPTY barrel before filling. Therefor, you would be adding enough conditioner to treat all the water in the barrel. My issue came from "topping off" my prep tank with only enough conditioner to treat the tap water which I was about to add.

Anyways, my nitrites are back to 0 as of this morning- thank goodness.

[Willie]

DO NOT LISTEN TO THESE PEOPLE! ... I have nothing to blame but this thread. :mad:

I know what I read, Willie

[hehe]

highlighting the fact that I was pissed that your advice messed up my tank does not make any point... Nor does it make your last post make any more sense in this situation. I'm sorry...

-hehe

[Altum Nut]

I appears that there is something to be thankful for hehe that your water is now stable.
In my only opinion is that you will get advise from many hobbiest not only on this forum. Recommended suggestions that hobbies offer can differ...which may work for one and not work for another. There is no one to blame here as you took advise and tried it at your own will.
I personally would get advise if needed by more than one.
So lets shake hands and call it a day.

...Ralph

[tcyiu]

Willie- you must have misread my post. If you run straight tapwater with chlorine and such through a biological filter, it will kill everything. I am confused about why you are telling me to sterilize a tank that has been established for 3 years by running pure tapwater through it. ...

Hehe, you need to calm down. You're not reading what Willie wrote.

He said that IF tap water with chlorine does in fact kill off that much bacteria as you claim, we would all just use tap water to sterilize our tanks. Obviously tap water cannot sterilize our tanks because it contains very little chlorine to do any significant damage to the biological filter.

He did NOT tell you to sterilize your tank.

In my opinion, something else happened. Your data point of 1 is not enough to indict a common practice. Don't blame this thread.

Tim

[aalbina]

Unless you actually tested your water for the presence of chlorine - I don't understand how you can make these claims. Lots of assumptions here hehe. It does't add up and also doesn't make sense that if your bio filter was killed by chlorine from an I'll conditioned prep tank that it could completely re- establish in a few days. I think there was something else going on. The described method of preparing water is one I have used for many years with at least 7 different water sources. Fortunately, for the last 10 I've been on well water.

Adam