High nitrate question....help!

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All Rubbermain BRUTE products are food grade. You can pick somethig up at Lowe's or HD. Then you can use a powerhead to mix and aerate it for 24 hours before use.
 
Okay, so a quick search revealed that some plastics are known to leach and others are not. My 5 gallon jug is a #3 recycleable container (stamped onto the bottom of the jug) and google reveals this means it is made from PVC which, from what I understand, is safe and should not be leaching anything. (Reefers use PVC for all their plumbing).

Maybe this needs a closer look as to why the test was producing high TDS?

#1 type plastics are to be avoided at all costs...
When subjected to harsh treatment, PVC is believed to release chlorine. Maybe the bleaching and whatnot caused a release of chlorine and that caused the TDS spike?
Matt
 
mrg02d said:
Okay, so a quick search revealed that some plastics are known to leach and others are not. My 5 gallon jug is a #3 recycleable container (stamped onto the bottom of the jug) and google reveals this means it is made from PVC which, from what I understand, is safe and should not be leaching anything. (Reefers use PVC for all their plumbing).

Maybe this needs a closer look as to why the test was producing high TDS?

#1 type plastics are to be avoided at all costs...
When subjected to harsh treatment, PVC is believed to release chlorine. Maybe the bleaching and whatnot caused a release of chlorine and that caused the TDS spike?
Matt
Click to expand...

Mine have a #7 on the bottom and are also supposed to be safe. I did not do any bleaching till I found the tds. I took one jug the other day and cleaned it with bleach to try and get rid of the tds. I added water last night with 0 TDS and lets it sit for 1 hour and still had 0 TDS. So it appears that cleaning with bleach may have cleaned I will find out tonight after I get home and the water has sat for 24hrs. This may not even be a problem, it could just simply be salt build up, or calsium, etc... anything from using the jugs for years. The fact is in order to kill the algae in the tank I need to have 0 tds from my jugs to figure out the problem.
 
Yeah I read several things saying that under "high temps" it can release stuff that is toxic to babies. Since that is what they use to make most baby stuff with, bottles, etc.

But it is supposed to be reef safe
 
Yes well now you are starting to learn that they don't have our best interest at heart. At "high temps" it can release stuff (to a high enough level that it can be noticed as toxic to babies) Like DDT it was safe right? The government as well as the company that made them said the stuff was safe... asbestos too... thalidomide (never made it to the US because of a Canadian in the US FDA) CFC's many prescription drugs and other things. There are many things that are considered safe at say 5 ppm but as time progresses the number changes and then it's considered safe at 5 ppb. But probably are not safe at any level it just hasn't been proven to be harmful at the new threshold. The way the system works is, it is safe until unequivocally proven harmful or has been on the market for 10-50 years and can be attributed to enough deaths. When they say something is safe often it isn't because they did a lot of safety testing but more the lack of evidence that it is harmful. California has more things that they say are unsafe then the rest of the US. The FDA will say that something is safe but California will say that it has to be labeled as harmful.

I know I kinda went off on a tangent here... it's just one of those things that get me riled up... and aquariums are slightly more fragile then our bodies.
 
Yep, LOL! I was doing a break job one time and noticed on the can of brake clean it said causes cancer in California. I was like what about the rest of the world? LOL!
 
Ok so I finally got home tonight did a water test on the water jug that had TDS. I washed out with bleach, rinsed it very well, let it sit and air out for 24hrs, and finally added RO/DI water and let it sit in the jug for 24hrs. The TDS was 0. So this weekend I will clean all 6 jugs the sameway! I will let you know if it works on all
 
All jugs have been washed with a 10:1 water and bleach mix. Set out for 24 hours, rinsed several times. All jugs are readinf 0 TDS!
 
Well my skimmer is starting to settle back in from the Boyd's. I added to Boyds twice and it did help calm the algae down.

If there is anything I can say that is good from all this the Pulsing Xenia I got a few months back has split eight times now.
 
I believe xenias love nitrates, and you had plenty and still have enough to keep them happy. :lol:

Back when I had 10-20ppm nitrates, my xenias were happy. Then I added clearmax and started some chaeto...Now the xenias are just existing rather than thriving.

Matt
 
I am so glad to be RID of my Xenia. They are one of the weeds of the marine aquarium. Enjoy it for a while, but be prepared for it to spread and want to take over the tank.
 
It can cover the rock that its on then I will start trimming it. Might lay reef plugs around it and let them grow to those then sell them to the lfs. :)
 
YAY! Got back from Myrtle Beach this evening and my live rock rubble is reading 0 nitrites. So its going in the sump tomorrow night. I was also doing some thinking my roommate called me yesterday to let me know that we had a power outage and that when the power came back on the sump pump did not. Hmmm I cleaned it and replaced the impellar about a month ago so it sounds like its time to replace the Mag Drive 7. I am thinking tho that since I have upgraded the main tank circulation with 3 Hydor Koralia's so thats 1950gph in the tank not including the Mag Drive 7. So that alone is 35x turn over rate on my 55g. With the Mag Drive 7 I am looking at 44x. So I was thinking of down grading my sump pump to a Eheim 1250 then I can take out my overflow and just use the 2 drilled returns on the back of the tank. That would allow for more live rock to be in display tank and might even open up a little flow behind the rock and would still have a 39x turn over rate. The logic behind it is to allow more contact time with rock and skimmer in sump! What do you all think of the down grade?
 
I don't think contact time in the sump matters... I believe the sump will work through as much as it can no mater the water flow and with a higher turnover it means that you will get the crap into the sump sooner to be cleaned out. But either way I don't think it's that big of a deal.
 
Greenmaster said:
I don't think contact time in the sump matters... I believe the sump will work through as much as it can no mater the water flow and with a higher turnover it means that you will get the crap into the sump sooner to be cleaned out. But either way I don't think it's that big of a deal.
Click to expand...

I know that for de*nitrafication to work in a reactor with de*nitrate you need slower water flow.
 
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