please help me before i go crazy

[itschromesteel]

I posted a while back that my ammonia levels were very high around 4ppm so I moved the fish to a different tank and tried everything I could think of lots of pwcs and I removed my plants and I always gravel vac and finally zeolite because I had no salt in the tank and it brought I down less than 1ppm but after I removed it it shot back up to 4-6ppm
I tested the water id been using which i use in all my tanks 0ppm. So finally I broke the tank down rinsed everything off rinsed the filter off(it has no carbon) got new gravel and started over with bottled water 12hrs later 4ppm. What is going on with this tank? I am about to give up on it all together on it.

 

[murad]

you are messing with ur tank thats not even cycled yet if you have a filter your fine just wait till ur tank finishes cycling and your ammonia and nitrate will be 0
your tank is new thats why

 

[itschromesteel]

This tank was cycled. Then it randomly hit 4ppm I have had this tank over a year. And I waited for 3 weeks and my ammonia never changed.

 

[itschromesteel]

Trates and trites have always been 0

 

[murad]

howmany, what type of fish and how big is ur tank and what kind of filter . everywhen do u siphon your tank and how much water you take out

 

[itschromesteel]

Okay its a 10 with a marineland penguin 150 it used to house 4 guppies and a less than 1in bn pleco. I don't over feed them. I usually did 20% weekly. After the ammo spike I did water changes of about 50% everyday for a week then after no change 75 -80% for about 4 days. At first ammo would be .25 then rose about 1ppm and hr to 4-6 and even 8 before I broke it down two days ago and started over I never put fish back in it or plants.

 

[Fishkeeper26]

What are you using to test (strips or liquid)? How did you cycle the tank first (fishless or fish in)?

 

[murad]

i think the test is messed up especcially if u have a penguin with few fish with weekly 20 percent watrr change

 

[itschromesteel]

Its the API liquid I ran out had to buy more and 2nd bottle gave same results and I cycled with fish in but with seeded filter media.

 

[murad]

for now it dosnt matter what u used to cycle the tank since you had the tank for a year

 

[librarygirl]

That is odd, it's acting like it was never cycled with ammonia and no nitrates. Did you do a water change and forget to add dechlorinator? Did you change out filter media? And ammonia is rising on its own without dosing ammonia, or with fish? Hm...... Have you checked the filter media? If it's a year old perhaps its clogged with old food and waste and that's causing a buildup of toxins that the bacteria can't handle? Just thinking out loud.....

 

[Fishkeeper26]

If it was a fish in cycling it may have never been fully cycled

 

[itschromesteel]

I am fairly certain it cycled even with the seeded filter I had a bit of a spike and them my trites and ammo hit zero and trates were around 10 took about 2.5 weeks
It still doesn't explain why my ammo wont go away now

 

[jeffp]

so you broke the tank down and ran it empty and the ammonia still shot up to 4ppm by itself? the only thing I can think of would be some sort of dead rotting thing that is stuck in your filter somewhere. try letting the tank sit with the filter off and see if the ammonia spikes up again

 

[itschromesteel]

Yeah dead empty and it shot right up. I meticulously cleaned my filter when I broke the tank down. But I could try it.