Zeolithe

[the german]

anybody tried it????
i can get it dirt cheap and read a lot of good things about it but i cant find anyone who tried it......
so give me some feedback please

[ILLUSN]

G'day mate, been using it on my water aging barrels for the last 9 months, GREAT for conditioning water, removes any stray ammonia from the splitting of chloroamine.

to be honest i use it together with activated carbon on the aging tanks, the fish spawn much more easily and I dont have any fish going shy after a water change like i use to.

[the german]

sounds good,do you change it after a certain time?

[ILLUSN]

Yeah mate, I give it about 2-4 weeks to become saturated on the ageing barrells. You'll know when its done, your fish will start reacting to the water changes.

I dont use it on my planted display tank, (the plants mop up any nitrogenous compounds) but i usually have a bag of it in the filter of my fry grow out tanks which i change monthly with a filter clean.

[the german]

i will give it a go and let you know how it worked :D

[FNQ]

Soak it in salt water for 24 hours and it will release the bonded ammonia etc so that you can reuse it

[nd55]

There's a product called Zelbrite availble from pool shops.

It's a zeolite product targetted at pool sand filters to remove ammonia.

I've used it a few times as substrate, so it's definitely fish safe, although give it a wash, as per all gravels.

$35 for about 25Kg.

ILLUSN> GREAT for conditioning water, removes any stray ammonia from the splitting of chloroamine

Not to start a flame war, but that might be a loaded response.

From my readings from the Sydney Water web site, water sourced direct from Warragamba (and thus distributed in Penrith) is not treated with ammonia.

Prospect water (which supplies the bulk of Sydney) isn't so lucky.

Nick.

[TW]

I live in Menai, Sydney & my tap water tests positive for ammonia. My tanks are ammonia free, but if I test a fesh cup of water & there it is - a positive when I test for ammonia. I believe my water comes mainly from Woronora & sometimes from Prospect. It's tested positive for ammonia for several years now :(

Might give this product a try, if it helps.

[ILLUSN]

Penrith water comes from prospect, you can smell it when filling up the aging barrels

[nd55]

Page 51 of "Quarterly Water Quality Report -> Third Quarter 2007/2008"
says otherwise.

http://www.sydneywater.com.au/WaterQuality/QuarterlyDrinkingWaterQualityReport/QuarterlyMonitoringReport/Quarterly_Drinking_Water_Quality_Report_Q30708.pdf #Page=1


Warragamba:
Monochloramine max 0.18 average 0.08 mg/L.

Nepean:
Monochloramine max 0.15 average 0.05 mg/L

North Richmond:
Monochloramine max 0.14 average 0.05 mg/L



Woronora:
Monochloramine max 1.46 average 0.65 mg/L

Prospect
Monochloramine max 1.82 average 1.07 mg/L

Prospect East
Monochloramine max 1.72 average 1.31 mg/L

Comparing 0.05 to 1.07 or even 1.31 we see a 20x difference.



I remember reading somewhere that the smaller distribution areas didn't require the ammonia addition.

I'll gladly admit that chenistry is not my forte and I'm well out of my league.




ILLUSN> Penrith water comes from prospect, you can smell it when filling up the aging barrels

Don't know excatly where you live Illusion, and am happy to be wrong, but there's a good chance Penrith doesn't get it's water from Prospect.

http://www.sydneywater.com.au/OurSystemsAndOperations/images/WaterSystem.jpg


If I'm wrong, however, it means that I'm wasting a monthly trip out to Penrith the collect my water.

Only reason I'm being anal about this is I have battled some bad green water in a well lit planted tank for quite some time.

On George Booth's web site, he is of the opinion that low levels of ammonia as present in some tap water is what causes the tiny algae spores to bloom, as opposed to having an excess of nutrients which of course fuel green water, as well as higher plants.

Frequent water changes being the devil in this case because by supplying more ammonia.

Since making the effort to source my water from Penrith, bye bye green water.

Nick.

PS.

[ILLUSN]

Nice post nick, you saved me alot of a lot of digging :)

those numbers dont suprise me in the slightest, if your making trip out to penrith for water drop by and you can help youself to my rainwater tanks at dads place (20000L storage), its the best stuff for discus tanks I'm just too lazy to cart it to my place.

going by your map I'm right in the middle of orchard hills and prospect (I'm at the kingswood/werrington border) which is proably why i can smell it in the tap water, its even worse after heavy rain.

[TW]

where can you buy this stuff?

[ILLUSN]

http://www.aquariumsuppliesaustralia.com.au/store/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=3171

[TW]

I did a search on their site before, and it came up with nothing - so I must have spelt it wrong. Thanks for the link.

[TW]

Can you use this in an aging barrel that doesn't have a filter - but only an airstone?

[ILLUSN]

It only works on water flowing through it, if you could place the airstone underneath the bag of zeolite so as the bubbles (and water) rise through it it should work ok.

[TW]

Thanks ILLUSN

Brings me to the next question - for a 1,000L storage barrel, what is an appropriate size pump to run the airstone on?

[ILLUSN]

I'd run an eheim 400, but that me I'm an eheim addict. any pump with around 400-600l/h should do, you just want to get the water flowing through the media. in 1000L I'd be using around 4 cups of zeolite (bout 1L).

with that size container you'd really want to think about using a power head with a venturi instead (more flow)

[TW]

Re: the power head, but do you mean something like this?
http://www.aquariumsuppliesaustralia.com.au/store/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=3028

I already have a spare Eheim Universal Pump 1046 doing nothing, but it's only 300 l/h. That's not enough, is it?

What is a venturi, please, & how do I set one up.

[ILLUSN]

something like that would be perfect, the venturi is the small air line type hose at the top with the plastic cap on it, when water exits the pump it sucks in air to airate the water, you see a jet stream of tiny bubbles in the tank, if you could aim such a pump at a bag of zeolite you'd have plenty of flow and good airation. 600L/h should be plenty, if you can find something like an airdiffuser for your spare pump you could use that 300L/h is a little low but it would do if its all you have on hand.

[TW]

Thanks, I'll probably order the other item, as it seems reasonable priced. The eheim pump was a mistake purchase. I got it ages ago to use to pump my water into the tank. Of course, it is nowhere near powerful enough :banghead

It's never been used. Maybe one day, I'll find a use for it LOL

[ILLUSN]

it would make an excellent pump for a CO2 reactor, or a an extra circulation pump for an L number breeding tank, when you wanted some extra flow near a good males cave.

[AHC]

Ive never used this stuff before but have heard about it for a while. Am going to give it a go in my water barrel. Will get a large sponge filter and will lodge some in the inside channel for water to pass through it. Might even DIY one and place some in the sponge section so it sucks the ammonia and hopeful the bacteria will convert it. Might work?