My Fishless Cycle.

[Joinerlavin]

11

 

[Miss Wiggle]

or it could be that the first drop would normally turn the liquid blue then subsequent drops would turn it orange/yellow, however if you've 0KH then maybe it just skipped the blue stage and went straight to yellow.

what does it tell you 1 drop equates to?

 

[Joinerlavin]

15 and still same


1st drop goes orange.

 

[Joinerlavin]

ok so i just tested the tank water kh and as soon as i put the solution in it went blue, now i put 5 drops in altogether and its yellow

 

[Miss Wiggle]

ok so not a faulty test kit, what does it tell you 5 drops relates too in KH, should be a table in the instructions or something like that.

i suspect your tap water has 0 KH which makes sense from the pH problems you've had but something in the tank (likely the substrate) is bring it up.

 

[Joinerlavin]

89.5

Just tested the tap water again and still doest turn blue, just a very pale yellow, and then goes oranger and oranger the more I put the solution in, with the tank water it went blue, then yellower until it went orange again the more i put in.

tested the tank again, and same, turns blue first one, then goes to yellowy orange after 5.

 

[waterdrop]

I think the most common confusion with a KH test is probably exactly what you're apparently describing there. If the KH of the water you're testing truly is zero, then the first drop will typically be yellow, not blue. Its "trying to tell you" its zero!

Any continued dripping you do beyond the first yellow one (ie. making it more "orange") is just wasting your test fluid, I believe.

(Sorry to jump in without reading the context of the whole problem here... )

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Joinerlavin]

is it ok if the tap water is 0kh And why is its 5kh in the tank (5 drops)

 

[waterdrop]

Generally, if tank KH is higher than tap KH then there is something in the tank that is raising KH. Usually that something is substrate or decoratons, assuming no chemicals are begin added.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Joinerlavin]

Im getting sick of fish keeping now and I dont have any fish yet lol, checked the water yesterday at the 12 hour interval and normally ammonia has gone and nitrite very low, my results where

ammonia - 0.25
nitrite - 1ppm
ph 6.6

Checked my ph this morning and its gone up to 7. ammonia 0, nitrite 0.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

OK with a tap water KH of 0, I'd definately suggest you try and buffer it up a bit, there's details I gave in the links before about how to do this with bicarb and I'd give that a go now.

 

[Joinerlavin]

just done a huge water change and the ph has gone dark blue, which is above 7.6, ordered some "interpet ph up" and should arrive tomorow, will this work, it was only £4 off ebay.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

you're better to not use products like that I'm afraid.

it will send the pH up but it's nto controlled because it's designed to work only on the pH, so it brings up the pH but because the KH is still low it's unstable and will quickly drop back down again. you're better off working at getting the KH up which gives stability to your pH.

 

[Joinerlavin]

didnt u say that it would stabalise once I have finished cycling???

 

[Miss Wiggle]

should do, some people do have persistent pH problems and there's another solution to that but for the vast majority of people the pH problems finish when the cycle finishes.