Emergency Water Perameters Way Bad

[pufferpoison]

Ok this is for my sister who has had a 55gallon tank with 3 full grown angel fish (about 2 1/2 - 3 years old) in the same tank with a pl*co (about 5 inches long) and a few cory cats i think (bottom feeders, chubby like clown loaches but not sure what they are) and there is no live plants and only a few decorative items in the whole tank. she mentioned to me that her angels haven't been acting right so i did a water check and this is what i got:
Ammonia 0ppm
NitrIte 0ppm
NitrAte over 80ppm and under 160ppm some where in between
GH 483ppm
KH either 17.9 or 35.8 (ran test and by second drop it was yellow so it could be under 17.9)
PH either 6 or below, test only measures from 7.6 to 6 and it looked lighter than the 6)

I know she needs a water change badly to reduce the nitrAtes but the gh kh and ph throws me for a loop, with PH like that the water must be very acidy, she lives in the same town as me and out of the tap the ph is 7.8
please let me know what's going on ASAP so we may be able to save these really big beautiful angels.
P.S. i know their are more than one species of angels, but these are the common ones you can buy just about anywhere also she "shuts off" her HOT filter at night because she thinks it sucks fish into and kills them, yes she is insane on this, but you don't know my sister, Hang on tank filter is a topfin 60 and she uses an UGF with airstones.

 

[tttnjfttt]

OK, well first of all, you can reassure her that the external filter will not suck in the fish and kill them. Thankfully she has an UGF filter, which is the main filter for the tank. The other one is more a decoration now since there is no way bacteria would survive the night.

I am not at all suprised to see her KH and GH that high and pH that low from what you described. Here is what has happened. Over time instead of doing water changes, she has just been topping her tank off. The problem wiht this is, while the water evaporates, everything else stays. The only way nitrates, minerals, and anything else in the water can leave is through a water change. Since this hasn't been happening, these minerals and various chemicals have built up in the tank. This is called old tank syndrome.

The solution for this is the same as it is for high nitrates (often the tell tale sign of old tank syndrome). Frequent, small partial water changes. If the pH gets much lower than 6.0, the nitrifying bacteria will become inactive, and lead to ammonia and nitrite problems as well.

 

[Tolak]

10% daily water changes will take care of it. If water changes haven't been done, the gravel probably hasn't been vacced in ages. Cleaning the bottom of a neglected tank can often cause an ammo spike, either use a dechlorinator that takes care of ammonia, or some ammo lock if your dechlorinator doesn't deal with ammonia.

 

[black angel]

Test the water in a glass from the tap and that will give you the readings you are aiming for.