HappyGeorge
Fish Herder
My tank has finished cycling and I thought with all the problems and glitches people post on here it might be useful to someone, for me to post my experiences.
Tank - 450 litres (I estimate 380 litres of water).
pH - 8 as it comes from the tap.
kH - 200
Before starting I was equipped with a Hagen master test kit.
I started cycling on the 16th August filling the tank heating to 29 degrees, dosing with Nutrafin cycle and Nutrafin aquasafe (I do not make any claims for either of these but they came as part of my tank starter kit so I saw no harm in using them).
I turned my filters on. Firstly a Fluval FX5 with one basket empty except for a polishing sponge, and both others containing 500g of ceramics and a piece of pond filter sponge cut to shape on top. Secondly a Fluval U4 with the carbon pads removed and replaced with pond filter fine sponge.
I then started by adding 15ml (approx 6ppm) of 9% Household Ammonia (Homebase own brand).
On 18th August I picked up some mature filter media in the form of a dirty sponge in a bag from Glolite (thanks again). 2 hours after picking it up I put it in my FX5 (minus the plastic bag) in the place of one of the pond filter sponge pieces.
Within the first week I was getting good drops on my Ammonia and by the end of the first week the tank was dropping to 0-0.1ppm in 24 hours, and by the 28th August the Ammonia was dropping to 0 in 12 hours from a 4-6ppm dose. At this point I started testing for NITRITES daily and continued dosing 4-6ppm morning and night.
Using the Hagen test kit I was getting some strange results, when carrying out the test the water would colour very quickly purple but by the time the 2 minute waiting period for test results was up the reaction was beginning to turn the test tube a reddish colour instead of purple, I took the test kit back to shop and they replaced it, but the new kit produced the same results, with the benefit of hinesight I have to conclude that this was due to having very high NITRITE levels that were distorting the test colours. On 4th September I did an 80% water change having turned filters and heaters off I added warm water from mixer tap and dosed it with the 2 Nutrafin products then redosed Ammonia and restarted the equipment.
07:00 On the 10th September I tested NITRITES and saw the same result as above, I then didn't test until 18:00 on 11th when I saw 0.3ppm on the NITRITE test, I retested and confirmed the result, therefore I never saw a true spike indicated on the Hagen test colour chart but was able to demonstrate that the NITRITE drop happens very rapidly.
Continued to add 4-6ppm and by the evening of the 11th was getting a zero reading after 24 hours, today 14th September having dosed at 07:00 with 5ppm it was tested
at 18:00 and showed a zero reading for Ammonia and Nitrites.
Tested for NITRATES today as well and is showing something close to 20ppm.
So with mature media 7 days to get to 12 hour Ammonia turn around and 14 days to get to 12 Hour Nitrite turn around.
Tank - 450 litres (I estimate 380 litres of water).
pH - 8 as it comes from the tap.
kH - 200
Before starting I was equipped with a Hagen master test kit.
I started cycling on the 16th August filling the tank heating to 29 degrees, dosing with Nutrafin cycle and Nutrafin aquasafe (I do not make any claims for either of these but they came as part of my tank starter kit so I saw no harm in using them).
I turned my filters on. Firstly a Fluval FX5 with one basket empty except for a polishing sponge, and both others containing 500g of ceramics and a piece of pond filter sponge cut to shape on top. Secondly a Fluval U4 with the carbon pads removed and replaced with pond filter fine sponge.
I then started by adding 15ml (approx 6ppm) of 9% Household Ammonia (Homebase own brand).
On 18th August I picked up some mature filter media in the form of a dirty sponge in a bag from Glolite (thanks again). 2 hours after picking it up I put it in my FX5 (minus the plastic bag) in the place of one of the pond filter sponge pieces.
Within the first week I was getting good drops on my Ammonia and by the end of the first week the tank was dropping to 0-0.1ppm in 24 hours, and by the 28th August the Ammonia was dropping to 0 in 12 hours from a 4-6ppm dose. At this point I started testing for NITRITES daily and continued dosing 4-6ppm morning and night.
Using the Hagen test kit I was getting some strange results, when carrying out the test the water would colour very quickly purple but by the time the 2 minute waiting period for test results was up the reaction was beginning to turn the test tube a reddish colour instead of purple, I took the test kit back to shop and they replaced it, but the new kit produced the same results, with the benefit of hinesight I have to conclude that this was due to having very high NITRITE levels that were distorting the test colours. On 4th September I did an 80% water change having turned filters and heaters off I added warm water from mixer tap and dosed it with the 2 Nutrafin products then redosed Ammonia and restarted the equipment.
07:00 On the 10th September I tested NITRITES and saw the same result as above, I then didn't test until 18:00 on 11th when I saw 0.3ppm on the NITRITE test, I retested and confirmed the result, therefore I never saw a true spike indicated on the Hagen test colour chart but was able to demonstrate that the NITRITE drop happens very rapidly.
Continued to add 4-6ppm and by the evening of the 11th was getting a zero reading after 24 hours, today 14th September having dosed at 07:00 with 5ppm it was tested
at 18:00 and showed a zero reading for Ammonia and Nitrites.
Tested for NITRATES today as well and is showing something close to 20ppm.
So with mature media 7 days to get to 12 hour Ammonia turn around and 14 days to get to 12 Hour Nitrite turn around.
