How Much Bleach

[DarkSoul]

I have a 55 US gallon aquarium, and its been sitting for some time, with gravel and stuff in it.

NEVER had fish in it, But for a while it was left with water, and the filter had quite a layer of algae.


Right now the tank sits filled with 100% pure RO+DI water to sort of clean it out a bit.

I want to add a little bleach to the water to kill any potentially harmful bacteria or organisims that may be present but I dont know how much bleach I should add to do the job right.

I would like to state, that this water will be drained 100% before anything is added (and plants are first before fish), just so people don't start getting into discussions about weather or not bleach will kill my fish.... i dont have any

 

[dthoffsett]

I believe the common ratio is 10 parts water to 1 part bleach, then rinse rinse rinse. I believe vinegar can also be effective if you don't want to use bleach.

 

[DarkSoul]

well, bleach is just a form of chlorine, So I don't see that it should do any more harm than chlorine would, especially if it is well rinsed.

also... that ratio would mean I would need 5.5 gallons of bleach

I just went ahead and added about 200ML or so to the entire tank.

I'll let it run like this for a couple of days and then empty the water out of it.