Question: How Long Does Dechlorinater/dechloramine Stay Active In Wate

[mrapoc]

I have heard of others dosing dechrolamine/chlorine for example, the whole tank before filling up with a hose meaning no buckets (in theory no mess!) but my worry is, say u add the dechlor stuff and by the time you have added all of the water change water, the dechlor may have already reacted/bonded or done whatever it does (lets just say, became useless) by the time all of the actual chlorinated water has been added.

Is it a case of, it will stay there until it has actually bonded to chlor**** atoms (chlorine or the more stable chloramine) for as long as it takes, or is there a time ticking from the time you add it to the existing aquarium water?

Thanks

^ n00b

 

[mrapoc]

bump

 

[raptorrex]

I have heard of others dosing dechrolamine/chlorine for example, the whole tank before filling up with a hose meaning no buckets (in theory no mess!) but my worry is, say u add the dechlor stuff and by the time you have added all of the water change water, the dechlor may have already reacted/bonded or done whatever it does (lets just say, became useless) by the time all of the actual chlorinated water has been added.

Is it a case of, it will stay there until it has actually bonded to chlor**** atoms (chlorine or the more stable chloramine) for as long as it takes, or is there a time ticking from the time you add it to the existing aquarium water?

Thanks

^ n00b

it works almost instantly, bonding the items. so just put it in after you have finished the water change, or bit by bit, as you wish. i must admit i dont use it at all, not even for my newts. however the peace of mind it offers may well make it worth while. even though the evedence seems to indicat, there is little point in using it (in the UK atleast).

 

[mrapoc]

wow really, i knew it was instant for chlorine but i thought chloramine would take longer

so if i filled up tank, then added enough to treat whole tank (to be safe) there would be minimal damage

i could even just turn off the external for 5 mins to allow bonding

 

[waterdrop]

Its a chemical reaction - the physicists can hardly measure the speed of things they are so fast - nothing you could do with turning your external off would help it or have much to do with it other than slowing down the overall mixing.

My favorite way of doing this (of taking care of my anxiety probably, lol) is to put half the correct dosage directly into the tank water before or just after I start the hose pouring in, then adding the other half at the end of the fill. I credit RDD, the writer of the fishless article as the member I copied on this. I am also paranoid enough to use a python attached to a mixing tap and roughly match the water temps with my hand, for the changes larger than 30% or so. I'm even rougher about the temp on smaller percentages.

This is one of those topics where a large number of the very experienced here just laugh and put the water in and don't worry about conditioner or temp matches at all and nearly all say the have always come out fine and I believe them. The niggling thing is that there are also a few experienced ones who say that "once in a long while" they have had a "kill-off" (or have heard of one) that they attribute to not being careful about this (or have delicate fish which concerns them) and they have decided to be careful.

My personal opinion is that conditioner is relatively of more importance to the newly established filter/tank system in that the bacterial populations for the first year are still somewhat more susceptible to mini-cycles if some of their ranks get killed off by, say, chloramine. I think this importance fades more and more over time as the filter colonies get more robust (which might explain why the very experienced aquarists get a feeling of caring less about conditioner.) I think the percentage chance (whatever it is... small, or perhaps larger for certain sensitive fish) that the chlorine/chloramine might weaken or kill fish however stays constant over time, but is just small enough the many hobbyists have found that they are unconcerned with conditioning.

If you search back on TFF over time, there have been quite a few lengthy discussions of this.

~~waterdrop~~