There's Something Strange In The Neighbourhood

[Miss Wiggle]

really unless its keeping you awake at night ignore what happens to tap water if left to stand because as well as the exchange out of the water it absorbs lots of crap as well like household dust (skin cells) which produce ammonia very quickly

i agree with you, but the issue is the filter is seemingly unable to process this extra bit of ammonia that comes. Weather the water is put into the tank or left to stand or whatever else after 12 hrs or so there is 0.25ppm of ammonia. The filter bacteria do not seem able to process this 0.25ppm, obviously it's not good to run a tank with this level permanenetly in the water.

 

[monkey_biz]

really unless its keeping you awake at night ignore what happens to tap water if left to stand because as well as the exchange out of the water it absorbs lots of crap as well like household dust (skin cells) which produce ammonia very quickly

i agree with you, but the issue is the filter is seemingly unable to process this extra bit of ammonia that comes. Weather the water is put into the tank or left to stand or whatever else after 12 hrs or so there is 0.25ppm of ammonia. The filter bacteria do not seem able to process this 0.25ppm, obviously it's not good to run a tank with this level permanenetly in the water.

is the filter adquate? is the tank overstocked? is it a poor test kit? some cheap test kits will show the minimum ie .25 when in reality there is none

when it rains the H2O reacts with the carbon dioxide in the air..... think greenhouse effect and excess CO2, this produced H2CO3 or carbonic acid put simply
when this lands on the soil/rock it can combine with CaCO3to produce Ca(HCO3)2, the water is then treated by the waterboard. depending on teh water boarsd they are obliged to supply water at a set condition..... ie hardness, chlorination and ph. when its dry the water comes from deeper wells=bigger problems.
the process is
1. settling in resevoirs
2.screening to remove big bits like leaves
3.flocculation could be aluminium sulphate or iron sulphate to suspend all small mater including bacteria
4. clarification either by sedimentation or dissolved air flotation (dont ask!!!)
5.filtration through sand filters
6.chlorination
7. water stabilisation for anti corrosion
8. sampling
then to main supply


so you can see how hard it could be to point it down to what causes what

 

[Miss Wiggle]

is the filter adquate? is the tank overstocked? is it a poor test kit? some cheap test kits will show the minimum ie .25 when in reality there is none

doesn't seem to be any obvious problem with the tank along those lines. filter is big enough, tank is stocked sensibly, maintenance routine seems fine, using the API liquid test kit, they're never gonna be as good as the stuff you have access too, but it's one of the better ones available to the average home aquarist.

 

[locust267]

Can I also point out that when the person in question testing bottled water and left it overnight next to a container of tapwater the following morning the tapwater had gone from 0 to 0.25ppm but the bottled water was still 0, surely ruling out contamination.

I'm gonna run a test on my tap water leaving it over night to see what it does here in Bournemouth - Tank always reads 0 but if tap water in glass goes from 0 to 0.25 then it shows my filter is processing the 0.25 of ammonia, could we maybe get some others trying it?

Vicki

 

[rockerBOO]

I am guessing the water source is adding some buffers to the water. Where I am at, the water is 5.2PH, and they add a PH buffer to make it 7.0PH, as to not have the acidicness break down pipes with a lower PH. It could be something with that buffer that is masking the ammonia

 

[OldMan47]

Just letting my mind wander across things that we know actually happen and starting with the idea that I am to explain how no change in ammonia / ammonium total content would look like a rise.
I am tempted to say forget about the initial reading. We all know that depending on the indicators used, you either do or do not actually measure ammonium. If the water arrives with CO2 in it and the pH thus driven down, your ammonia will be more at the ammonium state and your test kit won't see it. Once it gasses off, the CO2 is gone and the pH rises. This converts the ammonium present to be more in the ammonia state and it becomes detectable by your test kit.
I can't explain anything about the filter not performing but I think that could show the measured response in tap water left out to degas.

 

[aaronnorth]

The CO2 wont drop the pH that much, even at 30ppm (the reccomended level - ph 6.6, dkh4) the ph drops by about 1.