Water Change Advice

[cheeky_chappie]

hi samuk, i face a similar prob to you although i have a 180 litre tank so maybe not on the same scale, having said that it's upstairs which means i have to fill bucket x amount of times, take downstairs to pour out, then reverse the process when filling up, as you say makes the job a lot longer and more tiresome.

i have a hose and a mixer tap so i'm going to hunt the diy stores for the suitable fixture to attach the hose to it, i know you get these attachments as i used to have one years ago. the tricky bit for me will be filling the tank upstairs with the hose trailing all the way down to the kitchen sink

okay i'll still have to empty the water the long way, but at least filling will be quicker and the water can be at proper temp.

 

[tttnjfttt]

if you do get the python, it also will remove water and vacume the gravel/sand.

 

[SamUK]

hi samuk, i face a similar prob to you although i have a 180 litre tank so maybe not on the same scale, having said that it's upstairs which means i have to fill bucket x amount of times, take downstairs to pour out, then reverse the process when filling up, as you say makes the job a lot longer and more tiresome.

i have a hose and a mixer tap so i'm going to hunt the diy stores for the suitable fixture to attach the hose to it, i know you get these attachments as i used to have one years ago. the tricky bit for me will be filling the tank upstairs with the hose trailing all the way down to the kitchen sink

okay i'll still have to empty the water the long way, but at least filling will be quicker and the water can be at proper temp.

well if i get something sorted ill send you a PM on how im doing it!

up and down stairs....that must be hard work!


Ill have to try a python and then figure out how to connect it up to my tap.

we fill from the cold tap Via a phthon...

If you work it out even with the cold water at 8deg... (odly that is the same as ours is at the moment)

80% at 26deg and 20% at 8deg the temp will drop to about 23deg for a short period of time.

the fish will be fine and the heater will soon bring it up to temperature.
we add declorinator to the tank, turn off the filter and fill it up

thats some nice calculating ya did there!

had an idea on how to test it too.....infact i dont kno why i didnt think of this earlier.

i have a spare 4 foot tank that i could try runnin the hose straight into and fillin slowly.

then i can watch the temp and see what happens and i dont have to risk anybody


thanx guys! ill let you know how i get on.

 

[smithrc]

we run the python to the bathroom and use a universal tap adapter.

no stairs and no buckets... its a great time saver - we can water change all our house tanks in about 1 hour - it used to take that for the 4ft 40gal using buckets

 

[SamUK]

an hour?!?


definately need a new method of doing it then lol cos it takes me about an hour per tank.

 

[Ed4567]

i have 2 x 300 w heaters in my tank and if i ran the water back in really slowly from the hose, would my fish be ok and the heaters keep up with the temp drop?

After a quick bit of physics I've come up with the following:

The maximum rate that you can add water to the tank in litres per minute
= (1/70) * power of heaters / (difference in temp. between tank and new water - (acceptable change in tank temp.*tank volume / volume of water changed) )

This includes a few assumptions along the way but should give a reasonable approximation.

Nb I did this very quickly so might have made a mistake, if anyone is interested I'll post the derivation.

Ed