Supraman's 10Gal Tank Journal

[Blondielovesfish]

2ppm? Are you using mature media? That seems fast to get as low as 2ppm?

 

[Supraman]

I have ran this filter poreviously yes.

 

[Supraman]

Update

Ammonia is now at 1ppm, I am wondering if now is a good time to up the ppm back to 4ppm or if I should let it settle to 0 first?

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Oh right okay that makes sense then! I would wait till it gets down to 0ppm before you add any more!

 

[Supraman]

Update,

This morning my tank is sitting around .05ppm of ammonia. It's a color in between .05 and 1ppm

So maybe tomorrow I can add more ammonia, in the tank I have the heat set to 85, a 20gal aqueon filter and some aeration tubbing to help speed the process like the great fish less cycle thread told me to do

 

[Blondielovesfish]

That's looking good! You could even test again later today and it will probably be at 0ppm.
Make sure you do have the air pump working as the temperature forces the oxygen out of the water and the bacteria need oxygen!

 

[Supraman]

Yupp my pump is active and I'm about to test it again, I will post when I have the results.

 

[Supraman]

So my results were .25ppm, but I think it was this high this time around because we lost power today for 2.5 hours so by tomorrow morning they should be ready for a nice dose of ammonia

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Yep that sounds good!
While the power was out did you keep the filter media wet?
If the filter media is not kept wet then the bacteria will dry out and the cycling will have been wasted most likely.
If You have another power cut make sure the media is wet (You may have to just float the media in the water until the power goes on - also make sure to turn all of the power off at the wall, other wise the heater may crack and/or the lights might get wrecked if there is a power surge.

 

[Supraman]

Hmm very good to know, and my filter media has a built in water storage for such a case so yes my media was wet the entire time.

My current results are still .25ppm

I will check again before I go to bed

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Hmmmmmm
Even with the built in storage it is still possible that it dried out which could be why the test is still .25ppm.
As a precaution in you have another power outtage I would still take the media out and float it in your tank although this is up to you whether or not you wanted to do this.
When testing make sure to shake the bottle up well as I've heard of people getting wrong results due to not shaking it well enough.
What temperature do you have your tank at?

 

[Supraman]

The temp is just under 80 I added another heater today to get it around 85 cause my one heater was only able to get it to 78 on max


Next power outage I will float the media just in case

Also I added more ammonia and it is now back to 4 ppm some one said that the API kit reads that .25 ppm is actually 0 so I added more

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Okay, well thats good then, I didn't know that the API .25 was actually 0 but well I suppose it makes sense then for it to stay at .25 lol!
That's a good temp for the bacteria and you could even go higher if you wanted, although I wouldn't go over 92 or thereabouts. 

 

[Supraman]

Cool thanks for the advise I will possibly add another heater then

 

[Supraman]

Well time for an update

The tank is now processing the ammonia in around 27 hours so I'm getting close

I'm wondering how fast have you guys got it to cycle the ammonia out?is it possible to get it to cycle in under 10 hours? This is over kill I know but I'm just curious.