WATER CHANGE

[nigel]

hiya fishy people thanks for all your advice & help,especially sylvia who seems to know about fish & usually replies to my posts.
I;ve only been keeping fish for about 6 months but i read a lot & get as much advice as possible hopefully for the well being of the fish,one of my previous posts i lost 5 platys,i think to a 25% water change usually 15% change
what can u do to warm the water up to take the chill off it other than stand it at room temp,can u put boiled water in it out of the kettle as it is sterilised after boiling.(THANKS FOR YOUR HELP)

 

[daza]

I don't think I quite understand your question nigel, sorry...

but if you mean how do you get the water from the tap up to the same temperature as the tank before adding it, then simply run the hot and cold taps into the bucket at the same time, using a thermometer until you have the mix right, probably easier with a mixer tap.

hope that helps.

 

[yvez9]

since i let the water rest in a bucket for a day or two before adding it to the tank, it is at room temp, which is about 4-5 degrees colder than the tank water

If i'm doing a large water change, i wil boil about 1 cup of water for every gallon. I found this brings my new water temperature pretty close to the tank temperature. it doesn't seem tpo affect the tank temperature at all

 

[Cheese Specialist]

Why do you sit the weater for a couple of days? I just tempature match the water to touch using both hot and cold taps (some say you should not use the hot tap but a kettle).

 

[yvez9]

I fill up a 5 gallon bucket full of treated water that way i always have water handy if i find the tank is really dirty or if there is a nitrite spike or something... a bucket will last me 2-3 water changes and when it's empty i just fill it up again.
i never run out of water that way!

 

[freddyk]

Why do you sit the weater for a couple of days? I just tempature match the water to touch using both hot and cold taps

Bingo, why complicate matters that should be simple? With modern dechlorinators aging water is unneeded effort. You can use a thermometer to measure, but again, it's pointless effort - just use the back of the hand test (the back of the hand is most sensitive to temperature) At the extreme, even if your water is off by 10 degrees because you have very poor judgement, a 25% water change will really only yield a 2.5 deg. difference in total temp, a difference the fish can handle without a problem.

 

[rick999]

i have a cheap tank heater set to 20 c that goes into a 10 galon ish bucket with a spare powerhead and some declorinator and gets left over night or till it's needed then i empty the tank to the same level and let the new water syphon in though some bigger than normal tube takes about 20 mins to fill back up

 

[ferrikins]

Why do you sit the weater for a couple of days? I just tempature match the water to touch using both hot and cold taps (some say you should not use the hot tap but a kettle).

thats very true, but think it depends on the copper in the hot tap.

I normaly boil my water then add slowly to the cold in the bucket untill the temp match's.

 

[gixer]

Why do you sit the weater for a couple of days? I just tempature match the water to touch using both hot and cold taps (some say you should not use the hot tap but a kettle).

hot water systems (especially old ones) have all kids of crap in them, thats the reason i will never use hot water from the tap.. Have you ever seen the insides of an old hot water tank?

i change over 100 gallons of water a week and boiling a few kettles is no great hardship and i know i'm not putting any of that disgusting gunk from my water tankl in with my fish..

water from the hot tap is not recomended to drink so why put your fish in it?

 

[CFC]

I too use the kettle to add boiling water to my water change water to keep it from chilling the water too much, as gixer said the insides of a hotwater system are pretty disgusting and the way i see it anything i would not want to drink is not something i would keep my fish in.

 

[Danno]

This seems very odd to me. I've noticed that where I live I dont have any problems just turning on the hot water.. In the UK is thier a problem with piping or plumbing? Here if the use yua just turn on the hot water.....Strange....or am I just misunderstanding something?

 

[gixer]

we also have no problems just turning on the hot tap in the UK either..although its all down to the hot water tank.. i'm assuming that if you have a combi boiler this won't be so bad (just a guess) if you use a dechlorinator that removes heavy metals, but i still wouldn't risk it...theres no need IMO.

using water that has been heated in the large copper water tanks like most have their airing cupboard though is a big no no IMO

also the reason i don't like pythons

 

[DeadlyAlliance]

I had that problem today. I was chaging the water in my 46 gallon tank and i chage about 10 gallons of it. Anyway the water that was going to be put in was in gallons in the kitchen. The problem is that i live in a 4000 sq ft home and if i turn the heater on in the 2nd floor it gets hot. So i figure the kitchen is always warm not this time after i fisnish putting the water in the tank i realize how cold it was and i panic. It seem my fish panic too. And i was waiting for the heater to kick in but it olny did for like 5 minutes then it would shut off. Then i remember i had another heater in my 10 gallon tank that i didnt use so i took the heater stuck it in the tank and pluge it in. That seem to work im glad my fish didnt die even thought it was just about 10 minutes. But it thought me a lesson about the water change and remember that i have to match the temperature. Which brings me to my next question does anybody know how high can the temperature be for tropical fish without being to hot for the fish? My is always around 80 C.

 

[gale]

Which brings me to my next question does anybody know how high can the temperature be for tropical fish without being to hot for the fish? My is always around 80 C.

I hope you mean 80F or you'll be cooking your fish. I've read about people treating ich and setting their temp up to 85 F but it really depends also on what type of fish you have.

When we do water changes we use the hot tap and the cold and no problems so far. We use the touch method to make sure the temp is ok.

 

[nigel]

thanks everyone ferrikins,gixer & cfc ta i think i will use the kettle method dont fancy the old hot water tank,but i did not know u could mix hot & cold water together out of the tap anyway thats what i on forum for thick me
thanks again everyone just doing water change now (MERRY CHRISTMAS ALL)