Water Hardness

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Offline Fiona

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Water Hardness
« on: August 10, 2014, 08:21:29 PM »
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I'm so cross over this, I didnt realise water hardness isnt the same as ph and I've just found out my water is considered VERY hard which isnt good news for any of my fish especially the tetras. The indian glass fish don't seem the least bit bother ditto with the ottos but it might explain why the tetras keep getting affected by fin rot.

Do water conditioners remove the 'hardness' if not is there anything I can do?

Offline Sue

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #1 on: August 10, 2014, 08:46:36 PM »
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No, water conditioners don't remove hardness. Things like running peat in the filter or using lots of bogwood will remove a bit of calcium but not much. I'm afraid there is only one, expensive way t lower hardness to any significant degree and that's by using RO (reverse osmosis) water. Either mix your very hard water with RO or use all RO with remineralisation salts added.

A quick summary:
pH is a measure of acidity; it actually measures the amount of hydrogen ions in an upside down way so the more hydrogen ions, the lower the number
GH or general hardness, is what is meant when we say this fish likes soft water and that one likes hard water. It is a measure of divalent metal ions, which to all practical purposes in tapwater means calcium with maybe a bit of magnesium
KH, carbonate hardness, is a measure of the amount of carbonate and bicarbonate in the water. Water companies call it alkalinity as it is measured by adding acid to a sample of water and measuring how much acid it takes to drop the pH to a certain value (4.5 if I remember correctly). High KH takes a lot of acid, low KH doesn't take very much.

They are inter-related to some degree. Carbonate stabilises pH. The more there is, the more difficult it is for the pH to change.
And they all tend to be high or low together, though you can have high pH with soft water. My pH is 7.5 and my water company classes my hardness as moderately soft.

Offline Fiona

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #2 on: August 11, 2014, 03:53:14 PM »
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I've got a lot of mopani in the tank. My total hardeness is 318mm/l, calcium 127mg/l

Would de-ionised water work?

Offline SteveS

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #3 on: August 11, 2014, 05:40:17 PM »
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I don't know what mm/l is measuring. 38mm of what. 127ppm calcium works out at about 7dDH. This is medium hardness, or moderate hardness, perhaps at a push it might be hard, it certainly isn't very hard. It should be fine for most tetras (I'm not sure which model you have)


A Selection of Fish in my Fish Community Creator Tanks
Angelfish (1) - Panda Cory (10) - Harlequin Rasbora (10) - Otocinclus (10) - Japonica Shrimp (10) - Honey Gourami (10) - Galaxy Rasbora (10) -
Note: The user may not necessarily own these fish, these are tanks that they may be building or researching for stocking purposes


Offline Puffin

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #4 on: August 11, 2014, 06:06:10 PM »
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Do you mean mmol/l ?
I don't think autocorrect likes mmol/l !

Offline Sue

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #5 on: August 11, 2014, 07:53:33 PM »
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Would de-ionised water work?

Yes it would, it's just as good as RO. Either mix it with your tapwater to get the hardness you want (you would need a GH tester) or add remineralisation salts to get the desired hardness. If you did use DI water, you would have to use it mixed or with added salts at every water change as using pure tapwater to do say an emergency water change would alter the chemistry of the tank enough to harm the fish. And of course when starting to use DI you'd have to start slowly and build up to gradually change the tank water.

Offline ColinB

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #6 on: August 12, 2014, 08:09:21 AM »
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RO water from Maidenhead Aquatics costs £1.40 for 10litres. I do a 50:50 mix with my tap water to bring it down from 16ºGH to 8ºGH. I also use rain water from a water butt in exactly the same way... but it tends to get a bit icky when the water level is low so I always have some RO in reserve.

I do this mainly to get the Nitrate value down, which is 40ppm straight out of the tap, but bringing the GH down to a middling value is a bonus, plus that's what they do at MA so introducing new fish is smoother.

A Selection of Fish in my Fish Community Creator Tanks
Panda Cory (7) - Honey Gourami (3) - Ember Tetra (9) - Lemon Tetra (4) - Cherry Barb (1) - Otocinclus (2) -
Note: The user may not necessarily own these fish, these are tanks that they may be building or researching for stocking purposes


Offline Fiona

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #7 on: August 13, 2014, 04:50:45 PM »
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Copied this from my water sippliers website

HARD WATER
The area supplied by Affinity Water has 'hard' water. The hardness occurs naturally and is characterised by the presence of high levels of calcium and magnesium, which are good for healthy teeth and bones.
CALCIUM   127 mg/l
Calcium is the principal constituent of hardness.
TOTAL HARDNESS   318 mg/l
Total hardness is usually expressed in terms of calcium carbonate and is measured in milligrammes per litre (mg/l) or parts per million (ppm). The recognised classification scheme we are using is: 0-75 soft, 76-150 moderately hard, 151-300 hard, 300+ very hard. Your water is very hard.
Degrees English (or Clarke)   22
This hardness measurement is used on some British appliances.
Degrees German   18
This is used on some German appliances.
Degrees French   32
This is used on some French appliances.
MILLIMOLS   3.2 mmol/l
Millimols per litre. Some appliances refer to water hardness in millimols per litre (mmol/l).
FLUORIDE   0.15 mg/l
Fluoride naturally occurs in the water in many areas. Affinity Water does not add any fluoride to your water. Fluoride is measured in milligrammes per litre (mg/l).

Offline Sue

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #8 on: August 13, 2014, 07:42:23 PM »
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That is hard!

You can ignore the English (Clarke), French and millimols measures as no-one uses them in fishkeeping. You'll see hardness expressed as German degrees, and usually the calcium carbonate figure. Calcium doesn't exist on its own, it has to be in combination, usually with carbonate. 318 mg calcium carbonate contains 127mg calcium, it's just a different way of expressing it.

Offline SteveS

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #9 on: August 13, 2014, 09:41:40 PM »
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That is hard!
No Sue, that is "very hard"; Can't you read! :rotfl:

Actually, I would call that "Very very hard".

A Selection of Fish in my Fish Community Creator Tanks
Angelfish (1) - Panda Cory (10) - Harlequin Rasbora (10) - Otocinclus (10) - Japonica Shrimp (10) - Honey Gourami (10) - Galaxy Rasbora (10) -
Note: The user may not necessarily own these fish, these are tanks that they may be building or researching for stocking purposes


Offline Fiona

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Re: Water Hardness
« Reply #10 on: August 16, 2014, 05:59:11 PM »
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London water is well 'ard of course  ;)

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