Using acid to remove/disolve shell fragments in substrate

[Shadow]

Does anyone soak sand into acid pool to remove/disolve piece of shell mixed in the sand? Any idea what acid can be find in Singapore? where to buy?

[grey_fox]

Never really heard to soaking gravel in acid. The shells you are referring to are snail shells?

[Shadow]

good guestion no idea what shell is that, the web side I'm reading said that some shells are mixed in the sand thus causing the pH to go up.

"Their "Lapis Lustre" aquarium-gravel line (from Moss Landing) is one of the
prettier gravels you will find, but it has about 2-5% (by visual guess) of
shell chips. They are the (attractive) really white flecks. That is only a
problem for breeders trying to maintain soft, acid tank water. The shells
tend to slowly dissolve at low pH and raise both GH and KH. In your water
that is not a problem. I used to soak it in pool acid, to create a "casing"
around the chips that rendered them more inert. [After killing some baby
fish when rinse was inadequate, I quit that hazardous habit.]"

also mention in below link:
http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plant.../msg00107.html

[juggler]

It is probably cheaper and easier to get new substrate in this case.

BTW - what's your concern with the contaminated substrate? More concern for plants or the fish?

My old 4ft tank was using a coral chip substrate by mistake since I was a newbie then. The pH could go to 7.6 and kH up 8 and could go more if I don't change water. The plants grew well too. Later I learnt something from that experince. I don't need to add baking soda to raise kH and the coral shells provided Mg and Ca important for the plants too. No need to dose them as well.

For fish - mine seem to got use to the environment and I don't notice anything unusual.

Now that I have switched to inert substrate, I still purposely add sea shells periodically to my cannister filter to provide for the Ca and Mg as well as the necessary kH.

[Shadow]

Interesting.

I want to try apisto and I read from the forum that it require low pH. I do not want to keep dossing pH low solution every day, don't think it will be heathy for the fish.

[Quixotic]

Ah, I remember there was discussion on this from a while back.

Frankly, the amount of shells or whatever it is in Lapis Lustre sand may not affect the pH of your tank much. I have always used them in my tanks all these while and the pH is always close to 7 or below.

I think the shells may instead provide some kH buffering that will prevent pH swings.

There are also plenty of AQ members who use them as well and have not heard of huge deviation from the pH. So I think there isn't a need to be overly worried about pH wise.

Try reading more on the freshwater fauna section, I think most of the Apistogramma keepers don't use pH solutions to adjust the pH. If you want that specific low pH, why not use ADA aquasoil then?

P.S. This isn't about Fertilisation and Algae, so Mods please move to the appropriate section.

[Shadow]

Sorry, not sure where to post .

And thanks all for the answer/sugestion.

I become concern on the pH when I measure my old setup using Oceanfree substrate, the one look a like clay ball, and it registed 7.6

Aquasoil is good though they increase the price recenly to $4x (maybe not that recent, last time I bough is $3x).

The plant that I want to use is fissiden, flame moss, petite nana and Fern, so having ADA kind of waste. These plants doesn't need soils