Tapwater Dechlorinators

[stormhawk]

For some of us here, we do employ the use of immediate dechlorinators to condition fresh tap water quickly. I personally use Hagen Nutrafin AquaPlus when it comes to dechlorinating my tap water for water changes. However of late, some people have found odd results when using these dechlorinators, especially those from certain brands which I'm not going to list. One has reported that almost all of his Otocinclus died when he switched from Tetra Aquasafe to the Nutrafin product. Apparently, this has not been the first time it has been mentioned. I've come across this interesting article link while browsing in another forum. Thought I'd share the article with all of you. There is a section in the article that deals with the issue of "slime coat protection" as stated on some dechlorinators.

http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/rev-cond.htm

[whuntley]

For some of us here, we do employ the use of immediate dechlorinators to condition fresh tap water quickly. I personally use Hagen Nutrafin AquaPlus when it comes to dechlorinating my tap water for water changes. However of late, some people have found odd results when using these dechlorinators, especially those from certain brands which I'm not going to list. One has reported that almost all of his Otocinclus died when he switched from Tetra Aquasafe to the Nutrafin product. Apparently, this has not been the first time it has been mentioned. I've come across this interesting article link while browsing in another forum. Thought I'd share the article with all of you. There is a section in the article that deals with the issue of "slime coat protection" as stated on some dechlorinators.

http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/rev-cond.htm

Unless you are absolutely certain that your water does not contain chloramine, I would avoid any of the listed products that has the "Y" enclosed in parentheses in that list or those that have an "N."

Chlorine was shown to combine with organics in water systems to form trihalomethanes, which cause cancer. Most US systems now add ammonium to the water to convert the chlorine to chloramines. It will no longer dissipate with overnight aeration, but has a half-life of about 5 weeks. Ammonium is also in much ground water as a byproduct of agriculture.

While killing germs with about the same efficiency, chloramine lasts to the farthest end of the water system, so gives better disinfection, too.

When chloramine is treated with hypo-based products, the results depend greatly on the strength in solution and the pH. If the pH is (and stays) below 6.5, nothing much happens. If it is much above 7, some of the ammonium ions (NH4+) are turned to ammonia (unionized NH3) which is toxic to fish in incredibly small amounts. Gill and other damage can happen at a few parts per billion without killing the fish, outright. Permanent gill damage to babies and subsequent stunting has been shown to happen at 5-8 ppb.

[I use the USA "billion" which is a thousand million, BTW. Maybe I should say 5-8 ug/L?]

Hypo breaks the chlorine ammonia bond, and neutralizes only the chlorine part, releasing a burst of ammonium/ammonia into the water.

Folks who do large percent water changes are more likely to experience dead fish than those doing partial changes. Several leading Betta breeders in the US were just wiped out when they were changed to chloramine and ignored the warnings, continuing to use the old-style dechlorinators.

The only down side to using "Prime" or "Amquel" is that they kill inverts and can remove all the infusoria your babies need for a good start. Good carbon block in-line filtering can remove chloramine, but the chips sold by the LFS for use in the tank are pretty useless for anything but removing dyes.

BTW, I never use any of the "slime-coat" snake-oils. They are generally worthless or harmful and avoiding ammonia exposure is far, far more important, IMO.

HTH

Wright

[stormhawk]

Wright, thanks for the extra information. I've always wondered whether my tap water has chloramines. Anyway I'm considering a switch back to Tetra AquaSafe NH/Cl formula. Much more expensive than the Hagen product but much more safe to me. I've had no problems previously when using Tetra AquaSafe but I was going for a cheaper solution so I switched to the Hagen product.

[zmzfam]

I've always wondered whether my tap water has chloramines.

For the locals, here's a link to SG water quality :

http://www.pub.gov.sg/ws_potable_water.htm

However, they only mentioned that the residual chlorine is in the form of chloramines or free chlorine.

[RonWill]

BTW, I never use any of the "slime-coat" snake-oils. They are generally worthless or harmful and avoiding ammonia exposure is far, far more important, IMO.

Wright, I know someone embarking on DIYing their own solution to chloramine-treated tapwater.

The shopping list was for;
Sodium phosphate dibasic
Potassium phosphate monobasic
Sodium thiosulphate

What I ended up are (as labelled on the bottles);
di-Sodium Hydrogen orthophosphate anhyd
(Na²HPO4 = 141.96) - 'Technical Grade'

Potassium dihydrogen orthophosphate
(Potassium phosphate, monobasic)
(KH²PO4 = 136.09) - 'AR Grade'

Sodium thiosulphate
(Sodium hyposulphite)
(Na²S²O³.5H²0 = 248.18 ) - 'AR Grade'

I'm chemistry-handicapped and in this case, only the 'errand-boy', but curiousity never fail to get the better of me... will these 'stuff' work?

[whuntley]

BTW, I never use any of the "slime-coat" snake-oils. They are generally worthless or harmful and avoiding ammonia exposure is far, far more important, IMO.

Wright, I know someone embarking on DIYing their own solution to chloramine-treated tapwater.

The shopping list was for;
Sodium phosphate dibasic
Potassium phosphate monobasic
Sodium thiosulphate

snip...

I'm chemistry-handicapped and in this case, only the 'errand-boy', but curiousity never fail to get the better of me... will these 'stuff' work?

Probably not. It will create enough of a chemical soup to cause other problems, IMHO. As a chemist, I'm a pretty good electrical engineer. It will surely kill or sicken fish in very soft water, tho. The phosphates will render the burst of ammonium harmless if they can overcome buffering and drop pH to 7 or below, but they may help create an algae bloom in some conditions.

The products effective at sequestering the ammonium, properly, are all formaldehyde-related organic compounds. That's why they kill inverts like hydra and infusoria.

"Prime" isn't too expensive, and even "Amquel" is reasonable, here, if bought in bulk. If you need huge amounts, you should be line-filtering with activated carbon, anyway, which is cheap.

Wright

[whuntley]

Want a quick and dirty test for chloramine?

Chlorine dissipates with 24 hours of constant aeration, but chloramine takes several weeks to just drop a little.

Test for chlorine, right out of the tap.

Aerate for 24 hours.

Test again for chlorine.

Unless that second test reads zero, you have chloramine and need to treat very differently from chlorine. Don't even think of using sodium thiosulfate (hypo) on chloramine unless you want burned gills and mysterious outbreaks of various diseases in your tanks.

Use "Prime," "Amquel," Ammo-lock 2" o/e.

Wright