Drinking Water : Tap Water ratio

[hitman12131976]

I've been using drinking water to fill up my tank every time that I've done a water change. Sure, it's costly ($1.25 a water change), but my tap water has Ammonia at 0.5.

People have stated that tap water has minerals that are beneficial to the fish. So I asked around at different LFS's and many tell me to use 1/2 drinking water and 1/2 tap water.

I was a bit worried that my tank wouldn't break down the ammonia of the tap, so instead of a 1:1 ratio I used a 2:1 (2 gallons drinking:1 gallon tap).

Does anyone else use this idea of 1:1 with drinking and tap? Or is there another ratio that has been used more than 1:1?

[Miguel]

It all depends on what type of water you are trying to create with the mix. People use different ratios to get the right amount of hardness for thier tanks. The problem is that many people have different views on what the right chemistry makeup of thier water should be. The ratio of tap water to ro or drinking water is a complex process and depends on what exactly you need for replicating the water that your fish's native water chemical makeup is. Most people don't need to have the exact water for there fish since the only fish that respond to this are the wild caught fish. Most tank bred fish will do well in any water. If there is a real need for finding the right ratio, I would recommend reading up on water chemistry and use trial and error to figure out the ratio that would work for you.

miguel

[Rbishop]

Use all tap with Prime, and it won't be an issue.

[Coler]

exactly...back of the bottle (of Prime) I think says that one capful will detoxify a concentration of .25 ppm ammonia per 50 gallons (from memory so check bottle for dose)

[chris331]

ditto... use prime and you can save the trouble of mixing.

[hitman12131976]

After mixing the tap water (which had Ammo at 0.5) and the drinking water (Ammo 0) I let the water sit for about 1 hour and then did a water test (I'll do another one today after 6 pm) and there were no traces of Ammo. I used Water Conditioner and AmQuel+ to neutralize the Ammonia.

Next time I'll try 1:2 (1 gallon of drinking to 2 gallons of tap) and see what happens.

I don't want to try all tap yet as the last time I did that my Ammo readings were 0.25. I also don't have prime yet, so I first want to finish the bottle of AquaSafe by Tetra that I have. Yeah, i'm cheap. Haha.

[chris331]

i think amquel helps nutralize the ammonia.

[hitman12131976]

Yeah, it does. What is weird about it is that last time I used only tap water and AmQuel+, the ammonia was still present after 2 hours of water being filtered. So I did an immediate water change to drinking water and all levels went back to normal. I'm trying to see if last time was a fluke or not.

[musho3210]

buy a rubbermaid tub, buy a cheap filter, fill the filter bag with zeolite, then run the zoelite in the water for a week or so. Should fix the ammonia problem. Or just use prime....

[captaincrampton]

If the tank is cycled shouldn't it get rid of the ammonia in the tap water anyway?

[hitman12131976]

So I've heard...just haven't experienced this phenomenon personally.

[Star_Rider]

well one thing you may want to consider...the tests usually test for total ammonia(ammonia and ammonium) so you could be seeing NH4 (ammonium) when you see the ammonia test reading at .25

the NH3 and NH4 will be consumed in a cycled tank..