Salt Mixing

[kreblak]

Allright, I am trying to get some water mixed up, and I am running into some problems I haven't ever encountered before. I am using a 10 gallon tank to mix. I have an aquaclear 201 powerhead running in 8 gallons of water. The water is at 76*. I have added 4 full cups of instant ocean, and my salinity doesn't ever register on a hydrometer.

Usually, 1/2 cup of IO per gallon of water is enough to get good salinity. What is happening here?

[mogurnda]

What kind of hydrometer are you using? That much water usually takes about 6+ cups of IO to get where I want it (SpG 1.024).

[Chase]

Are you sure the needle isn't stuck?

[kreblak]

I'm using a deep-six hydrometer, and I'm sure that the needle isn't stuck. I used it in the main tank and everything was fine.

[latazyo]

check it with some tap water, it should register at 1.000...other than that, I dont know what to tell you...keep trying, that's happened to me before, a good rinse usually does the trick

[liquafaction]

your holding the hydrometer upside down........... lol

if it works fine in your tank, you would think that it would work fine in your mixture, unless your mixture is wrong. Did ya pull something like I would do and put somthing else in the bucket besides salt, and forget?

[kreblak]

I'm quite sure it was IO that I put into the mix. Does salt mix go bad? This particular bag of IO had been sitting opened for about 5 months behind a bucket. I just happened to move the bucket and discovered the bag.

[mogurnda]

Might pick up some moisture, so you might see a little effect, but it should affect your SpGr by too much. How far off was it?

[kreblak]

Four cups of IO mixed into the 8 gallons for 36 hours yielded an SG of just barely above 1.000. The needle was floating on its own, but there was just barely daylight inbetween...

[g. mcclean]

Be careful with the hydrometer. We almost had a calamity with a faulty one. My salinity was off the chart when I went out and bought a new one. Be sure to check it against a known quantity such as tap water, which I think was suggested.

[mogurnda]

Here's an even better idea. Calibrate that thing with a refractometer. LFS usually will do it for you, or you can get them for about $80 online. I was shocked to find that 1.024 on my hydrometer was really 1.026.

[votek]

Just make sure you take your reading when the water is clear...and has been mixed for at least 1/2 an hour.

I use the Istant Ocean 200g mix bucket with one of the mixing pumps. A stingy 2 cups of salt usualy yeilds 1.025 (which is where I run mine)

Drop the mixing powerhead in and just go about whever else you wana do and then come back when the water has been mixed. ;)

After a while it gets so monotonous that you dont even need to check it.

[kreblak]

I added some more salt (about 1 more cup) and everything read just fine. I'm not sure exactly what the problem was, but now my SG is right at 1.023 and holding. Oh well...

[mike7123]

is it better to be high than low with the salinity