Alkalinity in tanks updated 1/3/08

[ammie1018]

I have a fairly new 55gal tank. My alkalinity is too high. How do I bring it down.

 

[Ashlar]

How high is too high? If it's only slightly high, time will cure it if you stop dosing alk. If it's VERY high, water changes will resolve it.

 

[ammie1018]

I did a water change and it did not bring down the alk. Its higher then the test will read.

 

[GraviT]

I think the best course of action is to have either a local fish store (LFS) or somebody with an Alk test kit to get a second opinion before doing anything drastic. What test kit are you using?

What are you using for source water? I've heard that some well water has very high Alk content.

 

[ammie1018]

The test kit is tropic marin kh alkalinity test.

I'm using the regular city tap water

 

[fejus]

Yea you will want to go ahead and start getting RO/DI water from your Local Fish Store
Using tap water can have some very nasty side effects for your tank.

 

[feasible]

@ammie1018 wrote:

Amber, you should be using RO/DI water either purchased from a LFS or made from your own RO/DI system. This insures that the Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) of the water you use to mix is 0. This also insures that there is nothing that could adversely affect your tank like metals, phosphate, copper and other bad things for your tank. It is apparent that you are getting alkalinity from the water and then on top adding more alkalinity from the salt added.