Instant ocean salt mix reveals ammonia

[Newb73]

What I am saying Jason is this: In my opinion, in a freshly mixed batch of salt water that was made with good/clean RO/DI fresh water, you should not be able to test a detectable level of phosphates, nitrates and certainly NOT ammonia with hobbyist level reagent style test kits. I am also saying that you will not get detectable levels in any of the Tropic Marin salt mixes.

You are invited to my house to see for yourself.

FWIW i run a prefilter, TWO carbon blocks, TWO RO membranes, and TWO di resin stages on my water mix. Tap is only 60tds to start with.

But..as i said, you are welcome to come to my house and check. Every major brand ive checked so far tests positive for nitrates.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

What I am saying Jason is this: In my opinion, in a freshly mixed batch of salt water that was made with good/clean RO/DI fresh water, you should not be able to test a detectable level of phosphates, nitrates and certainly NOT ammonia with hobbyist level reagent style test kits. I am also saying that you will not get detectable levels in any of the Tropic Marin salt mixes.

Years ago, Craig Bingman found ammonia in all salt mixes (using tests better than hobby kits), but Tropic Marin of that time was among the lower ones.

The Composition Of Several Synthetic Seawater Mixes
http://web.archive.org/web/20001215...om/fish2/aqfm/1999/mar/features/1/default.asp


from it:

The variation in the concentration of ammonia in the salts is notable. Figure 12 shows that two salts were notably low in ammonia: Tropic Marin at 0.55 micromoles per kilogram and SeaChem at 0.7. All the other salts were substantially higher in ammonia than tropical ocean surface water, ranging from 5.2 to 11.9 micromoles per kilogram. These concentrations of ammonia will not be toxic to fish or invertebrates and would not be an issue at all when performing a modest partial water exchange in an established reef tank. It would be a wise to aerate freshly mixed synthetic seawater to allow equilibration with atmospheric gases, and to bring it to the temperature of the tank before doing a water exchange. An inert holding container with a heater and an airstone would be sufficient.

 

[jason2459]

Thanks Randy, I was not too thrilled with the way a product rep was responding so I kept my reply short.

I think I stated this earlier in this thread and I know others but I would assume most all saltmixes will have some nitrates or phosphates at some level and I've shown several with detectable phosphate levels. I haven't tested for ammonia but it would not surprise me and that article definitely shows it there at some level as well. None of it would concern me either.

 

[brandon429]

what I like best about Randys link is it validates what four thousand pico reefers are actively doing

full water changes not partial even after recent mixing within the hour nbd. ammonia insig. agreed most of them aren't keeping linkia but for 99% of reef fare including small nano fish, even a 90% change isn't harmful using recently mixed salts. my own changes for years were reefcrystals freshly made with wal mart distilled water---> heat and mix, dump into full tank change within ten minutes. all corals opened up within a couple hours. im googling which ppm those readings play out to...the ones mentioned in the article in mm, wondering if API can detect those ranges. nearly every ammonia assessment posted is made with api yellow v green subjectivity

 

[jjmccloud2011]

What I am saying Jason is this: In my opinion, in a freshly mixed batch of salt water that was made with good/clean RO/DI fresh water, you should not be able to test a detectable level of phosphates, nitrates and certainly NOT ammonia with hobbyist level reagent style test kits. I am also saying that you will not get detectable levels in any of the Tropic Marin salt mixes.

I myself have only experienced ammonia in regular version of instant ocean, I'm a proud user of tropic marine and have never had any ammonia register on a test. I don't even test every mix anymore using tropic marine its been so reliable and consistent I check maybe every 3rd mix now days and would never do that using instant ocean lol others maybe if after testing they stayed as consistent but if they done that I'd be using their salt instead of tropic marine