New tank with 4% tap water.

Miami Reef · Mar 26, 2022

Hey guys!

I did a test fill with hose water (160 TDS) and I drained as much as I can out.

There’s probably about 5-8 gallons of water in the tank that I cannot remove. Let’s round it to 10 gallons for arguments sake.

Tank capacity 260 gallons. I’m filling the rest of the tank with 0 TDS water.

Basically there will be about 4% of tap water in this tank. Would should I worry about? Will running cuprisorb and poly filters remove as much of the elements as possible?

Miami Reef · Mar 26, 2022

@Randy Holmes-Farley I’d appreciate your input!

Spare time · Mar 26, 2022

You can check your city water report to double check. This doesn't account for the pipes from there to your house, but it should help. I doubt 4% will be much of an issue.

rwb500 · Mar 26, 2022

you cant siphon it out with some airline tubing? Or get with a sponge? Whatever amount you cant get out (hopefully a tiny amount), you could dilute it with a bunch of RO/DI, and siphon again.

EricR · Mar 26, 2022

No way to pump out more with a cheap, low profile pump ... or cheap pump and hose?
If it were me, I'd do everything I could to get it out,,, including beach towels to soak up the last of it, if possible.

EDIT -- I also like the idea just posted about diluting what's left at the end with a bunch of RO/DI and re-syphoning if you can't just get it dry in the first place.

Miami Reef · Mar 26, 2022

rwb500 said:
you cant siphon it out with some airline tubing? Or get with a sponge? Whatever amount you cant get out (hopefully a tiny amount), you could dilute it with a bunch of RO/DI, and siphon again.

Good idea. Let me try this.

Lbrdsoxfan · Mar 26, 2022

I wouldn't worry about it, that's just me tho.

Some will freak out at how tanks were filled back in the day. Which was just tap and water conditioner.

piranhaman00 · Mar 26, 2022

I had this issue, I went to Walmart and bought 10 or so 3$ shower towels and soaked up all the water with them, now they are fish towels.

Smite · Mar 26, 2022

Wet/dry shop vacs might be one of the handiest things to have around the house. Pull the filter if working with water. They are great for situations like this as well as sump maintenance or major accidents.

A towel works great. 1 works just keep wringing it out into a bucket

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 27, 2022

Depends on how high the copper is in the water entering the tank. That's my only concern.

1 ppm can be in tap water (though levels that high are fairly uncommon, but EPA allows it), and 4% of that would be 40 ppb, which is pretty high, IMO.