Not cycling after a fortnight with Dr Tim's

[waterbox100.3aus]

That’s amazing how much the results vary, I’m on week 3 ammonia has dropped to 1ppm. But I don’t have any nutrition or nitrates.

 

[LeftyReefer]

I'm not dosing my tank any more with ammonia. I'm just letting the tank sit for now. (heaters/powerheads running)

I dosed with ammonia three times during cycling and now my tank has high nitrates.
After letting all the ammonia process out, my tank sat with at 0ppm ammonia, 0ppm nitrite, and 40+ppm nitrates.

I did a 50% water change the other night, which got it down to 20ppm, but probably need to do it again.

The 20ppm nitrates are probably safe for fish, but I'm probably going to do another 50% water change to get it down to 10ppm just to be safe. I also don't want the higher nitrates to induce any extra ugliness post cycle so I'd like to get nitrates lower now if possible.

My tank certainly cycled faster than I was expecting, and while I may consider it cycled, I'm not adding any fish yet. I still have a few issues I need to work through with the tank before risking livestock. I haven't even fired up my skimmer yet, nor is my screen top screened. I built the top, but haven't added the screen yet. I also haven't even tried or hung my lights yet. So while my bio filter maybe be ready for a small fish load now, the rest of my setup isn't there yet.

 

[Captain Highliner]

Did you dose the ammonium chloride until you had a reading of 2ppm or did you just dose the amount per gallons of water on the bottle? There is a lot of notes on their guide and and one of them is to only dose according to the water volume. I missed one which caused me to have a nitrite spike that lasted a couple of weeks. Here is a link to the instructions if you hadn't seen this. Maybe read through and see if you missed something?

Recipes | DrTim's Aquatics

Recipes for Aquarium Success This page contains recipes with step by step directions on how to use a combination of DrTim’s Products to: Fishless Cycle your aquarium with One & Only and ammonium chloride Fight Cyanobacteria and/or Algae with Re-Fresh and Waste-Away Color-Up your corals with...

store.drtimsaquatics.com

 

[waterbox100.3aus]

Hi captain, I dosed as per the instructions but i do agree I feel like it went to 4ppm at the start. I’m almost certain that dr Tim’s bottle was dead. I just did a nitrate test first time I have detected it test shows 2ppm ... and my ammonia is at 1ppm. If I do a water change do you think the tank is ready for a fish ?

 

[waterbox100.3aus]

Also how are you plotting those charts for the levels ?

 

[LeftyReefer]

Those charts are from the AquaticLog app.

When I started cycling my tank, I read a lot of threads where people were complaining about over-dosing their tanks with bottled ammonia, and some were questioning if the 4 drops per gallon were correct on the label. So when I went to do it, instead of just doing the 4 drops per gallon right off the bat, I went with just two drops per gallon and then waited a few hours to test. When I tested a couple hours later, it was at only at 1 ppm. dosing confirmed. For the second (and third) dosing of ammonia, I went with the full 4 drops per gallon, which tests confirmed put the tank at 2ppm.

 

[Captain Highliner]

Even with a water change I wouldn't add fish if you are still having an ammonia reading. That tells me that either you are not cycled or it's the bleach. Neither one is good but I'm guessing it's the bleach. I would try a large water change, let it sit for 24 hours, and then test it again. If you don't have an ammonia reading then dose it and wait 24 hours to see if it gets processed to zero ammonia, 0 nitrites, and a nitrate reading of whatever. If you have ammonia or nitrites after those 24 hours then keep waiting as it isn't cycled. Mine took around 4 weeks.