Bleach vs Acid

[fourzero]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14738088#post14738088 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by bheron


- what ratio are you using to dip? 10:1 water to acid?

- are you going to rinse in water afterwards or let it dry first. I know water and acid dont go well together.

- are we assuming the acid will remove the chlorine left over from the bleach?

1) Depends on strength of acid used. Anything you can get your hands on most likely won't matter. Wear gloves and eye protection.

2) Anything you can get your hands on won't matter. Rinse it off. Wear gloves and eye protection.

3) Rinse it off well with fresh water. Test for chlorine. Rinse, repeat.

In short, RINSE THE ROCK. This is like reading directions on the back of the shampoo bottle and debating just how many times you should rinse and repeat (it is rather vague, isn't it?).

 

[gwenvet]

I've rinsed my bleached rock twice now in about 30 gal of water each time. Still smells and some is still brown, not white. Should it all be white? Went and bought Muratic acid and Drayno. Was thinking of doing a 10% acid wash (how long to soak) then rinsing with water and adding a capful(?) of Drayno. The Drayno contains sodium hydroxide, sodium hypochlorite and sodium silicate. Is that OK to use?
Gumby, if you don't like the thread than don't read it. We're all helping each other out here and we're all a bit out of our 'box'. I'm sure we do really well with what we're familiar with, but at least we're open to learning new things.

 

[LISound]

FYI.


I had some really dirty/old rock that I wanted to use. Based on an older thread with Randy...here is what i did and it worked like a charm.

First. Acid Bath.

1:10 ratio to start. put a power head in there as well to keep the water moving.
This was the most disgusting foam I've ever seen. The rock will bubble and a dark brown foam will form at the surface of the water, depending on how dirty the rock is.

I did this to remove PO4. Once the foam and bubbles stop, the acid has been used up, usually after about 20-30 min.
you can add some baking soda to see if all the acid has been nutrulized.


I dumped all the water out...be careful where you dump this as there may still be a small amount of acid.
I wasn't convinced my rock was clean, so i gave it another bath. This time a 1:5 ratio--much stronger. I was still getting the brown black foam at the surface and the water was dark brown when I was done.

I went for a third soak, just for good measure, this one didn't produce as much dark foam, so I assumed the rock was getting cleaner.

After all that, I soaked in clean RO water with a power head for 2 days.

dumped the water out and added new RO water. Now time for the bleach.
The rock was cleaner, and white. but I could still see some algae on the rock and dead worms, etc.
I soaked that in 1/4 cup of bleach to 10 gallons of water. leave the power head in there again for 2 days.

After the 2 days, I took the rock out and did it again.

2 days after that, I soaked in ro water with a dechlornator. amaquel or something like that for 2 days and repeated that 2 more times.

I then let the rock sit out in the sun for a day or 2.

After all of the above...I let the rock soak in ro water with a powerhead for week.
I smelled the water after that week and could not detect any chlorine.

I did one more water change just to be safe with clean RO water.

I added the rock to my tank with some other live rock and now, a month and half later.
No algae on any of the new cleaned rock and it's starting to color up purple.

no PO4 in the tank at all.

What I did might seem like a lot but the rock I was using was in really bad shape.
I was always getting HA, it was a mess. Not anymore.


hope that helps.

 

[LISound]

i wouldn't use draino. just use the acid. you can find it at any hardware store.
Some rocks, I just went with a 1:1 ratio. The acid will eat away at the rock, which is made up of carbonet.

 

[gwenvet]

Just wondering if I add the acid before absolutely all the bleach is gone it that will be a problem. Seem to remember something long ago about bleach and acids causing deadly gas. Lovely.

 

[Hammsreefbeer]

thanx for your help LISound

 

[bertoni]

Bleach and ammonia will produce toxic chloramine gas when combined. I'm not aware of any issues that would result from an interaction of muriatic acid and lye in dilute solutions.

 

[gwenvet]

Oh yeah, that was the combination. Thanks.
LISound...thanks for the protocol. Too bad I started the other way around allready.

 

[therealfatman]

Muriatic acid (hydrochloric acid) and Draino (sodium hydroxide) are at opposite ends of the pH scale and therefore they merely neutralize each other. Oils are miscible in very high pH waters. ie draino removes greeze from drains. Where as oils they readily seperate from water in low pH water and therefore coat surfaces and fill pores. Besides neutralizing the acid quicker and easier than water rinses (dilution of acids) the base (draino) will remove the oils still present on your rock.

 

[Hammsreefbeer]

how many parts of draino would you use that would be safe for a 32g brute trash can full of rock but with only say20-25 g of water.also how many RO soaks should be done with this type of treatment.
thanx everyone for all your help.ive never delt with before and it was hard to even do because the rock was bac to the bone.But 2 good things came from all this...
1. the rock is nice and clean(6 yr old rock)and no more aiptasia's
2.ill get to re-aquascape,and peg everthing instead of having a big pile of rocks(250 lbs est..).im putting half in the sump this time.

WORD OF ADVICE FOR NEWBIES.....NEVER LET AIPTASIA'S GET A HOLD OF YOUR TANK!!!!!!!!!!!:smokin:

 

[mouserusker]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14742204#post14742204 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Hammsreefbeer

WORD OF ADVICE FOR NEWBIES.....NEVER LET AIPTASIA'S GET A HOLD OF YOUR TANK!!!!!!!!!!!:smokin:

+1
I'm fighting those little buggers right now. I'm thinking of trying some Berghia nudis. I cannot bring myself to imagine my rocks all dead and white...

 

[bertoni]

The base might also do some saponification, which is interesting, if irrelevant.

 

[LISound]

try a few peppermint shrimp. they will get all of them, just don't feed them as much to encourage them to eat the aptasia.
use joe's juice or kalk paste in a syringe for the bigger ones. If you have fish in the tank, just target feed them for the month.

No reason to break down the tank and kill all that live rock for some aptasia.
IMO.

 

[therealfatman]

We could all be Beverly Hillbillies and saphonate up some good old lye soap. Times be getting rough, might not be a bad knowledge to possess. I am presently taking lots of Vicodan while trying to pass a kidney stone so my replies might be a bit strange.

 

[gwenvet]

Things are bubbling away in acid right now but they are more brown than when they went in. Is anyone else experiencing this? It's been soaking for about 2 hrs and still bubbling. I don't know how much Drayno to add either. I think I may go back and do another bleach soak to get it white again. Aaargh.

 

[therealfatman]

The acid soaks need only be for minutes at a time if the acid concentration is high enough as to have the rocks show active effervescence (bubbling). After a few minutes, remove rock and rinse then put in a bucket with base water. It is easiest to use a seperate container for acid soaks and a seperate container for the base soak and rinse however is convenient just do not drip the acid on any organics such as carpet or wood. Just like with battery acid on your jeans, the next time you wash then you have holes in them every where the acid contacted the fabric.

If you use seperate buckets for the acid water and the base water with a clear rinse in between you can use the same water for several dips (soaks) before needing to add more acid or Draino to boost the strength. I would just add a tablespoon or two of Draino per each five gallons of water. When done doing your acid base soaks/dips just do not rinse between the two final dips. After a final water rinse put fresh water in your tub and let the rock soak a while and then check the waters pH. If needed adjust water to around a pH of 7 to 7.5.

 

[gwenvet]

Yes, I can tell you that 1/3 to 1/2 a small bottle of Drayno to about 30ish gal of water with 3 quarts of muratic acid made it VERY basic. But since I don't have a low pH kit, this way I can monitor the pH going back to 7. I realized that the brown color comes off very easily when I scrub the rock with a toothbrush. Tedious, but better than doing another bleach wash! How's everyone's else's going?

 

[Hammsreefbeer]

mine is going good,i went to lowes and all they had was Draino crystals...will that be ok?
i havent dipped in acid yet,still soaking in bleach.do i dip the rock in base water after bleach too?im going to start dipping (acid/base)after i get the bleach out of the rock.thank you

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Personally, I'd use baking soda to neutralize the acid rather than Draino. But sodium hydroxide (as in some drain products) can work. make sure there are no other ingredients listed.

 

[Hammsreefbeer]

thanx randy,thats what ill use.really didnt want to use draino.
almost finished,rock is nice and clean.im going to start to seed the rock with nice peices of LR this weekend.
ill let it sit for about a month or so,im only putting half the rock back in the DT,the rest will get put in the sump.im going to do a foam back wall like Customcolor did.i had a big pile of rock before,so now im setting my aquascape for sps.
Some people might think doing this is crazy and i dont have to say it made me nervous but in the end im glad i did it. i let aiptasia's get out of control,pepperment didnt work and some time wont work but in the end ive learned from this...QT and make sure everything i put in my DT is clean and pest free(or keep an eye on thing so i dont have anymore outbrakes.
i wanted to let everyone no THANK YOU for all your help...

thanx....randy,therealfatman,LISound,gwenvet and last but not least bheron for letting me highjack his thread.:smokin: