instant ocean salt

mcrbar910

New member
Hey guys my first aquarium is coming Wednesday it is a 24 gallon aquapod. The lfs told me to use tap water with declorinator for the first fill. They said to put the whole box of instant ocean in the water that says it is for 25 gallons even though I will only be filling it half full to allow room for the rock. Is this correct?
 
Never use tap water. Trust me, I found that out the hard way. (3 dead fish) Use water treated with reverse osmosis.
Never assume what your LFS says is correct. I highly recommend getting a refractometer and making sure your salinity is correct. Especially in a small tank, a few extra grams of salt can change your specific gravity quite a bit.
 
Never ever use tap water! Quality water is available everywhere ... even in front of safeway; Glacier Water Vending Machines $.75 for 5 gallons! You won't need any water treatment chemicals such as Prime if you use RO water.

Tap water contains heavy metals some of which are deadly to fish, corals, and inverts. Tap also water contains tons of phosphates and often times nitrates. I don't even drink tap water anymore because of what I've learned ... not to mention it tastes like $h!t compared to the sweet taste of RO water!

As far as salt goes ... don't listen to your LFS! Sometimes a 25 gallon worth amount of salt will make more or less, and your LFS probably didn't take account for displaced water by LS and LR. Pre-Mix some salt and water into a bucket, agitate the water to aerate and dissolve salt, let sit and check your salinity. If you are using a swing arm hydrometer I highly suggest you check it against a refractometer if you can't afford one; this is what I did to ensure my swing arm was calibrated. I hope you are not using a Marineland Labs Instant Ocean Hydrometer ... they are AWFUL and off by A LOT! My LFS guy and I opened a bunch to test them and some where off by +/- .005! That can spell trouble from the begining. The Deep Six is a much better swing arm hydrometer. Anyway after you let the salt mix properly pour it into your tank ... when you are nearing the last few inches to the top of your tank take a reading from your tank with the hydrometer, this way you'll know where you're at. Then you can adjust just in case if you went over or under your salinity.

Good Luck!
 
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I want to add something here. About Instant Ocean, is not a bad salt mix, but is not the best, specially for reef aquarium. Calcium level varie a lot on every mix, it doen't have concintence of calcium wich can be a PITA.

Instead I will highly recomend Tropic Marine. I had always problem with calcium levels on my 55g and the SPS corals were the more affected by this. A LFS that I really thrust( not every LFS will lock you on a 5x5 bathroom and tell you, will you like to live there?, no? well that tang will hate your 30g tank. I saw thatin person) recomend me Tropic Marine salt and even gave me a good price cheaper than IO just to give it a try. I to tell you the true the difference can be seen in day!!!!
 
Hey Kenny,

Quick Question:
When you switched to Tropic Marine did you have to do anything special like a bigger than normal water change or did you just start using Tropic Marine like usual?

I have IO but am running low, I would like to try Tropic Marine.

Thanks

-Colin
 
since I was doing 20g water changes every 2 week. I start doing 10g water changes with the tropic marine. It didn't affect anything. I have seen people just changing salt mix with the smae amount of water changes and no problem at all. but just for precaution I did like that
 
If we are arguing which salt is the best ... I would have to say Seachem's Reef Salt!

It starts your water with a lot higher pH than other salts making it easier to keep pH at proper levels. It also promotes calcium and alkalinity stability.

I would rate salt's like this ... never heard of Tropic Marine so I don't know where it would be.

1. Seachem's Reef or Marine Salt
2. Reef Crystals
3. Oceanic
4. Instant Ocean
5. Red Sea Salt
6. Coralife
7. Kent
 
never heard of Seacherm's Reef salt either haha. we should try both and see for our self. I knwo that Reef crystal is a lot bettern than IO
 
Pablo I'd like to tell you that when you come back to the nano section for help with phosphates, nitrates, mysterious fish/coral/invert death or heavy algae blooms we'll tell you to keep using tap water :smokin:

... at 4 weeks and a 5.5 gal. aquarium you should do more reading than talking! :eek2:
 
Kenny I just did some research on Tropic Marin Salts ... if it's Deutsche it's not bad ;) Actually it seems like really good salt however I have never ever seen this product in the U.S. ... perhaps they don't sell it here!?
 
Yes it cost more than IO and other brand but Irather pay more for better quality. Is not that bad if to buy it online. Bigalsonline.com have it at $40 the bucket of 200g
 
Nice information. I didn't knew that but as soon as I read the second link article and saw the last chart I had a releive. Tropic Marine and Kent came out to be the one's with less toxic metals or better said, closer to NSW having only 7 out of 29 toxic metal out of range compared from NSW second by Instant Ocean that had 8 out of 29.
 
First of all Louis, I only make such sweeping statements because the water in America is sh!t ... just cuz you found a loophole to my statement because you live elsewhere outside the U.S. and I forgot RC is international is good for you but bad for the majority of us living here. So consider yourself lucky to live near an Ocean that is still clean and it doesn't take much to purify the water you take for granted. Yes I've tested many water samples up & down Nor*Cal with a buddy who's an intern at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Also I rated Kent badly just because of the recent alk. problems many are running into ... http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=807046
 
Wow if I test the tap water here in PR I will put the island in shame. the water taste good an everything but when it come to quemistry does guy at the aqueduct* company care less every day
 
It would be an interesting thread to start ... have people all over test their tap water to see how it varies. I think I am going to do it ... but perhaps when I wake up tomm. ... it's getting late *yawn!
 
Guys I am confused lfs store told me that salt does not evaporate only water. So when you add water only to add water no salt, but it looks like you are talking about adding salt can someone please explain this to me. He actually sold me the size box of salt for my tank because he said I won't need it. This is not a chain either has lots of salt stuff.
 
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