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Correct dosing method for my tank

Joined
4 Jan 2010
Messages
91
Location
Sidcup, United Kingdom
I currently have a 90 litre aquarium which is my first tank and I have now upgraded an 180 litre aquarium with external filter in which I plan to keep a fair stock of fish and plants in. The light unit consists of 2 x 35w T5 fluorescent tubes. My water parameters are listed below.

PH 8.2
Ammonia 0 ppm
Nitrite 0 ppm
Nitrate 10-20 ppm
KH 12° dKH 214.8 ppm
GH 17° dGH 304.3 ppm

I am planning to have initially run my lights for 6 hours a day and increase by an hour each month until I get to about 8-10 hours. I will have a nutrient rich substrate, pressurised CO2, fast flow and want to dose with dry fertilizers.

I know that there is a number of dosing methods out there e.g. EI, PPS-Classic and PPS Pro.

What method would be best for me as I will have quite a few fish. I also would like to try and keep water changes to either every week or every two weeks and only change about 25%. I have read that the EI method requires 50% water changes every week.

My main aim is to make sure the plants look healthy and lush I am not too concerned on fast growth.

I really would appreciate your advice as this is my second tank and I would really like to do everything right. Thanks
 
There is no correct method, but I would recommend EI.
It is not vital to do 50% weekly water changes with EI, you can adapt it to the WC routine you envision for yourself. Just dose less.

Also, search for londondragon's auto water changer in the DIY section. You can effortlessly change a hundred litres in a few minutes. I have a version of this with no pump, just relying on gravity and it takes a little longer, but still very painless.
 
Hi tommyleestaples,

I agree with matt EI would be your easiest way foward especially with dosing dry ferts if you haven't done so before. On the face of it doing these large water changes at first appears rather daunting but believe me when you have thought it through and honed the method that you eventually decide on its really easy, forget about buckets if you have a large tank its just to much work, look at some of the other methods that people use on this thread.

http://ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=7336


Regards, Chris.
 
Problem my tank is at an office and I don’t get any hot water from the taps its only cold. So I have to boil a kettle for each bucket to make the water warmer. If I could just attach a hose to the tap and fill up that way then I would but it will be ice cold water and wont of been treated for chemicals.
 
Thats a shame.

I sometimes fill up with just cold water at home, but I dribble the water into the tank so that the overall temp does not drop more than a degree or two during the process. I appreciate this is not practical if you are sharing the office with others.

As to adding non treated water, that is not a problem, you can just squirt the dechlor straight into the tank.
 
CeeJay said:
Hi tommyleestaples
tommyleestaples said:
I will be using part RO water and part tap water. Does this affect dosing method?
No. Not at all :D .

Hi,

I think it largly depends on just how much RO your using. For the most part Ceejay is quite right as the tapwater will contain a lot of trace elements and magnesium but the more RO you use the more traces you'll need to add to the water and the higher the magnesium content you'll require in your macro solution. A lot will depend on the make up of your tapwater and the ratio of tap-RO you use. Thing with EI is to just make sure there is an unlimited supply of all of the ferts all of the time do your water changes and your good to go.

Regards, Chris.
 
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