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Re: Who to contact at water company



> Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2001 16:16:26 -0500
> From: "Monolith Marine Monsters \(m3\)" <puffie at marine-monsters_com>
> Subject: Re: Subject: Who to contact at water company

snip...

>  ...I think the most ideal way is to get a detailed water analysis
> from our local water department monthly and then custom-formulate our
> own water conditioner accordingly.  Does such a service exist at all?
> 
> Edward
> www.marine-monsters.com

Some metropolitan areas have web pages where you can check, but many do not.
While they are required (by nannny-state mandate) to give you an annual
report, no one ever mentions that the report information can (legally) be
three or more years out of date. Monthly updates are out of the question, most
places, even if they do happen to test that often. Use the annual reports for
rough mineral content only, and never for a "promise" of particular
chlorine/chloramine levels.

I have found the city water engineers are very helpful about calling you when
major changes are planned. They are glad someone expresses real interest in
what they are doing. Get acquainted -- it can't hurt. They love it when
someone drops in *before* there is any problem. They bust ass to deliver a
safe, quality product, and all they usually hear is complaints, after the
fact.

There is just no substitute for a simple and cheap chlorine test kit. You can
pay <$10 at the LFS, or go to the pool/spa dept. at Home Depot and get one for
a buck or two. The reagents and sensitivity are identical, but the cheap one
is probably way fresher. Last two times I went for refills of the reagent, at
Home Depot, the bigger bottle was under a dollar (several times the size of
the LFS kit's).

Chloramine's chlorine content registers OK on them, so you can easily tell
about how many ppm you have and adjust "Amquel" o/e dose accordingly. [BTW, I
routinely use "Amquel" at triple strength or more for shipping fish, to absorb
their ammonium/ammonia. It is *not* fussy.] I tested chlorine between my
carbon filters, so I could swap and replace, if the first one showed
punch-through.

Beside my $15 Hannah tds pen, the chlorine test kit is the most important test
equipment in my fishroom. 

Areas with (normally) no chlorine/chloramine have often imported water with it
included, with no warning at all. The people's republic of Palo Alto is one of
the most notorious offenders in this dept. Others, like East Bay MUD and
Alameda County WD have gone way out of their way to warn folks of the
problems.

San Francisco water dept. was warning aquarists, via SFAS, several *years* in
advance, of their intentions to add chloramine.

Get a simple chlorine test kit and use it. Killing fish because you didn't is
inexcusable.

That's my $0.02. YMMV.

Wright

-- 
Wright Huntley 510 612-1467 - 879 Clara Drive, Palo Alto CA  94303

   "You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get
   yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to
   go about repeating the very phrases which our founding
   fathers used in the struggle for independence."
           --   Charles A. Beard (1874-1948), U.S. historian