"Charles" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 06 Feb 2005 13:12:21 -0500, Larry wrote:

When I take the reading for GH using my hot water ( have a water
softener installed) the GH is 6. Using the cold water the GH is 1.
After leaving the hot water to cool the GH is 6. Can anyone explain
this?

Secondly, for the fish I have keyholes, yellow lab. gold ram,
minor tetras, rasporas and corys, should I be using hot water cooled
down when I do the water changes?

TIA,


Larry


Something does not make sense here. If I understand correctly, your
gH 1 water is very soft. why even have a water softener in the house
at all. Especially one that is making the water harder.

Can you check with your water company to find out what they think is
in the water. It may be that your test kit is giving you funny
readings.


--
Charles

Does not play well with others.

I think his source water is over 6dgH and then it goes through a whole
house ion exchange-type water softener using resin and brine rinse.
Ordinarily the water should be 0-1 dgH after this but the output of
Larry's hot water tank is 6dgH. It sounds like the hot water tank ran
without a water softener for a long time and accumulated some scaling,
which the now very soft water is leeching back into the water.

Larry, if you want your water harder, install a faucet before the water
softener. It will be cold water, so when doing water changes, add the
water very slowly (you can also mix a small bit of very hot water to
bring it up to temperature). By adjusting the ratio of unsoftened (raw)
water to softened water, you can get a variety of different parameters.

In the winter, when my well water is harder, I typically use 1 raw w/c
(water change) for every 3 softened w/c. In the summer, I might
alternate 1 for 1 or go straight raw (to reduce the salt levels in the
tanks, from the softener). Note that I have fish which like hard water
though. hth
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