Broken Hydrometer causes disaster.... Maybe

So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle doesnt
move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at the
Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb mistakes
I can avoid??

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by friday.........

Make sure you measure correctly the salt to water ratio. If you don't add
enought salt, your meter will not move. Also when mixing, use a power head
inside the container you use for mixing the water/salt solutions to mix it
real well. It takes a while for the salt to disolve, you could be left with
muck at the bottom.
"James" wrote in message
m...
So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle
doesnt move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at
the Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb
mistakes I can avoid??

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by
friday.........

(another newbie)

I find that air bubbles keep getting in the "pointer" and giving me false
readings. How do you fill the darn thing without getting air bubbles?

I know you can tap the hydrometer to get rid of the bubbles, but some just
wont go away.

"StringerBell" wrote in message ...
I find that air bubbles keep getting in the "pointer" and giving me false
readings. How do you fill the darn thing without getting air bubbles?

I know you can tap the hydrometer to get rid of the bubbles, but
some just wont go away.

It usually happens when the hydrometer is "too clean"
or "dry". Keep new hydrometer with water for 24 hours
and it should develop some minimal bacteria film maybe?
or something like that to make it "less dry" and more
slippery for the air bubbles :-)
It will get better when you use more often and longer.

Also - there is a smart hydrometer called Deep Six
which has a nice design with a little dam and water
gets in slowly falling/sliding on the inner wall,
not causing any bubbles to develop...

"James" wrote in message m...
So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle doesnt
move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at the
Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb mistakes
I can avoid??

The biggest mistake to avoid is to DO NOT MIX SALT directly in the tank!

Use dedicated container, a barrel (I use several 160g Instant Ocean buckets)
and measure with kitchen cups how much salt does container take
(estimated) to make up the desided water salinity. Than you will
know how much salt to add to make water close to the target salinity.
Than you will rely on the hydrometer only to adjust salinity
preciselly and you can avoid a major error when the needle sticks
to the wall/bottom next time you do not wash the device after use
and you let it get dry with salt glueing the needle ;-)

I know I need to add little more than 3+1/3 cups of salt to the bucket
to get very close to desired salinity. Than I only fine adjust...

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by friday.........

I would start with live rock and no fish.
Let the rock cycle and then add fish.
No need for fish to suffer high ammonia burning their gills
while the live rock is "curing" after the shipment...

Hey James,

No one can tell you exactly when your rocks will be done curing or exactly
how high ammonia and the nitrites/ates will get. That said, maybe it's not
quite a good idea yet to add anything. There are a lot of people that put
damsels in the tank at your stage because they're hardy... Let me just
throw something out there to you that I've learned through friends, reading
and a few pet stores: try to resist damsels unless you are REALLY sure you
like a particular species, you want to keep it, and you know they will be ok
with future fish in your plans. Why? Because those fish turn out to be
quite the mean *******s when they get a little older. haha. On another
quick note too, along with stressing your fish, it's a real pain to set and
rearrange rock with creatures in the way And if you already have sand, in a
minute you won't be able to see in the water too well (or at all) so you
can't avoid your animals.

On the damsel thing, I just helped a friend out with getting damsels from
his tank he didn't want. Unfortunately he didn't even know what kind of
fish he had. So I made the mistake of taking them in BEFORE I did some
research (including asking people on this newsgroup.) I regret it. Even
though they were added AFTER my fish, they were territorial and mean. The
local pet store let me take these fish to him for some store credit and he
was so used to the damsel story he laughed. Just like I've read before,
people get these hardy fish to cure their tanks and then don't like them.
Many damsels lose their colors and good manners as the grow.

I was where you were not long ago. What did I do to suffice this? Hermit
crabs. Sounds silly but to satisfy my needs to want to see if my water was
working, my set up was worthy, heck to see if my money and readings are
going toward something that WORKS. It was neat for maybe a few weeks to
watch them move around..... but alas just hermit crabs will get dull too...
it's not a permanent fix.

Good luck to you,
B
www.geocities.com/bryg30


"James" wrote in message
m...
So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle
doesnt move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at
the Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb
mistakes I can avoid??

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by
friday.........

* James wrote, On 9/18/2006 7:33 PM:
So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle doesnt
move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at the
Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb mistakes
I can avoid??

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by friday.........


James.

How could there be a disaster if there's nothing in the tank yet?

Take your hydrometer to the aquarium store and have them test it and tell you
where it reads so you know if it's correct. If you look back at hydrometer
threads in here, you'll find that the cheapo ones they sell you are not always
accurate. I have one that reads low, so I kept my salinity too high for quite
awhile.

Then do yourself a favor. First get your salinity right, then put in your rock
and a pound or two of live sand from the shop tank, if they have it, then let
the tank cycle. THEN add some crabs, snails, etc., and let the tank cycle.
Don't add any fish until it's done!! Then add one or two at a time. Unless of
course you enjoy stressing out watching expensive fish stress out and get sick
and maybe die.

And have your protein skimmer running and optimum lighting on. Don't wait until
you "need" it to get it.

What does the hydrometer read when you mix 1/2 cup per
gallon in a container?

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



James wrote on 9/18/2006 8:33 PM:
So i have my water and my salt. I start adding but the little needle doesnt
move. Add some more still nothing. Whole lot more nada. Guy at the
Aquarium Center told me he would look at it the meter tomorrow.

Thank goodness there is nothing alive in the tank. Any other newb mistakes
I can avoid??

I did get a maxi-Jet 1200 which is running quite nicely. I have added my
"Dead" sand and some rocks though not any live ones yet. Once I get the
water worked out I will add the rock.

Any think I am rushing? I would love to put some fish in by friday.........