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PostPosted: Mon Oct 27, 2003 10:22 am 
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I tried our local fish store and they said this.

"We don't stock chemical testing kits because the sodium thiosulfate works every time. Everyone who is serious about their fish knows what the entire range of chlorine is in our tapwater and they just drop in enough ST to account for it - case closed."

There is a "siphon" type of brass hose attachment that allows you to inject any liquid into your hose stream. It would just be a case of determining how to mix the ST in a container to suck it into the hose for watering. That's a Jim Dandy idea!!

Now, where's my Siphonex?

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PostPosted: Mon Oct 27, 2003 1:30 pm 
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Location: Rowlett TX
Oh please - don't you love the know it alls who can't simply say "sorry, we don't carry them but a little ST will do" without adding a dig... I guess you are not a serious aquarist, now go sit in the corner and rethink your evil ways. :roll: BTW - genius boy is wrong, chlorine levels in the tap vary daily depending on what's going on in the water supply, the part he got right is that Sodium Thiosulfate is pretty idiot proof (ie, I have used it successfully thus you can't miss).

Oh well, here's a test kit on Ebay that looks good: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... gory=20684

The good news is that a drop of ST will do gallons of water and the sprinkler actually removes some chlorine (aerating water removes it fast)... My guess is that if you can setup a ST drip you will get the job done - no need for precision here.

Cheap too! You can make a gallon of concentrate by using 4 dry ounces of ST and then 1 drop of concentrate per gallon of tap water so if you get a bucket here: http://www.chemistrystore.com/sodium_thiosulfate.htm
for $4 whole dollars for two pounds it'll make 8 gallons of concentrate which will dechlorinate Texas for a month. Not sure how many drops are in a gallon but I'm guessing one gallon of concentrate would make my pool dechlorinated in about 5 minutes.


OK, spending way too much time on this but ya got me curious - y'all have water from aquifers and the water filters through calcium carbonate like I figured - you have hard alkaline water which is why the rain does so much more.

here is your contaminant report:
http://www.saws.org/our_water/waterqual ... arts.shtml

Don't freak out when you read it, that is actually 'superior'.

In answer to your next question, Walmart has 2 gallon jugs of distilled water with a spigot for drinking pretty cheap and an under-sink RO system is down to $109 on ebay and this one looks good - http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... gory=20758
I used to design the things and they are a lot better these days - look for 3 stage filters - 1 micron sediment filter, activated carbon (smell/taste takes out dissolved organics as well as all those 12 hyphen chemical compounds in the water from pesticides) and the RO membrane - basically that allows only pure water through and removes all of the dissolved salts. Way too expensive for the yard because they typically waste 3-4 gallons of water for each pure gallon made (run it right into the garden) but great for drinking and mixing home brews..... just be careful - any microbe living in very hard water will likely explode in RO water when the pure H2O runs into the cells to dilute the harder water... sometimes a spoonful of epsom salt to replace some hardness is a good idea.

Far more than you wanted to know... am I procrastinating getting my work done today or what.


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PostPosted: Thu Oct 30, 2003 1:33 pm 
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Where do you get sodium thiosulfate in dry form?

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PostPosted: Thu Oct 30, 2003 4:07 pm 
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You missed the link :-)
http://www.chemistrystore.com/sodium_thiosulfate.htm

Cheap cheap stuff.


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PostPosted: Fri Oct 31, 2003 1:05 am 
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Thanks. That's where I got my sodium percarbonate for laundry bleach.

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PostPosted: Fri Jan 07, 2011 3:58 pm 
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For the garden hose some balance must be regular pool, the balance of your tasks. Most of time the water garden maintenance to eliminate weeds rather than adding to their problems. Aquatic plants are weeds, and will be taken in the pond in the swamp if given a chance. So do your water garden in the monthly maintenance, remove all dead or dying plant material. If you do not break down, it can kill your water smell of fish.

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PostPosted: Fri Jan 07, 2011 11:04 pm 
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I think it's the pH that is the probelm with tap water compared to rain water.

I'm working on recovering all of the 40.000 gallons of rainwater that fall on my 2000 square foot roof anually here in the DFW metroplex.

Rain water is 100 times less alkaline than tap water and has nitorgen and sulfur in it that plants can use which it picks up from the air while falling..

I've seen 3000 gallon drums that are approximately 8x8 that run for around 1000 dollars. If I had the money, I'd could use about three of them to be able to utilize most all of the water that falls onto the roof each year.

I'm placing 300 gallon barrels under each of the four gutters and running them by gravity into the as of yet unacquired large storage barrels. Then I am going to buy a pump from Home Depot to be able to water our plants and garden, maybe even the turf. I could even stick to a totally gravity fed system.

40.000 gallons of free water works out to a savings of 400 dollars per year, plus it's healthier for the alkaline soil here because it flushes out accumulated salts that may be present due to our tap water. Rainwater is magical stuff.

I'm thinking that chlorine is only a small part of the problem with our alkaline tap water.


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PostPosted: Wed Jan 12, 2011 1:06 pm 
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I think I just committed a cardinal sin in logic, though...the truth is, I don't know for sure how much chlorine is a part of of the problem with an alkaline tapwater such as ours...a lot, a little, or none as part of an overall organic plan.

But in large part , chlorine becomes a gas, or a salt, and is very electron dense, so reacts rapidly with soil. But as noted, it also contributes to potetnially harmful salts already presenct in alkaline tap water.

I can say this, what I have actually done with tapwater. When I use it, I water very deeply, sometimies three inches at a time during the peak of summer.

Part of the aim is to better leach out the top layers of soil that have already accumulated salts from using tapwater too lightly, or too frequently, as is the norm here.. Since I don't own an automatic irrigation system, this system has evolved and seems to work well for me.

We know that the excess presence of introduced salts from alkaline tapwater in soil should make native plants less drougt tolerant, for a couple of reasons, one being that the salts surrounding the roots of plants creates what amounts to, an osmotic pull of water out from the roots, and back into the soil..

Anyways, rain water eliminates not knowing how much to water plants or how frequently, rainwater should be beneficiall to the soil at any reasonable dose and when you run out of it, that's when you know how much to use...

Chlorine is highly reactive and it wouldn't seem like it's all that great for your soil, but maybe it depends upon how much of an organic buffer is present in the soil....it's also very difficult for me to understand how any chlorine containing chemical in the tapwater could be very stable and stick around...

One could presumably leave a barrel of tapwater out for a couple of days and then measure for any chlorine...what is one presumably to do with a highly chorinated carbon filter....I guess that would answer whether it's an organic approach:)

Regardss,
Mackel in DFW


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