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Tank Issues and Using an Immersion Blender

GDawson

GDawson

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Arrrrrrrrrgh….Well it was bound to happen. And of course it happened at 1:00am. The overflow lost its siphon and approx 5 gals overflowed onto the floor. The good news is my wife was still up and got me immediately so I could shut everything down.

Really need to get that tank drilled!

The interesting thing in all this was mixing the new salt water. It had to be quickly so I used the immersion blender from the kitchen. It worked amazingly. Mixed and aerated the water at the same time. The salt, Salinity, was actually clear when I was done. It usually takes several hours to overnight to clear up but using the immersion blender the water was clear within minutes. Pretty cool!

-Gregory
 
That's creative! How long did you use the blender? I also have a problem with the Salinity mix remaining cloudy when mixing with a powerhead.
 
I used to mix Salinity without a heater in a 5G bucket. It always remained cloudy for me. Even up to 48 hours later.


Salinity seems to be more temperature sensitive for mixing than other salt preparations. I now have a 250W Theo heater with busted temperature control that I put in the 5G bucket with a powerhead. It heats the water to about 90 degrees in about an hour and the water is crystal clear.

I have found that mixing the 2 cups of salt I use for a 5G bucket with 6-8 cups of water and then not adding the rest of the water until it stops fizzing (5-10 minutes) also makes it clear more quickly. Surprisingly, this is the directions printed on the product.... ;-) I hadn't bothered to read them and was just adding salt to full 5G buckets.
 
bondolo said:
I have found that mixing the 2 cups of salt I use for a 5G bucket with 6-8 cups of water and then not adding the rest of the water until it stops fizzing (5-10 minutes) also makes it clear more quickly. Surprisingly, this is the directions printed on the product.... ;-) I hadn't bothered to read them and was just adding salt to full 5G buckets.
Click to expand...
Brand?
That is odd. Everyone has always warned me not to do that, and from experience I learned not to do that. By making a brine like that you will cause parts to precipitate out and getting them back into solution is not an easy task.
 
99sf said:
That's creative! How long did you use the blender? I also have a problem with the Salinity mix remaining cloudy when mixing with a powerhead.
Click to expand...

It was no more than 2 or three minutes. At 1am I'm cranky and inpatient!

-Gregory
 
bondolo said:
I used to mix Salinity without a heater in a 5G bucket. It always remained cloudy for me. Even up to 48 hours later.


Salinity seems to be more temperature sensitive for mixing than other salt preparations. I now have a 250W Theo heater with busted temperature control that I put in the 5G bucket with a powerhead. It heats the water to about 90 degrees in about an hour and the water is crystal clear.

I have found that mixing the 2 cups of salt I use for a 5G bucket with 6-8 cups of water and then not adding the rest of the water until it stops fizzing (5-10 minutes) also makes it clear more quickly. Surprisingly, this is the directions printed on the product.... ;-) I hadn't bothered to read them and was just adding salt to full 5G buckets.
Click to expand...

What salt mix tells you to do that? It's interesting.

BTW - what are directions? Never heard of them. :p

-Gregory
 
Some tricks that help me:

1) Dump the salt directly into the power head.
Probably shortens the pump life. But nicely distributes and breaks up the salt, so less clumps on the bottom.
And is a lot like the blender idea that started the thread.

2) Assuming a round barrel, keep powerhead placed low in barrel, and point the powerhead slightly down and off center.
Gets a nice gyre going around and around the barrel, with max flow on the bottom.

3) Add about 2/3 of the salt, then wait for reasonably clear, then add the rest.
I think the lower concentration really helps the first part dissolve faster and better.
 
Apparently I do need to read the directions even more closely. I conflated the instructions on the Aquavitro Salinity for making a liter of water along with the instructions for making 15 gallons. Oops. The real instructions say add salt to full amount of water. It has seemed to be working though. Perhaps this is due to the flaky heater warming the water up significantly above room temperature. Best would probably to heat the water up fully before adding the salt for best dissolving.
 
Perhaps the heat does have something to do with it (faster uptake into the solution?). The water was warm from the tap as I had no time to wait for it to heat and age in the bucket.

-Gregory
 
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