PLEASE READ: What is wrong with Houston water?

[LooksLater]

Sorry for your loss, Panda. It HAS been a rough month for you.

I don't use a carbon bottle either, a lot of people don't. Most people assume stuff like this isn't going to happen to them until it does. We live and learn. :sad:

[BeefyG]

Sorry for your loss, Panda. It HAS been a rough month for you.

I don't use a carbon bottle either, a lot of people don't. Most people assume stuff like this isn't going to happen to them until it does. We live and learn. :sad:

Unless they have the cash to burn, most people with a carbon bottle probably have already had a water issue before or know someone personally that has. I don't consider them commonplace aquarium equipment and that is mostly because they are not easy to get. If you could buy them off the shelf it would be different.

Sorry for your loss Panda. I lost a whole tank of discus due to a business trip I couldn't avoid. Its a bad bad feeling.

[mistahoo]

Not being able to afford one is the biggest load of crap I've ever heard. I've heard that excuse so many times now. No offense to anyone.

You don't have to go out and buy a $300+ carbon bottle. There's several cheaper and affordable alternatives. There's a few carbon filters (bottle, snake, etc.) that are posted up in the DIY section. Most don't take much time to make and, for the most part, very simple. Preventive measure is always best.

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[SunnyHouTX]

No offense Sunny but this is why i did not post here what was for me a traumatic experience yesterday.
I knew i would get some "you should have known" - "you should have done" X,Y,Z responses...

At the end of the day i lost close to a $1000's worth of beautiful fish, it took me many months to put the setup/colony together and to watch helplessly as they all died within an hour was devastating...

Anyway, hopefully my loss will help some of my fellow hobbyists avoid tragedy...

This plus my USPS disaster has made for a heck of a month for me, just when you think you are on top
life knocks you back down. You just have to get back up, dust yourself off and start over...

No offense taken Theo and I'm saddened to hear of your loss, but please take to heart that you're not alone in having gone through a situation such as you just went through. They're all tough to deal with.

I'm trying to stress that so many of us, including myself, have lost fish to bad water during a WC and more often than not somebody always recommends using a carbon bottle in every thread that's started about fish loss during a water change after heavy rains or during very hot summer months. Several members had been telling me to get a carbon bottle when I started keeping Trophs/Petros and it took the loss of a lot of fish after a WC for me to finally bite the bullet and purchase a carbon bottle. Like Sasha said, we tend to think that this type of catastrophe won't happen to us, but I caution everyone to test that at their risk.

[nightster]

Just remember, the smaller the carbon contraption the slower the flow through it. Contact time is key...

[mistahoo]

Just remember, the smaller the carbon contraption the slower the flow through it. Contact time is key...

+1

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[SunnyHouTX]

In other words, size matters

[specialone0812]

http://www.houstonfishbox.com/vforums/showthread.php?57787-Massive-RO-DI-Units-Price-Drop!!-4-19-2013

These bottles can hold about 50lbs of carbon, so for another $100 for carbon, you are set with a nice carbon tank.
FYI: These bottles look too small in the pictures, but they are huge, at least 2x bigger than the bottle Chris was selling. I hardly lifted it to my car (hatch back-will not fit in a sedan car).

[Ballinxalex]

I don't know anything about carbon bottles they just look like a bottle to me and how are they hooked up anyways ? Anybody got some pics ?

[mistahoo]

[Ballinxalex]

We should make a group buy for one of these bad boys

[sunkenmetal]

We should make a group buy for one of these bad boys

A group buy for one WTF?

[Ballinxalex]

A group buy for one WTF?

Like one of those types in the pic . Of course why would we have a group order for one carbon bottle

[mistahoo]

Water hose goes to one end and the other end goes to your tank. Most of them work like this. Water goes down a long tube and is forced to go up because there's nowhere else to go. As it rises, it passes through several layers of carbon and/or filter floss. Once it reaches the top, it has to exit through the outlet which is the only opening. Now you have filtered water. It's very simple.

[sunkenmetal]

Doesn't fish gallery sell these?