Heavy Metals

[Europhyllia]

Just was reminded of something intersting I learned while researching my mortar for my overflow boxes.

Cement (even the popular portland cement) may have heavy metals in it. You won't find the info on what and how much on the MSDS sheets. It just depends on where it's mined, etc.
In fact even liverock may contain heavy metals.

Because of that the chemists on RC recommended running Cuprisorb (a Seachem product) to absorb not just copper but any heavy metals in the water.
I know I've always recommended PolyFilters on different occasions but apparently PolyFilter takes down the level on certain metals to about 30ppm while Cuprisorb can take it down to close to 0ppm. So Cuprisorb is the way to go.

Cuprisorb changes colors when it exhausts its ability to adsorb any more so it's easy to tell when to change it. If you don't have much to adsorb it can stay in there for months.

My plan is to just keep a couple of bags in the sump for good. Maybe the mortar will leach something. Maybe it won't.
I got my insurance policy...

Just figured I mention this option with so many of us using mortar/tiles/rocks etc from all kinds of sources...

[cbianco]

Good find.

Considering that some of us make our own live rock, plugs and other tank structures, this product may take some of the headache out of unsolved/unknown problems occuring in our tanks.

Product page: http://www.seachem.com/Products/product_pages/CupriSorb.html


Q: Will CupriSorb effectively remove metals other than Cu? I'm looking for a medium (preferably renewable) that will remove or at least significantly reduce all metals in my tap water.

A: It will also remove, nickel, zinc, cobalt, cadmium, manganese. it may remove other heavy metals but we have no data for any others.

Found at CupiSorb FAQ: http://www.seachem.com/support/FAQs/CupriSorb.html

Christopher :)

[ErikH]

Cool Ill try it out too since I am a heathen these days.