[Sakura8]

I'm a bit curious about this. So Brita water filters use carbon cartridges to filter out water impurities, including chlorine. Would carbon in an aquarium filter thus filter out excess chlorine too? Say you run out of water conditioner/dechlorinator and you can't get to the store to buy any but you need to do a water change. Would carbon filter out enough chlorine to make it fish-safe on a short-term basis?

Thoughts, opinions, scientific facts, anyone? (and yes, guess who just changed the cartridge in the Brita water pitcher, haha)

 

[Crazykat]

There looks like there is a difference in the particle size of the activated carbon used in tank filters and that used in Brita filters. I would guess that forcing water through the smaller carbon particles would remove more chlorine because there is a larger surface area and the rate of passage is slower (completely basing this off of running gel filtration columns in lab). So, I would think the tank filters would not remove as much chlorine as the Brita filters. Would it remove enough to make it safe? Dunno.
You could always run water through a Brita pitcher before putting it in your fish tank. Although you would probably lose your mind from the amount of time it takes.
Interesting topic.

 

[Sakura8]

Yeah, I guess I was feeling bored while I was changing the Brita water filter and I was reading the boxx and how it said it "reduced the taste and odor of chlorine." Then I thought about aquarium carbon and, well, you can see the weird path my brain took.

Regardless of whether or not it does though, I certainly would never advocate using only carbon in the filter to remove chlorine/chloramines.

Use your water conditioners and dechlorinators, folks!

 

[dramaqueen]

That's an interesting question, Sakura.I never thought about it before.

 

[Sakura8]

So far, I've learned from OFL that it will filter out some chlorine but not enough to really make a difference, that there are all sorts of carbons on the market and they work differently, and that Brita filters don't filter out sodium from water softeners. I never fail to learn something new from this forum.