* drsolo wrote, On 12/04/2007 19:16:
when clay is allowed to sit without disturbance it will come out of
solution. As long as it is agitated it wont. hydrophilic doesnt mean
positively charged in the sense of NaCl which has an ionic bond which is +
charged.

The clay forms an electrostatic interaction with water molecules, so in
that sense it's the same as NaCl. Luckily it's not as strong as an ionic
bond, or else our ponds would need to be very hot in order to be liquid

Calcium (Ca++) added to water will help precipitate the clay as
will Alum or aluminum sulfate. This helps the clay clump together. Then a
good polyester batting is needed to filter it all out. Ingrid

BTW, did you read my first post in this thread? Do you know if any pond
water clearing techniques that use electrical potentials to remove
dissolved solids. My electrochemistry is a bit rusty and it's not a
particularly well planned experiment. I might just put 12 volts across a
bucket of dirty pond water to see what happens. If clay precipitates and
rises to the surface/sinks to the bottom it should be obvious.

--
DavidM
www.djmorgan.org.uk