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I've had my tank set up for about 2 months. filter was cycled and everything was good, than last week i ended up adding a few to many tetras at once and got an ammonia spike ( mini cycle is what im told). So i used api's ammolock for 7 days like the bottle said to do. and now when i test for the ammonia it says it's clear up to 4.0. me fish seem ok tho any ideas on how i can get a good reading of my tank thats not affected by the ammolock? my test kit is api also. im a newbie to this so i may just be a little worried. I did a 5 gallon water change on my 20gal hex today and the readin is still 4.0. I've got
1- blue ram ( hopefully 2 when i get this fixed)
8-tetra(neon & Glo)
1-killi bout 2"

Ah, the joys of ammolock. The instructions tend to guide the user into overuse of the product. One or two doses are usually enough to see the fish ride out a rough time, and then its better to do a big water change and just let the cycle do its thing and the filter recover, after all , using ammolock its completely possible to starve a filter into a total recycle, and if you were only hoping to quash a small spike a week of use is totally excessive, quite often a filter catches up with a little overzealous stocking in 48 hours or so.

Ammolock is one of those products that tends to guide the user into a dependancy on it. Its only to be used for short periods. It can actually be counterproductive if used for more than a couple of days, which is about as long as the average filter can go without ammonia before bacterial death commences.

Go API for having crap instructions on their own product

It also completely screws up test kit readings, making them unreliable, and they may remain unreliable for a couple of weeks.

Ammolock is a much over purchased and over used product, the only real use it has is in assisting fish in filterless quarantine under medication recover. Used in filtered tanks there is very little good it can do, it only ever delays a cycle or takes the worst of the ammonia off, and that makes it suitable only for very short term use before a filter can be starved into non-functionality.

The cycle is an absolute inevitability, it has to happen, and since the ammonia level will be determined by fish respiration or ambient filth, the only thing that can be done longer term is control ammonia with partial water changes. To use ammolock for a week is just to set your cycle back to day one. So like it or not there are usually 21 days or more of present ammonia and nitrate left to go the day you stop using ammolock, unless, like I said you only use it for a couple of days, and the filter bacteria is still alive and the colony redoubling itself over the coming days.

Basically do a major water change,mmaybe 50% or so, wait a day or two and then put in cycle, biospira, or safe start and see how you go. Sounds to me like you'll be starting from scratch. Gotta get the ammolock down and out before putting any bacterial aids in the tank or they will just starve and add to a bigger starting spike when new bacteria do finally establish.