Good parameters/crappy tank...I'm stumped! - Page 2

julie180 · 01/24/2010, 12:44 AM

Instead of stirring the cc, I would strongly suggest you vacuum with each water change. I had cc in my 72 for 2 years and was amazed at the crap in there when I broke it down. And I did vacuum it regularly.

bbris · 01/24/2010, 01:45 AM

I have just a few guesses. Maybe something will hit home. In all aquatic systems whether it be FW, SW or Ponds there is an almost no definable factor of harmonic stasis. The numbers you quote could produce that but since you are having problems perhaps this means they are not working in your dynamic situation. It strikes me, and perhaps I am wrong but many of you readings are just a little high. To me your salinity is a tad high. It also seems to me that your alkalinity and particularly your mg are are so high they should be supporting an even higher Ca level, particularly the mg. Even if some chemistry is there I still wonder if most wholesalers run numbers that high. Perhaps your CUC just doesn't have a chance if they are being raised in an environment of 1.025/ Alk 11 / Mg 1300. For that size system you must be adding substantial supplements as well. It sounds like you run a pretty first rate operation but is it possible that your chemicals are unpure enough that they are leaching high amounts of undesireable other elements into your water. Excuse me for not knowing this right of the top of my head, but for instance, I know if you used Epsom salts to keep your Mg high eventually you will possibly overdose your system with an undesireable element in salts and possibly not in aquarium grade supplements.

To my mind you need more water changes. I have to admit I do not know about dinoflaggelates. Seems you have two wrongs trying to make a right. If the dino. is a by product of your nutrient export system I'm guessing it's in your CC bed. I would try to vacuum it much more vigorously when I was doing more frequent water changes and targeting these changes to move you away from vigorous wet skimming which is also taken good stuff out of you water.

Too many chemicals, to much crap in the substrate and too much pro healthy tank elements being skimmed out of your water. Maybe none of these are right but I really think you need a paradigm shift. Your premise is I am doing everything right and getting the wrong results. I submit the results tell you need to be doing some 'right' thing differently. JMO
Good Luck
Bill

eyeguy · 01/24/2010, 09:19 AM

Bill,

I couldn't agree more with the last statement in your post; I need to be doing something "right" differently. The problem is I'm trying everything I read about and nothing seems to be making a dent. I don't know which "right" I need to do differently for my particular system. I know there are people who do some or all of these things with wonderful results. I feel like I'm chasing my tail, but maybe I'm just being impatient with the results. I can deal with slow resolution of a dino/algae problem, but the loss of corals and CUC makes me very upset. I just began "wet" skimming a few weeks ago b/c that's what I've read (along with no light days) in the posts on dinos so while that may a problem for the long term in removing too much "good" things, I don't think it is the source of my problem now. I had also hoped the wet skimming would ease my salinity down very slowly.

My source water tests 26 TDS incoming and 0 TDS outgoing from the 6 stage RO/DI unit.

All my supplents are aquarium grade from BRS. Other than adding Mg just last week (raising the level from 1320 to 1470) I don't regularly use any supplements anyway. I keep Randy's two part solution on hand if I need to make an adjustment, but rely primarily on the Ca reactor for Ca, alk, and trace elements. The Mg was the recipe from Randy's 2 part solution and contains primarily BRS MgCl, although it does have some Epsom salt. According to Randy's paper, you need some Epsom (MgSO4) so that the system doesn't become imbalanced w/ Cl- ions. My understanding is that "normal" Mg levels for a reef tank are 1300-1500 and I'm trying to keep mine 1400-1500 since I had a pump freeze up due to CaCO3 abiotic deposition about 2 months ago.

My belief is that the primary problem is the dinos. That is why I am wet skimming, and added mechanical filtration with some dark photoperiods. I've read that raising the pH will help, but that seems impossible with the Ca reactor. Maybe I'm going to have to turn the reactor off and do Kalk drips for awhile. My thinking is that the system has become imbalanced due to lack of a significant CUC, and the dinos have made it impossible to successfully add more snails at present. The RTN, however is what has me worried that I may not be on the right track and that is why I've posted.

Hyperfocal, I'm already running Cuprisorb to remove any possibility of copper...there has been no color change with it so I really think I've eliminated that possibility.

My plan today is to break down the refugium/sump and remove as much detritis from there as possible. Thanks for all the input everyone.

Rhodan · 01/24/2010, 10:12 AM

How are you testing your saility? Swing-Arm type hydrometer or a refractor?

cdbias2 · 01/24/2010, 10:17 AM

I think I'd try a huge water change.

FishTruck · 01/24/2010, 10:51 AM

I feel your pain eyeguy!

Just a few things to look into.

1. Calibrate your refractometer with a saline solution. It will read about .003 different than one calibrated with RO water.
2. A grounding probe will protect you from getting shocked, but, if there is stray current in the tank, everything between that source and your grounding probe will be at risk. So check with a multimeter, with your grounding probe out of the tank (be careful). Then, put your grounding probe back in the tank.
3. Check the TDS in your RO unit. Make sure your source water is truly pure.
4. Double check your ALK with another test kit. You are on the high end. If your test kit is off, you might be REALLY high.
5. Make sure your flow is adequate in your tank with no dead spots to allow the cyano to proliferate.
6. Consider a UV sterilizer as a last resort.

hoffy02 · 01/24/2010, 10:56 AM

Not to hi-jack but seems appropriate here... Does it matter if brass or copper are before your RO/DI system?

FishTruck · 01/24/2010, 11:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hoffy02

Not to hi-jack but seems appropriate here... Does it matter if brass or copper are before your RO/DI system?

I hope not! I have copper pipes in my house!

hoffy02 · 01/24/2010, 11:03 AM

I was sure some people did. But my house has 99% cpvc But I have seen a stray metal fitting or two... figured Id ask... Hope everything works out with your tank problem eyeguy

eyeguy · 01/24/2010, 01:30 PM

I am checking salinity w/ a refractometer.

Fishtruck, I do calibrate w/ RO water. Are you saying I should get some medical grade saline and check it against that? How do I know that bottled saline is 0.9% NaCl precisely and what is the SG of that? BTW, I already double check Alk w/ both Salifert and API kits and as I've said my RO/DI water reads 0 TDS. I've got great flow.

Question: when checking for stray voltage in the tank w/ a multimeter, I presume I touch the red to the water and the black to a ground, correct?

I just completed removing all the LR and macroalgae from the sump, rinsing them in SW, vacuming the sand bed in the sump, and doing a 60 gal water change. Got a lot of detritis out of the sump. Will allow things to settle out for a week and then do another water change. Hopefully persistence will pay off.

tkeracer619 · 01/24/2010, 07:33 PM

As long as it is before the RO it is fine.

CJO · 01/24/2010, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eyeguy

I am checking salinity w/ a refractometer.

Fishtruck, I do calibrate w/ RO water. Are you saying I should get some medical grade saline and check it against that? How do I know that bottled saline is 0.9% NaCl precisely and what is the SG of that?

I think it depends on the refractometer whether it reads differently when calibrated with a higher salinity solution. I have a fairly nice one and it read 0.000 with RO/DI water and 0.026 with a 0.0264 calibration solution from Pinpoint that I ordered off of Amazon.com. Not sure what the SG of the saline solution is, but you can order the Pinpoint solution fairly easily.

Quote:

Originally Posted by eyeguy

Question: when checking for stray voltage in the tank w/ a multimeter, I presume I touch the red to the water and the black to a ground, correct?

Yep.

CJ

FishTruck · 01/25/2010, 03:41 PM

CJO scooped me! What he says is what I was going to say. Good luck and keep up the fight.

01/24/2010, 10:12 AM	#29
Rhodan Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Atlanta, GA Posts: 201	How are you testing your saility? Swing-Arm type hydrometer or a refractor? __________________ - Matt D. Current Tank Info: 180g with 150g basement sump

01/24/2010, 10:51 AM	#31
FishTruck Premium Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Downers Grove, IL Posts: 805	I feel your pain eyeguy! Just a few things to look into. 1. Calibrate your refractometer with a saline solution. It will read about .003 different than one calibrated with RO water. 2. A grounding probe will protect you from getting shocked, but, if there is stray current in the tank, everything between that source and your grounding probe will be at risk. So check with a multimeter, with your grounding probe out of the tank (be careful). Then, put your grounding probe back in the tank. 3. Check the TDS in your RO unit. Make sure your source water is truly pure. 4. Double check your ALK with another test kit. You are on the high end. If your test kit is off, you might be REALLY high. 5. Make sure your flow is adequate in your tank with no dead spots to allow the cyano to proliferate. 6. Consider a UV sterilizer as a last resort. __________________ Department of Redundancy Department. Current Tank Info: Established 2009 - 300 gal acrylic mostly sps, radion LEDs

01/24/2010, 07:33 PM	#36
tkeracer619 Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Westminster, CO Posts: 17,289	As long as it is before the RO it is fine. __________________ Hobby Experience: 9200ish gallons, 26 skimmers, and a handful of Kent Scrapers. Current Tank: Vortech Powered 600G SPS Tank w/ 100gal frag tank & 100g Sump. RK2-RK10 Skimmer. ReefAngel. Radium 20k.

01/25/2010, 03:41 PM	#38
FishTruck Premium Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Downers Grove, IL Posts: 805	CJO scooped me! What he says is what I was going to say. Good luck and keep up the fight. __________________ Department of Redundancy Department. Current Tank Info: Established 2009 - 300 gal acrylic mostly sps, radion LEDs

01/24/2010, 12:44 AM	#26
julie180 Registered Member Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Raymore, MO Posts: 2,556	Instead of stirring the cc, I would strongly suggest you vacuum with each water change. I had cc in my 72 for 2 years and was amazed at the crap in there when I broke it down. And I did vacuum it regularly.

01/24/2010, 01:45 AM	#27
bbris Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Leander, Texas Posts: 61	I have just a few guesses. Maybe something will hit home. In all aquatic systems whether it be FW, SW or Ponds there is an almost no definable factor of harmonic stasis. The numbers you quote could produce that but since you are having problems perhaps this means they are not working in your dynamic situation. It strikes me, and perhaps I am wrong but many of you readings are just a little high. To me your salinity is a tad high. It also seems to me that your alkalinity and particularly your mg are are so high they should be supporting an even higher Ca level, particularly the mg. Even if some chemistry is there I still wonder if most wholesalers run numbers that high. Perhaps your CUC just doesn't have a chance if they are being raised in an environment of 1.025/ Alk 11 / Mg 1300. For that size system you must be adding substantial supplements as well. It sounds like you run a pretty first rate operation but is it possible that your chemicals are unpure enough that they are leaching high amounts of undesireable other elements into your water. Excuse me for not knowing this right of the top of my head, but for instance, I know if you used Epsom salts to keep your Mg high eventually you will possibly overdose your system with an undesireable element in salts and possibly not in aquarium grade supplements. To my mind you need more water changes. I have to admit I do not know about dinoflaggelates. Seems you have two wrongs trying to make a right. If the dino. is a by product of your nutrient export system I'm guessing it's in your CC bed. I would try to vacuum it much more vigorously when I was doing more frequent water changes and targeting these changes to move you away from vigorous wet skimming which is also taken good stuff out of you water. Too many chemicals, to much crap in the substrate and too much pro healthy tank elements being skimmed out of your water. Maybe none of these are right but I really think you need a paradigm shift. Your premise is I am doing everything right and getting the wrong results. I submit the results tell you need to be doing some 'right' thing differently. JMO Good Luck Bill

01/24/2010, 09:19 AM	#28
eyeguy Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2000 Location: Crossville, TN Posts: 235	Bill, I couldn't agree more with the last statement in your post; I need to be doing something "right" differently. The problem is I'm trying everything I read about and nothing seems to be making a dent. I don't know which "right" I need to do differently for my particular system. I know there are people who do some or all of these things with wonderful results. I feel like I'm chasing my tail, but maybe I'm just being impatient with the results. I can deal with slow resolution of a dino/algae problem, but the loss of corals and CUC makes me very upset. I just began "wet" skimming a few weeks ago b/c that's what I've read (along with no light days) in the posts on dinos so while that may a problem for the long term in removing too much "good" things, I don't think it is the source of my problem now. I had also hoped the wet skimming would ease my salinity down very slowly. My source water tests 26 TDS incoming and 0 TDS outgoing from the 6 stage RO/DI unit. All my supplents are aquarium grade from BRS. Other than adding Mg just last week (raising the level from 1320 to 1470) I don't regularly use any supplements anyway. I keep Randy's two part solution on hand if I need to make an adjustment, but rely primarily on the Ca reactor for Ca, alk, and trace elements. The Mg was the recipe from Randy's 2 part solution and contains primarily BRS MgCl, although it does have some Epsom salt. According to Randy's paper, you need some Epsom (MgSO4) so that the system doesn't become imbalanced w/ Cl- ions. My understanding is that "normal" Mg levels for a reef tank are 1300-1500 and I'm trying to keep mine 1400-1500 since I had a pump freeze up due to CaCO3 abiotic deposition about 2 months ago. My belief is that the primary problem is the dinos. That is why I am wet skimming, and added mechanical filtration with some dark photoperiods. I've read that raising the pH will help, but that seems impossible with the Ca reactor. Maybe I'm going to have to turn the reactor off and do Kalk drips for awhile. My thinking is that the system has become imbalanced due to lack of a significant CUC, and the dinos have made it impossible to successfully add more snails at present. The RTN, however is what has me worried that I may not be on the right track and that is why I've posted. Hyperfocal, I'm already running Cuprisorb to remove any possibility of copper...there has been no color change with it so I really think I've eliminated that possibility. My plan today is to break down the refugium/sump and remove as much detritis from there as possible. Thanks for all the input everyone.

01/24/2010, 10:17 AM	#30
cdbias2 Appalachian Reef Society Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Alum Creek, WV (No more) Posts: 1,433	I think I'd try a huge water change.

01/24/2010, 10:56 AM	#32
hoffy02 Moved On Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Crosby, TX. Posts: 399	Not to hi-jack but seems appropriate here... Does it matter if brass or copper are before your RO/DI system?

01/24/2010, 11:03 AM	#34
hoffy02 Moved On Join Date: Dec 2009 Location: Crosby, TX. Posts: 399	I was sure some people did. But my house has 99% cpvc But I have seen a stray metal fitting or two... figured Id ask... Hope everything works out with your tank problem eyeguy

01/24/2010, 01:30 PM	#35
eyeguy Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2000 Location: Crossville, TN Posts: 235	I am checking salinity w/ a refractometer. Fishtruck, I do calibrate w/ RO water. Are you saying I should get some medical grade saline and check it against that? How do I know that bottled saline is 0.9% NaCl precisely and what is the SG of that? BTW, I already double check Alk w/ both Salifert and API kits and as I've said my RO/DI water reads 0 TDS. I've got great flow. Question: when checking for stray voltage in the tank w/ a multimeter, I presume I touch the red to the water and the black to a ground, correct? I just completed removing all the LR and macroalgae from the sump, rinsing them in SW, vacuming the sand bed in the sump, and doing a 60 gal water change. Got a lot of detritis out of the sump. Will allow things to settle out for a week and then do another water change. Hopefully persistence will pay off.