Best chemical filtration?

[mmelnick]

I've been battling GHA off and on for over a year now. I got the bryopsis under control by raising my magnesium. But the GHA is back.

 

I test 0 for phosphates and near 0 for nitrates, both before and after water changes. And water changes alone aren't enough to keep the algae down so I'm guessing it's due to silicates, but I don't have a test kit for that. Since a silicate test kit is a lot more than the products to remove silicates I think I'll give that a try first.

 

But I've never used any filtration in a saltwater tank besides LR and LS. Waht would you guys recomend?

 

The owner of the LFS here recomends Seachem Phosguard. But I know a lot more of you guys run Chemi-Pure. What's the difference? ANd is there anythign better for my needs?

[jfarabaugh]

Get straight GFO and a reactor. Then start the manual removal process of the GHA.

 

25% water changes once a week as well.

 

 

Also Sea Hairs rock!

[paneubert]

I use PhosGuard and it seems to work ok. It is not super expensive and is nice because you can add and remove the same bag over and over to control phosphates and silicates. Saves money if you don't always need it running/being replaced each time you want to add it back in.

 

I do have some GHA, but my tank is not that old. So it is to be expected. I wonder if maybe the low nitrates you are seeing are due to the GHA eating it? I know that always messes with my mind. What if I have high nitrates and don't know it because the algae is lowering it Maybe that is the real issue. I know it is tough to lower nitrates without doing some massive water changes (assuming the issue is trates and not silicates). Good luck

[paneubert]

Get straight GFO and a reactor. Then start the manual removal process of the GHA.

 

25% water changes once a week as well.

 

Also Sea Hairs rock!

 

+1 to this as well. I would either do this (maybe even up the water to 30-40% of you can manage that), or buy a jar of PhosGuard and put in wayyyyyy more than it recommends for tank size and make sure it is in a high flow area. It claims it will not leach back out and such, so there should not be an issue with overdosing it. See if you notice any difference.

[gabe_j]

also have you figured out whats the root cause of your excess nutrients? the aglae being present will give you false zeros. are you rinseing your food before feeding? i'll put the block of frozen in a cup of tank water and let it melt and then strain that out and only give my tank the shrimp or what have you. so as not to add extra "stuff" that may be frozen with the shrimp.. but like everyone says phosban or the like in a reactor passive filtration isn't doing a whole lot for you. have you also considered micro bacter 7 along with the recommended actions?

[mmelnick]

also have you figured out whats the root cause of your excess nutrients?

 

 

The only thing I can think of is that I have some silicates. I've been told that dosing for alkalinity with baking soda would have no ill effects, but I was also just recently told that sodium bicarb can leach silicates because of an anti caking agent that is added. I think that may be my problem.

 

I rinse my food in RO before feeding. I feed mysis 2X a week and make sure that each of my 2 fish gets about 3 shrimp. So I only feed 12 tiny mysis shrimp a week, and they all get eaten. Other than that the fish just eat pods.

 

I do a 25% water cahnge every other week. And have done a few 50% water changes, but it never has any effect. I tried doing 50% water changes every week for a month with no effect.

 

And I could have a "false zero" effect on nitrates I guess. I also have a sump full of chaeto and calupera. So I'm sure that eats up any trates that I would have had.

 

I use PhosGuard and it seems to work ok. It is not super expensive and is nice because you can add and remove the same bag over and over

 

How can you do this? Can you rinse it in RO or something?

 

 

And will GFO even remove silicates? Or just phosphates?

[Lawnman]

You using RO water for water changes or RODI ?

[paneubert]

Well, you cant reuse the stuff after it is saturated with phosphates or regenerate it or anything. What I meant was that they advertise that you can put some in, wait for phos to go away, take it out, let it dry or whatever, and then feel free to toss it back in if your phos rises again. No need to make a new bag of the stuff each time you need to use it. No risk of it leaching things back out if you use the same bag more than once.

I suppose to put it in context, something like Purigen is pretty much destroyed if you let it dry out. The beads break apart.

[Lawnman]

I run a bag of chemipue elite and another media bag with carbon and phosguard that I mix up. I change the carbon and phosguard every week. It always stays in even if my phos is at zero.

[mmelnick]

You using RO water for water changes or RODI ?

 

RODI. It's the spectrapure 4 stage RODI. It reads 0 TDS every time.

[Lawnman]

Ok I was just checking. Get you a bottle of phosguard and a media bag. Run it for a few weeks see if that helps.

[mmelnick]

Ok I was just checking. Get you a bottle of phosguard and a media bag. Run it for a few weeks see if that helps.

 

Will do. Thanks for the input guys.

[jfarabaugh]

I was running the GFO in media bag...then decided to switch to a BFS reactor and noticed a big difference within weeks with my GHA. Running the media in a reactor will always give you better results.

[MusicISUnlimited]

I've been battling GHA off and on for over a year now. I got the bryopsis under control by raising my magnesium. But the GHA is back.

 

I test 0 for phosphates and near 0 for nitrates, both before and after water changes. And water changes alone aren't enough to keep the algae down so I'm guessing it's due to silicates, but I don't have a test kit for that. Since a silicate test kit is a lot more than the products to remove silicates I think I'll give that a try first.

 

But I've never used any filtration in a saltwater tank besides LR and LS. Waht would you guys recomend?

 

The owner of the LFS here recomends Seachem Phosguard. But I know a lot more of you guys run Chemi-Pure. What's the difference? ANd is there anythign better for my needs?

 

i run the sechem purigen, and chemi-pure with great results

[mmelnick]

I was running the GFO in media bag...then decided to switch to a BFS reactor and noticed a big difference within weeks with my GHA. Running the media in a reactor will always give you better results.

 

What's BSF? I tried to google it but didn't find anything reef related.

[paneubert]

What's BSF? I tried to google it but didn't find anything reef related.

 

No matter what BSF stands for, the better performance was due to it being some sort of reactor versus simply in a bag. From all I have seen, reactors are pretty much going to be massively better than a bag when it comes to any sort of granular media. The turbulence and forced flow can saturate Purigen pretty fast from what I have read/seen photos of. One guy I knew had to switch out his Purigen every 2 weeks as opposed to every few months if it was in a bag....

[basser1]

I've been using those new fangled bio-pellets! The pellets I'm using is from warner marine. By using these I can say bye-bye to gfo, purigen and carbon! My tank has never looked better. However, you do need to run these in a media reactor.

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...247768&st=0

[Hognoxious]

I run a bag of chemipue elite and another media bag with carbon and phosguard that I mix up. I change the carbon and phosguard every week. It always stays in even if my phos is at zero.

 

 

Lawnman - how much carbon / phosguard do you put in the media bag that you change out weekly ... is it about a cup full or more / less?