REEFMASTER's Breaking down, leaving hobby for a while

[Reefmaster1996]

Also as you can see cal and my are still high, I will cut Red Sea foundations all in one dosing to .5ml a day instead of 1ml a day , Red Sea colors to .3ml a week on Wed instead of .5 ml 3 times a week, and see how that goes, I think my water chemistry is off and might have to do with the cloudiness, maybe some cal precipitation or mg. We'll see how it goes. Should help as I was also overdosing the colors program since it is 1ml of it to every 10ml of foundations used and I wasn't dosing foundations in the right amounts.

[Reefmaster1996]

Sorry for the lack of the video update and pics of the tang I've had a hectic day to say the least, tank is looking better than ever after my thorough maintnance, I will keep it up, just have to work on it once a week and it will make a world of a difference. Changed the way my current light intensity is setup my whites are kicked up to full same with blue, and the light is raised again, the tank looks less cloudy this way. More is explained in the video

[Reefmaster1996]

Tank is looking great today, clarity has been maintained since Sunday which is a good sign, algae has not grown back much at all after I scrubbed the back wall which was the only area they were present. Removing the the powder blue reduced my nutrient intake by about 50%, and spared my clam, so all in all it was a good call.

 

 

Params are in check, everything is the same, will re test cal on Friday, should be somewhere around 420-480ppm.

 

Little tang aka bumble bee jr is doing great and is very active, all the fish are doing great, same with coral, anemone and the clam( which has already started to heal form bieng nipped at).

 

Put the mp 10 on short pulse and was surprised to see a small subtle wave appear, I didn't think it could do it on this tank but it can, quite impressive to say the least. I will look into getting a mp40 though in the near future, after I get dosers and the light hooked up, which are my main priority at the moment.

 

Future updates forthcoming

[Reefmaster1996]

Was reflecting the past two nights while enjoying the current awesome condition of the tank, was thinking about what I was doing right and what was wrong in the first 3 months of this new tank's life.

 

 

Everything is doing much better this week, after my calcium went back into respectable levels (460ppm), I concluded that weekly water changes and sand vacuuming will be the key to my success as well as setting up dosers ASAP for more stable parameters and salt levels. Also the new light should be setup ASAP as well. For now all is well, I added a new cleaner shrimp, he is my first, and a new frag, for experimental purposes to see if I can maintain its health, instead of trying to recover browned out stuff in a brand new tank.

 

That's what I meditated on in a nutshell, also I concluded that removing the powder blue was the best thing I have ever done for this tank, my bioload was pretty much cut in half, the clam is happy, the water is perfectly clear, I have no complaints. OH AND I SAW GROWTH ON A FRAG FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER IN THIS TANK :) updates coming soon

[AJ_Tsin]

Was reflecting the past two nights while enjoying the current awesome condition of the tank, was thinking about what I was doing right and what was wrong in the first 3 months of this new tank's life.

 

 

Everything is doing much better this week, after my calcium went back into respectable levels (460ppm), I concluded that weekly water changes and sand vacuuming will be the key to my success as well as setting up dosers ASAP for more stable parameters and salt levels. Also the new light should be setup ASAP as well. For now all is well, I added a new cleaner shrimp, he is my first, and a new frag, for experimental purposes to see if I can maintain its health, instead of trying to recover browned out stuff in a brand new tank.

 

That's what I meditated on in a nutshell, also I concluded that removing the powder blue was the best thing I have ever done for this tank, my bioload was pretty much cut in half, the clam is happy, the water is perfectly clear, I have no complaints. OH AND I SAW GROWTH ON A FRAG FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER IN THIS TANK :) updates coming soon

 

Thats great news, sometimes you just need to take some time and appreciate it all. I just posted a "comparison" post of frags that have been added over the past few weeks. Only difference between my system and yours is less bioload and weekly water changes from day 1. I think lowering your load for now was a good call. Browned out corals will come back really fast with Zeovit just gotta make sure everything else is in check.

[ALexpsycho]

Nice tank man!

[Reefmaster1996]

Thanks, guys, yeah AJ everything was coloring back up but that last calc swing browned a lot of my Sps frags out the new piece is showing amazing polyp extension and still has the same color, so doing good so far in that aspect. Looking into getting some reef chilli and acropower as soon as the small bottle is in stock at BRS.

 

The acro that was growing is still showing more signs of encrusting growth so I think things are finally sorted out after a somewhat rough start, as far as coral goes.

Nice tank man!

Wow that means a lot, Alex, I was drooling over your tank just last night, what a coincidence. It's so cool that your running on nsw, I might try it, I go fishing 20-30nm offshore (at least 2x a month) so it might work.

[Reefmaster1996]

Working on video update, will post within next hour

 

Scratch that I have to wait till sundown to get good footage without a windows blinds glare, courtesy of Mother Nature. So by 8:30pm

[Reefmaster1996]

Never Mind new episode of river monsters is on

 

Update tommorrow

[Reefmaster1996]

Sorry for the lack of updates this week guys and gal, I've been busy with school and life, will update ASAP, everything is doing great, still getting good growth and color, so I'm doing something right, updates soon to come

[Reefmaster1996]

Will update with a video and pics sometime between Wednesday and Sunday having a busy week

[AJ_Tsin]

Will update with a video and pics sometime between Wednesday and Sunday having a busy week

Its actually nice being busy in this hobby sometimes things grow faster when you aren't staring at them and taking pictures all day. I was away all weekend only 3 days but it seemed like everything had changed dramatically when I got back.

[Reefmaster1996]

I agree AJ, I seem to have overdosed zeostart this past few days, tank was hazy again and had some sort of algae on the sand, have been dosing coral snow last night and just now, will update, other than that I have some new additions I forgot to mention from a friend last Friday, and everything is coloring up really nicely, need to take time to get good photos, also I glued most of my frags permenately, for a more natural look and stability (they no longer get knocked over by snails)

[Reefmaster1996]

Update:

I am waiting for the perfect lighting conditions/ water to clear up a bit to shoot an fts and video, I did increase the flow a bit on the zeovit reactor to see what happens.

 

 

Also I just ordered a BRS universal air filter, it connects to the air intake on skimmers and uses soda lime media to extract CO2 form the air and consequently raises your PH without changing the chemical content of your water other than O2 concentration. So my ph should go from 7.9 on average to 8.3 on average, but I will have to set skimmer up on a timer to make the change as slow as possible.

 

Other than those few tidbits, every thing is fine, and my corals are gaining color from the zeovit system.

[jedimasterben]

Also I just ordered a BRS universal air filter, it connects to the air intake on skimmers and uses soda lime media to extract CO2 form the air and consequently raises your PH without changing the chemical content of your water other than O2 concentration. So my ph should go from 7.9 on average to 8.3 on average, but I will have to set skimmer up on a timer to make the change as slow as possible.

The change in pH won't matter if it happens immediately or not (it won't). Be very aware of the cost of soda lime and that you'll need to change it every couple of days.

[Reefmaster1996]

I am aware of the cost issue, I have a good friend who uses the BRS version, and a jug last him about a year on a 90gallon. So I think I should be fine, we'll find out soon.

 

Thanks for the advice, how's the light coming along, I want to see some ridicules par readings from that thing.

[jedimasterben]

A year on 9lbs of media? Unless he lived in a house that didn't have any doors or windows, I find that very hard to believe. In a typical Florida home that even mediocrely sealed from the outside, indoor CO2 concentration is easily double or triple the reading outdoors. I went through a pound of media every day or so, and my house has horrific insulation.

 

I'm not saying that it may not be that way for them, but don't expect it to be like that for you. If you're filling a standard 10" filter housing, then I would expect to change it every 3-4 days.

 

 

Even buying 37lbs of the stuff for ~$110 (http://www.wayfair.com/Molecular-Products-Gallon-Pail-Sodalime-120020-00-AMW1000.html), my cost on running it is insane, which is why I never went forward with buying more of it.

[Reefmaster1996]

At the lfs I work at another friend was having the same lifespan on the media as you, and they found out they had a co2 leak in their house. As I said, we'll see how it works.

[jedimasterben]

A CO2 leak? Were they running a calcium reactor or something?

[Reefmaster1996]

That's what I was told, I have no idea from what. I will investigate further when I get a chance, lol.

[Reefmaster1996]

Update:

I increased the flow on the reactor from 50-60gph to about 100gph, the tank got a little cloudy, I went to LFS this morning and got purigen, chemi pure elite and a calcium test kit, calcium is high again around 500ppm, should not have this problem again, now that I have the test kit again.

Also I did a 5 gallon water change, waiting on my pump to get in on Tuesday along with my air filter to vacuum out the sump that is full of mulm/detritus.

[jedimasterben]

On what reactor, the one with the zeolith stones? You should never increase the water flow in it, always leave it the same.

[Reefmaster1996]

Yeah the zeolith one, trying something different to see what happens, what are your thoughts.

[jedimasterben]

Bad choice. Straying from the instructions with any of the Zeovit additives can be a really, really bad thing. Quite a few of the additives are extremely toxic to corals or zooxanthellae in very small amounts, and the dose is just under that.

[Reefmaster1996]

Yeah I just started reading up more on the zeovit system, and changed out 90% of my media a month later than I should have, I re calibrated my flow to 47gph just shy of the 50gph recommended for 500ml of media. Thanks for looking out for me, I was acting like a retard again. Will keep this thread updated with pics and vids soon, tank still looks ugly. Im reading through the zeovit guide to make sure I don't do anything stupid again.

 

Also dosed 6 drops of zeobak since I changed out media.