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Adding 6mL of nitrate by hand in addition to the doser to get nitrates above 5. Then I’ll adjust the doser to maintain that. Lots easier than dealing with food and stuffs. 
 

I also ordered everything I need to culture phyto. Thinking about doing 2 1G cultures. Should be a fun little project to maintain. 

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11 hours ago, ninjamyst said:

Wow didn't know you got a new tank!  We are IM buddies now.  How you liking the INT overflow??

Hate it tbh. 
i don’t like the return in the middle. Made plumbing suck. I ended up plugging one drain and running a herbie style. 
i don’t like the coast to coast overflow wall either. 1 cause it’s not flat, 2 because I can’t put anything on the back wall (power heads, frag racks, etc), and 3 because it steals valuable front to back depth in the tank. 
 

Sigh. 
 

i actually ordered the ext but was sent an int. 

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6 hours ago, TheKleinReef said:

Hate it tbh. 
i don’t like the return in the middle. Made plumbing suck. I ended up plugging one drain and running a herbie style. 
i don’t like the coast to coast overflow wall either. 1 cause it’s not flat, 2 because I can’t put anything on the back wall (power heads, frag racks, etc), and 3 because it steals valuable front to back depth in the tank. 
 

Sigh. 
 

i actually ordered the ext but was sent an int. 

I also regret getting the INT but the INT fits better for my space.  I actually tried to switch to EXT but the IM rep convinced me at the time the INT is better.   I do plan to mount my maxpect gyre on the overflow though along with frag racks...

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4 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

I also regret getting the INT but the INT fits better for my space.  I actually tried to switch to EXT but the IM rep convinced me at the time the INT is better.   I do plan to mount my maxpect gyre on the overflow though along with frag racks...

the only positives are the coast to coast and you can put it closer to the wall. 

In my case though, the latter isn't a  positive since I would need space behind to mount the RMS mounts and voretchs anyways. 

5 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

maxpect gyre on the overflow though along with frag racks...

going to submerge magnets? thought about this for racks, but haven't done it yet. 

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4 hours ago, TheKleinReef said:

the only positives are the coast to coast

The rep said for my peninsula, coast to coast is much better because more area for water to flow into the sump.  But I am worried about detritus being trapped in the large overflow.  I guess I will have to clean it every once in a while.  I also hate how it takes up even more room than a normal internal overflow....

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2 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

The rep said for my peninsula, coast to coast is much better because more area for water to flow into the sump.  But I am worried about detritus being trapped in the large overflow.  I guess I will have to clean it every once in a while.  I also hate how it takes up even more room than a normal internal overflow....

Yeah the INT design is not good at all, unfortunately. 
rep swayed you cause he didn’t wanna change the order lolllll

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Debating on switching to a kalk reactor. Mainly for the pH benefit. 
 

a lot of setups I’ve seen use continuous duty dosing pumps. Do they need to be continuous? Or will a head on my GHL doser be okay?

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Phyto professionals. 
is this okay? I started this culture last Wednesday  with phyto I’m not sure was alive but it’s all I had. I have since ordered more. 
 

1g at 1.019 

Started with 16oz of culture.  3mL of f2 fertilizer. 
this is 5 days out. Is this what it’s supposed to look like? Like I said. Not sure if the culture I had was alive. 

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Lots of quick shots cause my tripod is at work. 

Still need a feb FTS. 

 

General Observations & Updates:

1. Color is improving, it's slow, but it's happening. The Kat is no longer brown, but it's very pale. I may tinker around with lighting intensity to see. 

2. I'm dosing 5mL of Nitrate which seems to really be helping, might need to test and adjust. 

3. This tank hates when I miss a WC. Waiting a week killed one of my CC SPS and stressed another out bad. 

4. I may consider switching to kalk as my primary additive, but I'm worried about trace elements. 

 

Testing:

Ca: 440

Alk: 9.2 (sigh)

mg: 1350

PO4: .5

Nitrate: 1

SG: 1.025

Temp: 78.8

pH: 7.89-8.12

 

 

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1 hour ago, DevilDuck said:

Looking great! If you're doing frequent water changes, that should replenish your trace elements. 

Yeah that’s what I’m worried about. This tank does well with 2 WCs a month but I don’t want to do any more than that. Hence the hesitation to commit to kalk. 

51 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

I plan to do as little water change as possible...what do you think the water change is doing to help the tank?  If you are dosing already, that should replenish the necessary minerals right?

I’m honestly not sure. But the last 2 times I did it a week late I lost SPS. I’m thinking it was trace elements but I could be wrong?

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Something really ticked off the montis. The digi died over night. The setosa skin is super thin, and the spongodes is not looking to great. 
 

le sigh. 😕

alk is higher than I’d like at 8.9 but the doser is off right now to let it fall down. 
nitrate is 18

phosphate is still low at .01

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Just happened overnight and other corals are fine??  No changes to the tank?  That's so weird....monti are pretty hardy.  I never seen them die overnight.  I had a frag of sunset montipora upside down behind my rocks for months and it turned brown but not dead.

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1 hour ago, ninjamyst said:

Just happened overnight and other corals are fine??  No changes to the tank?  That's so weird....monti are pretty hardy.  I never seen them die overnight.  I had a frag of sunset montipora upside down behind my rocks for months and it turned brown but not dead.

It's very unusual. The acros all look fine. even the finicky ones like the red dragon, needle in a haystack, and oregon tort. Even the strawberry lemonade is taking off....

 

The digi for sure didn't look too happy last night, super pale and retracted polyps. This morning it was bone white. 

The only change I've made in the last 5 days was turning the doser off (because the alk was climbing more than I liked), and turning the radions down from 35 to 25%.

 

Changes in the past month was adding nitrate daily, but everything started too look really good after that.

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1 hour ago, TheKleinReef said:

and turning the radions down from 35 to 25%

unless you have some sort of PAR number you're targeting, I think this is super low, and might be why you have a tough time coloring up acros...

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1 hour ago, ninjamyst said:

You run radion at 35%??  I run mine at 80%.  LoL.  I am surprised I having burned all my corals....

 

34 minutes ago, mitten_reef said:

unless you have some sort of PAR number you're targeting, I think this is super low, and might be why you have a tough time coloring up acros...


it’s significantly worse at higher percentages. Started at 50. But both the sps and lps looked god awful I think this 25-35 balance is pretty good. 
Color is def improving. Just 2 pale guys left. 
 

i do think this tank is quite sensitive compared to my others. But aside from this monti thing it’s been doing quite well. Sigh 

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I’m jumping off the all for reef train too. I haven’t dosed it in like 5 days and my alk still hasn’t dropped. 
 

Looked back at my dosing log. I’ve been dosing 10mL per day since October and have been hovering between 8.2 and 8.6. Then something happened and it jumped to 9. Doser has been off since Friday afternoon.  So the calcium formate is still breaking down into alk. Not a fan of this right now. 
 

UGH. 

 

luckily the only thing that I lost was the digi. 
the stressed corals are the other two montis, a mystery acro my friend gave me, and the slimer. I just don’t want that group to get bigger. 

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alk is 8.5 today. finally it dropped. took 6 days.

I can't let it go over 8.5 again. I think it's just too high for how low my phosphate is.

 

Things don't look that good. Might have to go in and frag some tips to avoid some from full receeding.

Slimer is getting very mad, lost a few  acros and the digi. It's kind of interesting its all of the oldest corals that look the worst. The new ones look fine, good color and PE.

19 hours ago, ninjamyst said:

I was gonna jump on the All for Reef train...I am dosing ATI now.  Hope things turn around for you soon!  

 

Let me know how you like it. I'm seriously considering a switch. Was thinking kalk or red sea.

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2 hours ago, pokerdobe said:

ESV 2 part has been really solid for me. 

 

RE: levels - maybe I missed it, but isn't your PO4 .4? That's a relatively high PO4 in comparison to your NO3 which was 1?

Mighta been older values. I update this thread late/delayed sometimes. I did just test on Monday.  0.01 phosphate  and 18.8 nitrate. 
 

alk today is 8.5 

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  • TheKleinReef changed the title to Roger's SPS 75G - NEW FTS PG 36

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