tank crashing......

[Troylee]

Well I'm sure my magnet cleaner white shark is rare earth neo magnets because it is the toughest thing you can imagine it literally pulled my keys out of my pocket one time when I had it in my hand... Mike has the same one you saw his kid hanging from it there strong!!!! It does stay in my tank and could very well be the
Problem... I will check that first thing when I get home... But why the tips would crumble on my Millie as the first sign??? That's relates to alk IMHO and 10 is not to High but I guess with pellets... I guess I can't go any farther untill I rule out stray voltage and the mag cleaner when I get home....

 

[gqjeff]

I have personally experienced 2 crashes. 1 by nature and another by me when the ca rx stopped. That's why I have went away from the ca rx and with the balling lite method params have never been so stable in my tanks. The ghl dosing pump makes tweaking so convenient not sure how I ever did it without it.

 

[gqjeff]

Troy, I have had a tiger shark mag in my tank for 7 years.... Unless the plastic case is broken not sure how these could rust.

 

[Troylee]

Ya I feel ya I have never ran a ca rx and never will to many stories like yours... I have the full blown bubble Magnus set up just haven't got it out of the box yet... 6 months have went by lol... Still dosing by hand daily...

 

[gqjeff]

Get that sucker hooked up. You will he ****** at yourself for wasting a half year when you do lol....

 

[barbianj]

Through all of these posts, I'm still wondering how the pellets affected the Alk. Or was it the other way around, the corals stopped growth, causing the alk to rise?

 

[Troylee]

that i don't know.... i mean it didn't just jump and it only rose from 8 to 10 so im not sure exactly.... i mean maybe my dosing was off a hair but the slight increase was over time like a few weeks so it shouldn't have been to detrimental.....my system was and is far from being a ulns although test kits say it is.....i mean everything looks awesome why change it right???? i could have bumped up the pellets or reduced feedings etc but i have noticed my tank is happy with a little po4 and n03.... arrr.... let me test the current and check the magnet before i beat myself up any more on this....i will be home in a half hours or so..

 

[Troylee]

Voltage is a negative mag float negative... Checked for signs of rust on pumps that's a no also... pellets gotta be!!!

 

[Speg]

Are all the powerheads working properly and cleaned up? Nowhere in the tank where crap is collecting? Sucks man.

 

[Troylee]

i only have 2 mp60s there purring like kittens..... nope i have no dead spots really besides in the sump but i clean it regularly....

 

[Speg]

i only have 2 mp60s there purring like kittens..... nope i have no dead spots really besides in the sump but i clean it regularly....

ok good...at least you do...mine is crazy dirty lol

 

[lurchw00t]

Sorry to hear about this. I am currently experience a similar crash. Taken out a good chunk of my SPS/LPS thank god my zoas are unafffected.

 

[Jcr's Reef]

Don't take this the wrong way, and this goes to everyone in this forum. People really need to read up and understand the chemistry before they get into something like pellets, vodka dosing or any dosing for that matter. You should not put something in your tank or try something solely because someone else is doing it(not saying you are). The pellets are nothing more than a carbon source for the bacteria to feed on and therefore multiply. With vodka dosing, which is also a carbon source, the bacteria multiply in the display tank. There was some talk in the past about the bacteria colonizing in the DT being a bad thing. The reactor setup with pellets keeps most of the bacteria in the reactor sump area. The bacteria feed on the pellets along with the excess nutrient and also colonize on the pellets in the reactor. When the bacteria leave the reactor, they are then skimmed out via your protein skimmer also removing the excess nutrients. This is also the reason most people run the output of the reactor right next to the skimmer pump. For me I run my output next to the return pump. I have always been of the opinion that the bacteria in the DT is a good thing and I never had any issues while dosing vodka plus the mulm off of the pellets is good food for the coral. I run a nice size skimmer on my system and have always ran one a tad bigger than needed. I chose Warner Ecobak simply because of the name and reputation and have not been sorry. I have not tried any other pellets. Honestly is you are doing water changes, run gfo and your parameters are spot on, then I don't see the need for these. I went the vodka route and now the pellet route because I don't do water changes and I feed heavily but can still maintain zero nitrates and phosphates in the .03-.05 range and I also have not run gfo in over a year and a half.

No Worries Paul. I did my research but tend to take vendors words with a grain of salt. Vendors push one way and hobbyist tend to be cut down the middle on various issues. There's probably no right answer. It works well for some, and not so well for others...

I've ran both (Vodka & Pellets) and have since stopped using both for now bc the tank is ready to be taken down to move. I honestly liked vodka over the pellets bc I could dose Vodka as needed manually vs. pellets are always consuming the nutrients in my tank. Running a mixed reef, I don't want my tank being in the ULN state where other coral tends to suffer. I vodka dosed for almost 2yrs and never experienced any negative affects from it, not even cyano blooms. Within my 4th week of running pellets, and only running 50ml of the suggested 500mL, I started seeing cyano within my display tank. That was enough for me to pull them off bc I didnt want to deal with that or any other problems I read about them. Before pulling them off though, I thought about running the reactor on a timer so it's not constantly running, but figured the "stale" state without flow would tend to be on the negative side of things. I would say the anaerobic state would take over here and just cause a "crash lol" within the reactor.

I also never ran the output next to the skimmer as I felt the same way you do. I ran the pellets on a 40g long tank filled with liverock and sand (refugium), then the output of that tank drained into my pump return area feeding the main display tank before being skimmed out. Could be the reason I experienced cyano but who's to say really. I've read where people running the output to the skimmer have had the same experience.

Hope your tank pull through Troylee. You have some beautiful pieces in there! Isn't your new tank about done being built?

 

[Troylee]

Yeah it's in the works I got a few other jobs I have to finish before I can play with mine... my output was placed at the skimmer not that it matters really... Good news is no loss today and no pellets!!! I know it would take more than 24hrs to do it's thing after pulling the plug but there's hope!!!!my shortcake was dying yesterday and that put me into panic mode!!!! I clipped the decaying part and the rest looks good today....yeah!!!!!!

 

[Troylee]

But were you doing water changes prior when you were dosing all of them?

Just curious, does Sonny do water changes?

Just for you ms.cupcake... Ahahahahahah
No i didn't change water before I believe in stability promotes succses!!!!sps!!!!
Nothing is better than never disturbing the balance in my tank I replace elements daily with my dosing and it works... It works great!!! I never had luck changing 20gal a week it was always problems getting everything to balance etc.. I got lazy one time and didn't chane it for over a month and my polyps started extending Nf my colors and growth increased greatly so I sopped and my tAnk started thriving so I left it at that... never been a problem my skimmer can't handle...
As for sunny I don't know I'm sure he does changes his I just like breaking rules!!!!!!! Rules were meant to be broken right???

 

[turbo21]

Troy,

I since the magnet is good, i owuld have to agree with the pellets. There are 2 many threads out there with people having the same problem. There has to be something with the pellets are doing with the chemistry that we cant test for

bob

 

[Troylee]

well i checked this morning and the coast was clear!!!!! 2 days no pellets 2 days no losses!!!! yeah..... maybe it's just a quinkydink but im not gonna put them back on to find out!!!!!

 

[turbo21]

Great to hear, hopefully it stays this way. down with pellets:xd:

bob

 

[Troylee]

3 days no pellets 3 days no losses....1smile1

 

[Tabasco1]

Man! Sorry to hear and hopefully the issue is the pellets and you will have no more issues. What a bummer. Seems like there have been a couple tanks to crash on here lately. oh: Makes me nervous to get all set up.