28 Gal LPS & Softy tank crashing

[schooncw]

Was planning to post an update soon once I had more of a definitive answer, but this is where I'm at now:

I'm still working through the issue, but in terms of dying, things seem to have slowed down, but not completely halted. I've been working with my LFS and we think the culprit may have been unmixed salt.
I used to buy bags of Salt, but a few months back (maybe 2-3 months before the issues started) I switched to a bucket because it was more cost effective. Unfortunately I didn't know that you should be thoroughly mixing/rolling the bucket before use.

The ICP test I sent out confirmed my LFS's suspicions that the trace elements in the tank had likely been exhausted. I've now been thoroughly mixing my salt, and just finished 3 weeks of doing 50% water changes to see if there is any improvement with the corals (Its hard to say, but I think there has been).

I sent out another ICP yesterday to see if the trace elements have improved. I will update when the new ICP test results are in. Sounds like even if my trace elements have improved I may need to be dosing at least a two part solution to make sure my corals are extra happy (and prevent this from happening again)

Upon completing these water changes my LFS was nice enough to gift me an Acan frag to add to the tank as a Guinea pig to see how it reacts to my tank while we wait for ICP results. Its been in my tank for 2-3 days so far and it seems to be getting very puffy, so fingers crossed the major issue is solved and I can start focusing on the other improvements to the tank, many of which have been mentioned by other users in this thread (thank you all again!)

Here's a pick of the frag!

What brand/kind of salt were you using? I sincerely doubt the "not-rolling" of the bucket of salt was your problem. Now, you may have been using sub-standard salt but even so, I doubt that was the problem. As an FYI, I was a distributer/mfg sales rep in the business, selling to LFS's and sold many different marine salts.

 

[schooncw]

What brand/kind of salt were you using? I sincerely doubt the "not-rolling" of the bucket of salt was your problem. Now, you may have been using sub-standard salt but even so, I doubt that was the problem. As an FYI, I was a distributer/mfg sales rep in the business for many years, selling to LFS's and sold many different marine salts. Again, my guess is that your salinity was off and for sure, your lighting is inadequate. Edit: From what you have said, I'm not sure your LFS is giving solid advice. Did he/she mention salinity?-they are prob the one that sold you your hydrometer in the first place. Are they the ones that also sold you your light?

 

[chunkeylover59]

What brand/kind of salt were you using? I sincerely doubt the "not-rolling" of the bucket of salt was your problem. Now, you may have been using sub-standard salt but even so, I doubt that was the problem. As an FYI, I was a distributer/mfg sales rep in the business, selling to LFS's and sold many different marine salts.

I've been using Reef Crystals, which I'm told does tend to have lower trace elements. My LFS did say we may need to switch to a different salt if the ICP still comes back with low traces, but I think this is supposed to be a step in trying to identify where the issue is so that we can fix it at the source (e.g. get a new salt) rather than throw out bandaid solutions?

While I won't know about whether or not my trace elements have improved until I get my ICP back, I can say that my Mag and Calc have both increased since mixing the bucket and doing the water changes. I was dosing mage before because it was always quite low without it(~1100), but now it seems to be steady between 1400-1420

 

[JonoH]

I have never heard of mixing the buckets of salt by rolling them.

How often were you doing water changes?

 

[chunkeylover59]

Hahaha no they didn't sell me the hydrometer or the light. They did mention that my salinity was low and that I need to bring it up, as well as suggesting I get a refractometer to replace the hydrometer.

I don't doubt that there are many things contributing to the issues with my tank, lights included. I'm at a point where I think I've accepted the situation, and that it won't be a quick fix. Once the water chemistry is where it should be, I'll have to go from there I guess.

 

[chunkeylover59]

I have never heard of mixing the buckets of salt by rolling them.

How often were you doing water changes?

Well, to be fair I'm not just rolling it, I'm scooping from the bottom and churning it as best I can now in addition to giving it a roll.

I was doing 10% water changes weekly. Which im back to doing now that the 3 weeks of 50% water changes are complete

 

[schooncw]

I've been using Reef Crystals, which I'm told does tend to have lower trace elements. My LFS did say we may need to switch to a different salt if the ICP still comes back with low traces, but I think this is supposed to be a step in trying to identify where the issue is so that we can fix it at the source (e.g. get a new salt) rather than throw out bandaid solutions?

While I won't know about whether or not my trace elements have improved until I get my ICP back, I can say that my Mag and Calc have both increased since mixing the bucket and doing the water changes. I was dosing mage before because it was always quite low without it(~1100), but now it seems to be steady between 1400-1420

Reef Crystals is excellent salt. I think you need a new LFS.

 

[gkprevite]

Your water chemistry is close enough for that not to be your problem now that you’ve raised your salinity a bit. A refractometer costs about as much as a frag. Get one. You need to improve your flow and light. Only then will things improve

 

[chunkeylover59]

Hello everyone,

Its been a few months and I wanted to give an update on the situation.

After many tests, tweaks and inspections, I'm cautiously optimistic that the tank crash is over. It seems that there wasn't a single cause for the crash, but a few which I will outline below.

TL;DR: Seems like crash may have been caused by a perfect storm of improper mixing of salt bucket, salt bucket contamination, bottoming out Trace elements, A rusty component slowly dripping heavy metals into the tank, Low lighting, and maybe a faulty heater (unlikely, but someone had suggested it could have been giving off stray voltage)

The salt.
As mentioned previously we had been using Reef Crystals without issue until we switched over to the bucket format. There were two issues that came from this.
1. Due to my own lack of knowledge and research into salt buckets I was unaware that the salt needed to be mixed before using it to create fresh salt water. It seems this caused some imbalances in the desired levels of things like Calcium and Magnesium, with a similar issue happening to trace elements (potentially).
We had actually purchased 2 buckets, and due to many people being adamant that RC is solid we decided to open the second and try using that one with proper mixing before trying some new salt brands.
Sadly, even after a few 50% water changes with the new bucket, we did not notice any improvement. This leads me into point #2 regarding the Salt.
2. We decided to send out a control ICP test of just the freshly mixed RC water to see if there were any issues with the salt. It seems like we may have gotten a contaminated batch of salt, as there were many elements that were very high (such as Iron, Manganese, Barium, Bromine, and Iodine), and many trace elements that were non existent. We did not, and currently do not dose any trace elements, but it is something we are going to start doing once we are sure the tank is stable otherwise.

Since then we have been testing out Aquaforest Reef salt +, and things do seem to be improving. I'm sure RC is still a good brand of salt for many, but we chose to try a new salt after testing the new bucket due to the trace element imbalances we were seeing for our tank.

Rust
We also did a once over of the tank to see if there was anything that could be adding in heavy metals or other contaminants as @JerryB1232 suggested, and we found that a small area on the metal leg of the light was rusting. This was near one of the only splash zones and when I fully turned the light over to inspect, it looked like there was just enough water that the rust would run onto the light fixture and drip into the tank every so often.
To solve this I removed the metal legs, cleaned up the light, and 3D printed some new fixtures to support the light. We also added polyfilter to our HoB filter to help absorb the heavy metals in the water.

NOTE: the rust was discovered and addressed before we tried the second bucket of RC.

Heater
The discovery of the rust encouraged us to take another, closer look at all of our equipment. Our heater is quite old (came with our current tank years ago which is second hand). I pulled out the heater for no more than 5-10 seconds to double check that everything seemed good, and the moment the tip touched the water as I put it back the water began to boil and the glass housing cracked.
Now, I've learned my lesson and will always be unplugging the heater if it needs to be removed from the minimum water level regardless of how quick it will be. That said, while there could have been nothing wrong with the heater and 100% user error, I'm glad it failed while I was handling it and not some other point when I wouldn't have noticed. We've since upgraded to a titanium heater and an ink Bird controller.

LIGHT
I also turned my lights up much brighter than I had previously (I had them low thinking maybe I had the settings too bright). After doing this I did notice some more polyp extension on my corals, notably my monticap.
Things seem to be doing ok with this light, but we are looking into other lights as some users have suggested that the current lights may be too underpowered for this tank. Definitely open to suggestions on lights if anyone has them!



Now that is had been a few months, we added a few hardy corals to the tank (to test the waters so to speak lol), and see if they thrive or not. So far things seem good, with all the corals opening up and looking happy.
Assuming all continues improving, we are happy this tank crash is behind us, thankful for the lessons we've learned, and excited to start reefing again.

Thank you to everyone who took the time to lend their advice and expertise, it was/is greatly appreciated.
To anyone reviewing this thread in the future hoping to find answers for their own tanks, I hope some of the information discussed will help solve your issue. Im also happy to give more information to anyone who would like it.