Calcium Reactor Media- What tha HECK happened?

[Reefahholic]

What were you using and what are you using now. What have you tried? What was the difference? How did your corals respond?

Is it dissolving? Did you increase the drip rate? Did you have to increase your gas? pH more depressed now?

Did TLF loose their collecting spot or what? Was it COVID?

Will we ever have quality media again?!?

 

[kenchilada]

Setting up my reactor soon and was just looking into this. I am confused as well.

 

[jessezm]

I called them at one point because the large Reborn I received after it was on back order forever was small, and grey/greenish. They changed their supplier was what I was told, and also was told the media was perfectly fine to use. After using seachem's CaRx media to tide me over (which was absolute trash, btw), I went ahead and risked the new stuff from TLF. Give it a good rinse. But it's been fine for me since switching back, even if I'm a bit uneasy about it not being as "clean" looking as before...

Just my experience.

 

[Reefahholic]

I called them at one point because the large Reborn I received after it was on back order forever was small, and grey/greenish. They changed their supplier was what I was told, and also was told the media was perfectly fine to use. After using seachem's CaRx media to tide me over (which was absolute trash, btw), I went ahead and risked the new stuff from TLF. Give it a good rinse. But it's been fine for me since switching back, even if I'm a bit uneasy about it not being as "clean" looking as before...

Just my experience.

The old media was amazing, but it seems like it would work the same other the all the small shells and the actual size of the media. With it being smaller has it affected the melting point at all?

 

[Reefahholic]

Setting up my reactor soon and was just looking into this. I am confused as well.

I just talked to a guy using ARM media and he said he hasn't had any problems.

 

[jessezm]

The old media was amazing, but it seems like it would work the same other the all the small shells and the actual size of the media. With it being smaller has it affected the melting point at all?

Hard to say - it was just one batch and the last batch I got was back to normal size. I will say, however, that I keep my pH higher in general with this media than with others. Over time I turn up the CO2 if I'm too lazy to top off the reactor, and if I forget to do it for a while and then add a bunch of media, my alk shoots up and I have to dial the CO2 way back again. But that's all a function of how much media/surface area is actually in the chamber. It will look half-full but if you open it up and press it down, it dissolves into mostly dust...

 

[Reefahholic]

Maybe I can get PM @therman and see if he'll sell me two bags of the old TLF. He has a stash of 117 bags left! haha.

therman...I'd love to hear your thoughts on what media's would be a good options. I sure hate to see TLF changing suppliers when the old media was so perfect. I obviously don't think this was a voluntary decision for Julian. He most likely had issues getting the old media or maybe COVID affected the deliveries.

 

[Reefahholic]

Hard to say - it was just one batch and the last batch I got was back to normal size. I will say, however, that I keep my pH higher in general with this media than with others. Over time I turn up the CO2 if I'm too lazy to top off the reactor, and if I forget to do it for a while and then add a bunch of media, my alk shoots up and I have to dial the CO2 way back again. But that's all a function of how much media/surface area is actually in the chamber. It will look half-full but if you open it up and press it down, it dissolves into mostly dust...

That is what worries me about running other media's. Take Triton for example. The melting point is a lot lower than what TLF is which requires more gas and depresses my pH even further. It was already too depressed with TLF in my one bedroom apartment. If my CO2 scrubber wasn't on...the pH got down to 6.4 and was still dropping before I cut it back on. Who knows how low it would have got.

 

[stephj03]

I tried the newer, lesser reborn after sifting through for larger pieces.

Then did the same with middle keys.

But I have better things to do than that. Switched to crushed coral while I wait on a potential source for coarse coral gravel.

 

[stephj03]

FWIW they sell what looks like the old reborn on Alibaba direct from the Philippines, but you have to order at least 100lb.

 

[Reefahholic]

Would be nice to hear a more detailed story on what happened to Julian's supplier. I know somebody knows the full story.

 

[Greg Hiller]

> Alibaba direct from the Philippines, but you have to order at least 100lb.<

Interested in hearing about this. If you order, will it really show up? Also, what terms do you search on? I poked around there but only found "Philippine sand" at about 3-4 mm in size. I'd have no problem with 100 lb order.

 

[ca1ore]

I've been using the 'new' reborn for a number of months now. Seems to be fine. Media size does not affect the melting point but there's more surface area to melt so I had to reduce the effluent rate slightly (though I kept the same target pH). I did find some coral rubble boxes on amazon from Middle Keys. Has a fair amount of shells, but the coral pieces are just like the old reborn.

 

[rlman41299]

I called them at one point because the large Reborn I received after it was on back order forever was small, and grey/greenish. They changed their supplier was what I was told, and also was told the media was perfectly fine to use. After using seachem's CaRx media to tide me over (which was absolute trash, btw), I went ahead and risked the new stuff from TLF. Give it a good rinse. But it's been fine for me since switching back, even if I'm a bit uneasy about it not being as "clean" looking as before...

Just my experience.

Hi there, What was it that you did not like with the seachem reef reactor media? I am currently using it since I can't get a hold of any TLf reborn anywhere.

 

[therman]

I’ve been using the new reborn ever since it started showing up. Unfortunately I do not have a bunch of the old stuff, just one partial box. So far I haven’t noticed any substantial difference in performance with the new smaller media compared to the old. It is vastly superior to switching to Seachem, Brightwell, or ARM, all of which i tried and all are completely different and have a much lower point at which they start dissolving. I also added a kalk reactor, which will probably reduce my media usage somewhat and stretch out my stockpile of the new Reborn. (and it helps boost pH)

@jessezm you got some coarse Reborn like the old stuff recently? I’ve ordered 3 times and keep getting small stuff.

 

[coralbeauties]

I can tell a big difference between arm and the new small reborn media. In my reactor I have it 3/4 filled with arm and topped off with the small reborn media. when the reborn runs out and the reactor is using mostly arm, without changing anything my alk will start dropping quite a bit, requiring more co2 to melt it. I would love to toss the arm if I had a good media to replace it with.
Jeff

 

[jessezm]

Hi there, What was it that you did not like with the seachem reef reactor media? I am currently using it since I can't get a hold of any TLf reborn anywhere.

Terrible porosity - it was just like big chunks of white rock. And I couldn't get it to dissolve no matter how low I set my reactor pH it seemed. This also corresponded with a rough patch in my tank, but not sure if there was any connection.

I’ve been using the new reborn ever since it started showing up. Unfortunately I do not have a bunch of the old stuff, just one partial box. So far I haven’t noticed any substantial difference in performance with the new smaller media compared to the old. It is vastly superior to switching to Seachem, Brightwell, or ARM, all of which i tried and all are completely different and have a much lower point at which they start dissolving. I also added a kalk reactor, which will probably reduce my media usage somewhat and stretch out my stockpile of the new Reborn. (and it helps boost pH)

@jessezm you got some coarse Reborn like the old stuff recently? I’ve ordered 3 times and keep getting small stuff.

@therman I found the coarse stuff at one of my LFS's. I did order some as well - it said "coarse" but it definitely wasn't... Works fine, though I prefer the coarse like you. The store bought stuff seems like it has dried blue/green algae on it. The stuff I ordered was kinda grey... I feel like I'm playing russian roulette with this stuff but so far no issues and the tank is happy.

 

[rossco]

I am still using #15 coral gravel, just picked up a 40 pound bag today. My LFS got about 10 bags in a few weeks ago. $2 a pound which is almost twice what it was last time. Still a way better value than anything else out there especially since there is no shipping. I dropped a quarter in there for scale.

 

[kenchilada]

I am still using #15 coral gravel, just picked up a 40 pound bag today. My LFS got about 10 bags in a few weeks ago. $2 a pound which is almost twice what it was last time. Still a way better value than anything else out there especially since there is no shipping. I dropped a quarter in there for scale.

Whats those bags look like? Haven’t found anything like that here. This looks like the stuff I used 20 years ago that always did the trick.

 

[rossco]

Bags are white nylon. Just has a “#15” written on it with a marker. Flipped inside- out, re-purposed most likely. Has writing that I don’t understand, I’m assuming from somewhere in the pacific. I’ve seen it come in re-purposed rice bags in the past.