Phosphate help — GFO and phosguard making no difference?

[JDWolverine]

My waterbox 35.2 AIO was stable for a while at phosphate .12.

I then had a moderate cyano outbreak that was hanging on. I removed 95% manually, repeatedly, but it wasn’t enough so I used chemiclean to kick the last vestiges.

A week later my phosphates were .51. I don’t think I have room for a reactor so I used hc GFO in a media bag under one of my filter socks. Phosphate got even higher. I thought maybe I didn’t change the bag quickly enough and tried a fresh bag, no change at all.

I added phosguard instead and four days later I was at .08. It says in the instructions to change the bag if you’re not at .02 so I did, I’m happy with .08 but didnt want it creeping up again. 4 days into the new bag I was back up at .22. Changed the bag again and now I’m at .25 two days in, I don’t anticipate it will drop.

i don’t have lots of algae dying off. Just a teeny bit of hair algae that came with the first spike that my CUC is taking care of. Bioload is low. Feeding isnt excessive and possibly isnt enough. My best guess is the GFO/phosguard isnt getting enough flow in the media bag? But my chambers are all full so I don’t know how to make a reactor work. What can I do?

 

[mehaffydr]

The GFO must have flow to work. If water doesn't pass through then Phosphate can't be trapped.
What are you using to test with?

 

[JDWolverine]

The GFO must have flow to work. If water doesn't pass through then Phosphate can't be trapped.
What are you using to test with?

Hanna checker

 

[Spieg]

Try Lantanum Chloride. It works very well to reduce PO4.

 

[JNalley]

My waterbox 35.2 AIO was stable for a while at phosphate .12.

I then had a moderate cyano outbreak that was hanging on. I removed 95% manually, repeatedly, but it wasn’t enough so I used chemiclean to kick the last vestiges.

A week later my phosphates were .51. I don’t think I have room for a reactor so I used hc GFO in a media bag under one of my filter socks. Phosphate got even higher. I thought maybe I didn’t change the bag quickly enough and tried a fresh bag, no change at all.

I added phosguard instead and four days later I was at .08. It says in the instructions to change the bag if you’re not at .02 so I did, I’m happy with .08 but didnt want it creeping up again. 4 days into the new bag I was back up at .22. Changed the bag again and now I’m at .25 two days in, I don’t anticipate it will drop.

i don’t have lots of algae dying off. Just a teeny bit of hair algae that came with the first spike that my CUC is taking care of. Bioload is low. Feeding isnt excessive and possibly isnt enough. My best guess is the GFO/phosguard isnt getting enough flow in the media bag? But my chambers are all full so I don’t know how to make a reactor work. What can I do?

can you not run an in tank or a HOB reactor to get the phosphates down? Something like this:

 

[sdreef]

Hanna checker

You may already be doing this, but I would suggest to make sure you perform the test the same time of day. I believe its best in the morning prior to any feeding as many foods contain phosphates that can affect your readings.

 

[JDWolverine]

can you not run an in tank or a HOB reactor to get the phosphates down? Something like this:

This reactor looks pretty cool, but if I’m understanding right it still needs to drop into one of the compartments? Mine are full. If there was something exterior that I just needed to stick tubes into the chambers I could probably macgyver that but no open chambers so I’m not sure if there’s a way to do it.

 

[aggrofish]

I’m curios why its so high. Maybe you can jerryrig a HOB refugium? Do you have media baskets? You should be able to run some xport po4 biomedia

 

[JNalley]

This reactor looks pretty cool, but if I’m understanding right it still needs to drop into one of the compartments? Mine are full. If there was something exterior that I just needed to stick tubes into the chambers I could probably macgyver that but no open chambers so I’m not sure if there’s a way to do it.

Well, you can drop it in the display temporarily to get your phosphates under control (Unnecessary to run it long term). They also make HOB ones if you don't want it in your display temporarily. I just posted that one because it's small and will do the job on a temp basis, and it's really cheap.

Here's an example of a HOB Reactor:

 

[JDWolverine]

I’m curios why its so high. Maybe you can jerryrig a HOB refugium? Do you have media baskets? You should be able to run some xport po4 biomedia

I’m curious as well. All I can think is maybe the cyano spiked it when it died? Due to the timing. If my rocks were leeching or something it doesn’t seem like it would wait months to become a problem. My nitrates are very low, I’ve had to slow down on the water changes to keep them from going undetectable. It’s just phosphates. I don’t have media baskets. I have filter socks with bio balls and gems or something or other under them, uv with sponges, and skimmer. I’ve been trying to just add media bags with gfo or phosguard under the socks too but I suspect they must not be getting enough flow to be effective because out of like a half dozen bags only one has made a difference. And I can’t do anything that will lower nitrates too without bottoming them out.

 

[Pistondog]

Try putting the media bags with gfo in the filter sox, or in the middle chamber. I think the gfo below the sox is not enough flow..

 

[aggrofish]

I’m curious as well. All I can think is maybe the cyano spiked it when it died? Due to the timing. If my rocks were leeching or something it doesn’t seem like it would wait months to become a problem. My nitrates are very low, I’ve had to slow down on the water changes to keep them from going undetectable. It’s just phosphates. I don’t have media baskets. I have filter socks with bio balls and gems or something or other under them, uv with sponges, and skimmer. I’ve been trying to just add media bags with gfo or phosguard under the socks too but I suspect they must not be getting enough flow to be effective because out of like a half dozen bags only one has made a difference. And I can’t do anything that will lower nitrates too without bottoming them out.

As the other poster suggested - put the GFO in a bad in the sock. I did that with carbon and GFO until I picked up a couple InTank media baskets for a JBJ45 I had. I would pick up some neonitro, it’s cheap, and just do a bunch of water changes every few days to bring it down. If the nitrates get too low, just dose. I have to dose po4 and no3 ever since I removed a couple fish. Heres the basket that might be worth the price:

 

[brandon429]

This is a formula for dinos here, and coral bleaching helpful warning / prediction

in a tank this size you have a way to make it run perfectly not ever testing for phosphates and if this continues I rate your chance of having never ending trade off invasions between gha, cyano and soon to be dinos as nearly certain. Post a full tank picture of the tank if you want to get it fixed by cleaning the tank-if not thats no problem hardly anyone will cease testing and response once they begin away from simple manual controls in small tanks.

the good thing is since this is a nano if the current course wrecks it with dinos we can still fix it up manually right before you want to quit, that’s about the point most will consider taking manual control over the tank they’ll hardly ever do it preventatively it’s only considered as a last resort after lots of corals lost, replaced and months spent not enjoying the tank. You have a way to be invasion free, with dense coral growth, never testing for po4 not one time in the entire history of this tank if you want off this headache mode.

post pics if you want to consider a much much better way for nanos

 

[brandon429]

for example

in the tank pics we get an idea of white rock base % vs coralline rock base % and your overall lighting level. nearly everyone with a new nano runs lights at 110% power but the system runs ten times better and more stable at about 80% total power from the current setting, this is the vast majority of new setups. we are trained to lessen feed input based on algae challenges, vs increase it to provide better coral growth, while all along running intensities entirely too high for the withheld feed mode and constant stripping of nutrients corals need.

pics also show other ratios unspoken such as bioloading % and sandbed details in the cross sectioning we can see in the pic. more details past these as well, those are the big ones.

 

[brandon429]

just read this tank might be a 120+ gallons, I thought it was 32 gallons my bad. nothing changes in the assessment above it just means manual control is almost certain to not be chosen due to inaccessible size, that's rough / nano's have it easy I guess but the big tanks get all the good cool fish for sure.

if your checker isn't the ulr version Im reading right now a thread in the chemistry forum where dosing may be in response to bad readings, over stripping of po4 is certainly possible...the point is 100% of testers feel they're responding to accurate readings and I think per the chemistry forum/collective results from posters in any phosphate thread/ that number is more likely 10%...10% of testers for phosphate are responding to accurate numbers.

it would only make sense the massive degree of dino's battles lasting ten months we see directly following phosphate testing and response could be in response to bad kits at the start.

the point is reef tank invasions with white rock and blasting lights aren't a chemistry issue, but we're taught to assess everything in reefing as a chemistry issue and we don't even have the good tools for the job if they were.

there are times in reefing, especially in new tanks, where you simply do not alter chemistry and all work is manual or for the prepared large tankers: ran through UV. chemistry reactions up front is a dinos challenge, which is even ten times harder to remedy in a large tank like this one here, you will hate dinos more than any of the invasions.

if they set in your entire reefing thought and procedure clear through 22 will be testing, reaction, dosing, and more invasion its a horrible loop am hoping to prevent with these musings.

based on pics we can see if a certain chosen arrangement was prone to cyano vs arrangement options that are not (such as bare bottom, low initial bioload, medium level heavy blue lighting, using purple coralline rock cured before use)

and if the mode selected was known to produce cyano we would not try and suppress it with chemistry adjustments that inevitably bleach corals and bring dino's, we'd use physical means even larger tanks can employ, such as UV or being bare bottom until the rocks mature, then adding sand. Staggering sand addition is actually worth a new thread title, thanks for the brainstorm.