Phosphate

[scabbedwings616]

You should not have any clouding when you stir your sandbed. If so, you may need to think about rinsing the sand during your rescape.

What do you mean by rinsing? I vacuum half of it each water change.

 

[Saltyreef]

What do you mean by rinsing? I vacuum half of it each water change.

You can test by pushing your fingers into your sandbed until you touch the bottom glass. Then grabbing a handful of sand and picking it up a few inches off the sandbed, then release thru your fingers slowly.
If it clouds up a little in that area then youll want to rinse the sand. Remove as much sand as possible, place into buckets about half way full and rinse with a garden hose and jet sprayer until it comes out clear. After this, drain the tap water off and rinse once or twice more with 0ppm rodi. This will effectively remove all waste and not kill the beneficial bacteria thats encysted onto the sand.

 

[scabbedwings616]

You can test by pushing your fingers into your sandbed until you touch the bottom glass. Then grabbing a handful of sand and picking it up a few inches off the sandbed, then release thru your fingers slowly.
If it clouds up a little in that area then youll want to rinse the sand. Remove as much sand as possible, place into buckets about half way full and rinse with a garden hose and jet sprayer until it comes out clear. After this, drain the tap water off and rinse once or twice more with 0ppm rodi. This will effectively remove all waste and not kill the beneficial bacteria thats encysted onto the sand.

I just looked at the sand and it was fine. I just did the turkey baster in the rocks and oh boy did it create a cloud. Letting it go a few hours and gonna redo that again till nothing is on them. I feel like that was it. But never know.

 

[hsp]

Blue Life makes a regenerable phosphate Fx .
I have used it and it works , this will bring down you po4 in no time and you can reuse it.

How long until you saw a difference with the Blue Life Phos Fx? I am concerned about dropping my PO4 too fast (0.28 in an 80 g system).

 

[BryanM]

My phosphates are thru the roof .19. I have ran gfo and nothing has happened. I have tried less feedings in the tank, I’ve tried I feel like everything I know besides an additive. I don’t want to do that and want to find the true source of it. I sent in an icp test and should be back by Tuesday or Wednesday. It’s been scanned already. I do water changes once every two weeks to which I do about 25 percent change and 5hen two days later i

I had .8 when I started using lanthanum chloride to reduce it. LC dosed thru a 1 micron filter sock worked for me to reduce it, you should read and be careful if you go this route.

That said, since you're already using GFO, I'd probably focus on why this isn't doing what you want it to do.

I deployed an algae turf scrubbed for nutrient control, and I can tell you it works well enough that I'm now dosing phosphates until I can find balance.... either running the ATS less, or something. But I never want to bottom out phosphates again.