Reefmat working too well?

[DakotahSteel]

Hey everyone,

I’ve had a RS 1200 reefmat since the tank was wet back in July. Ever since I’ve been battling nonexistent nitrates and phosphates. When I say nonexistent I truly mean zero and that’s with a medium sized fish load and multiple feedings per day.
I started to dose for nitrates about two months ago and I’m finally seeing success in my sps. “Not starving them to death” But I was having to dose daily to even get my nitrates to 1.0.

My roller ran out of material about a week ago now and I haven’t changed it but now all of a sudden I actually have nitrates and I don’t have to dose daily to keep them between 1-5 “5 being preferred”
Do I keep the roller mat off? Do I open the side valve and let water through? I’m confused and concerned on what the right course of action is here… anything helps

 

[HankstankXXL750]

Sounds like a better problem than having too high nitrates. Are you running a skimmer or anything else?

What are you feeding?

 

[DakotahSteel]

Sounds like a better problem than having too high nitrates. Are you running a skimmer or anything else?

What are you feeding?

I am running a skimmer but just for 12 hours a day. Again to keep my nitrates from bottoming out.
As for feeding I’m doing 2 large frozen cubes or three of the regular sized frozen in the morning.
Auto feeder does pellets twice a day and then I do a regular sized block of cyclopeeze for a dinner snack.
I’m also putting a whole sheet of Nori in the clip

 

[HankstankXXL750]

I don’t know what would happen if you pulled the plug. Might just not trap anything. Don’t know if you can make it manual vs auto and then advance when you need to. Other option is stock some more fish.

 

[DakotahSteel]

I don’t know what would happen if you pulled the plug. Might just not trap anything. Don’t know if you can make it manual vs auto and then advance when you need to. Other option is stock some more fish.

That’s basically what I’ve been doing the last week. I’m thinking of loosening the screw plug on the other end of maybe even drilling some holes in it kind of thing

 

[nothing_fancy]

possible to use a timer to limit the amount of cycles it advances?

 

[PigFarmer]

Same, reefmat stole all my nitrates and phosphates from 25ppm N and .15 phos to zero in about 2 months time on a 200gallon system. Left me with dinos! Conqured them and now the gha battle is on

 

[wjm6449]

Same, reefmat stole all my nitrates and phosphates from 25ppm N and .15 phos to zero in about 2 months time on a 200gallon system. Left me with dinos! Conqured them and now the gha battle is on

Sounds like some one needs Crabs! An army of crabs. a ****** load of crabs

 

[doubleshot00]

Its what a reefmat does; pulls out organics. Your posts and others are the reason why I'm not gonna run one. Unless your running a ULNS why even have the reefmat?

 

[PigFarmer]

Sounds like some one needs Crabs! An army of crabs. a ****** load of crabs

The triggers ate them all, 3 x now

 

[PigFarmer]

Its what a reefmat does; pulls out organics. Your posts and others are the reason why I'm not gonna run one. Unless your running a ULNS why even have the reefmat?

Laziness sucked me in... wanted socks but didn't wanna wash socks.

 

[doubleshot00]

Laziness sucked me in... wanted socks but didn't wanna wash socks.

Exactly why i wanted one but dinos scare the ever living ____ out of me. I do not want to go through that again.

 

[NotoriousDMC]

I have a RM500. ClariSea before that. I don’t see how a roller wouldn’t lower your nutrients, all else being equal. That said, I just turn the RM off every once in a while and let it overflow. I also do the same with my skimmer—e.g., turn it off all night after dosing AB+. I said in a post a while ago that I don’t understand why Red Sea didn’t include an adjustable valve to bypass the RM (like the ClariSea) and/or include the ability to schedule periods where the RM doesn’t advance. The included ability to only advance at a schedule time 1x/day isn’t the same.

In short, I love the RM, would never remove it, but yes, I do need to “manage” it, and my skimmer, to make sure I don’t go too low on nutrients.

 

[PigFarmer]

Exactly why i wanted one but dinos scare the ever living ____ out of me. I do not want to go through that again.

Microbacter "clean" sure worked great on my dinos... for sure though I have ran sockless systems with much more success. Half this marketed newage hardware will do more harm than good and is unneeded.. Proved it too myself for the 6th or 7th time now

 

[doubleshot00]

Microbacter "clean" sure worked great on my dinos... for sure though I have ran sockless systems with much more success. Half this marketed newage hardware will do more harm than good and is unneeded.. Proved it too myself for the 6th or 7th time now

Yup and BRS suggestions. I know i strived for the whole .03 phos and "oh you have cyano use red slime remover". This industry is all about getting you to keep spending $.

 

[dpfriedman]

Hey everyone,

I’ve had a RS 1200 reefmat since the tank was wet back in July. Ever since I’ve been battling nonexistent nitrates and phosphates. When I say nonexistent I truly mean zero and that’s with a medium sized fish load and multiple feedings per day.
I started to dose for nitrates about two months ago and I’m finally seeing success in my sps. “Not starving them to death” But I was having to dose daily to even get my nitrates to 1.0.

My roller ran out of material about a week ago now and I haven’t changed it but now all of a sudden I actually have nitrates and I don’t have to dose daily to keep them between 1-5 “5 being preferred”
Do I keep the roller mat off? Do I open the side valve and let water through? I’m confused and concerned on what the right course of action is here… anything helps

I run the RS 1200 RM in my RSMax-S 650. My nitrates stay steady at 15-20.

 

[Duzzy]

Hey everyone,

I’ve had a RS 1200 reefmat since the tank was wet back in July. Ever since I’ve been battling nonexistent nitrates and phosphates. When I say nonexistent I truly mean zero and that’s with a medium sized fish load and multiple feedings per day.
I started to dose for nitrates about two months ago and I’m finally seeing success in my sps. “Not starving them to death” But I was having to dose daily to even get my nitrates to 1.0.

My roller ran out of material about a week ago now and I haven’t changed it but now all of a sudden I actually have nitrates and I don’t have to dose daily to keep them between 1-5 “5 being preferred”
Do I keep the roller mat off? Do I open the side valve and let water through? I’m confused and concerned on what the right course of action is here… anything helps

Is the Reefmat that good for removing nitrates and phosphates?

I’m doing a 740 display and was going to run 2 Reefmat 1200 but with the sump the reef mat 1200 would be over it’s rating. Though reading this perhaps that’s a good thing.

 

[Duzzy]

Same, reefmat stole all my nitrates and phosphates from 25ppm N and .15 phos to zero in about 2 months time on a 200gallon system. Left me with dinos! Conqured them and now the gha battle is on

Is the Reefmat that good?

 

[jasongrant15]

I have a question…. Why not only run the reefmat for certain times of the day? That would allow some organics to be processed by bacteria. Maybe reefmat for x hours and set the protein skimmer to turn on x minutes or hours before you power down the reefmat.

I’m no expert, but it seems that it would allow you to skim and allow some nitrates to build while also controlling and adjusting reefmat settings.

I’m sure once you turn the reefmat back on you’d go through some additional roll but, as the protein skimmer would have been running… I’d assume you’d go through less than if it was the primary device pulling out scum.

 

[dpfriedman]

I have a question…. Why not only run the reefmat for certain times of the day? That would allow some organics to be processed by bacteria. Maybe reefmat for x hours and set the protein skimmer to turn on x minutes or hours before you power down the reefmat.

I’m no expert, but it seems that it would allow you to skim and allow some nitrates to build while also controlling and adjusting reefmat settings.

I’m sure once you turn the reefmat back on you’d go through some additional roll but, as the protein skimmer would have been running… I’d assume you’d go through less than if it was the primary device pulling out scum.

If ReefMat is off, so is your filtration for tank which is no bueno.