YOUR CURIOUSLY INNOCENT NEGLIGENCE

[Battlecorals]

Ok cool please keep us posted. Does look like that skimmer working pretty hard there. I had another question I forgot to ask way earlier. do you flush your DI and discard at least a half gallon or so before you use them?

 

[tripdad]

Yes, shared that in a previous post. Flush for at least 1 minute, then start collecting, discarding anything that does not read 0 tds.

 

[Abhishek]

I followed Adam's advice and pulled gfo and carbon offline . Only skimmer - provided a really good one sized to your tank . And water changes .
Of course pulling the gfo, resulted in cyano . But I decided to just ignore it as if its there and only look at it during twice a week water change when I manually suck it out . Also added extra gyres to take care of flow .

Don't know what gfo or carbon does but my acros started showing more PE and colors and am keeping it that way .

Regards,
Abhishek

 

[Chris Ferrell]

I agree with Adam and Abhishek, I was having problems with my tank and after a short conversation with Adam while ordering some frags suggested the same thing and within a month corals started coming around. I had tried just about every method out there for growing healthy sps but what worked for me was getting back to the basics, strong skimming water changes and good maint.

 

[Abhishek]

Yes, shared that in a previous post. Flush for at least 1 minute, then start collecting, discarding anything that does not read 0 tds.

How old are the filters especially RO. I have started changing my sediment filter every month or 2, carbon blocks every 2-3 months and just changed RO membrane which was used for less than a year.
DI resins are color changing and hence I can change out accordingly .
Since removing all other filteration craps and using only skimmer, am trying to provide best water possible . Hence I flush the RO membrane for 5 mins before allowing the water to go through resins. Then I discard any water that reads above 1 ppm leaving RO membrane and entering DI resins . So ultimately, its a process of around 10 mins before I actually start collecting water for top off or water changes.

Regards,
Abhishek

 

[Salty_Box_Reef]

So I have a extra brs dual regulator that I was using for carbon/gfo. I am going to convert it to add two more chambers to my ro/di unit. I plan to run at least two carbon blocks, one of the 5 micron chlorine and voc blocks and the other a brs 1 micron universal block. That leaves one extra chamber. Would I be best off running another di cartridge or should I run two particle filters or even three carbon blocks?

 

[tripdad]

How old are the filters especially RO.

Ok, here's where some more confusion reigns. I was taught that you check rejection rate, keep it above 96-97% and all is functioning properly. I was also taught about membrane creep, always flush first, then collect and dump if needed, then collect. Then I see a post elsewhere from an RO/DI system supplier that says membrane creep is nothing to worry about and now someone is suggesting that we replace RO membranes by age not rejection rate. Is there any real consensus? Not ranting, seriously curious as to where the "hobby" stands these days. I have a 3 position TDS meter on the system just for this purpose of membrane performance checks. There are also some who advocate letting the water "breathe", "offgas" for at least 24 hours before using. I've never done this mostly due to time constraints, just always making water at last minute.

 

[Battlecorals]

Ok, here's where some more confusion reigns. I was taught that you check rejection rate, keep it above 96-97% and all is functioning properly. I was also taught about membrane creep, always flush first, then collect and dump if needed, then collect. Then I see a post elsewhere from an RO/DI system supplier that says membrane creep is nothing to worry about and now someone is suggesting that we replace RO membranes by age not rejection rate. Is there any real consensus? Not ranting, seriously curious as to where the "hobby" stands these days. I have a 3 position TDS meter on the system just for this purpose of membrane performance checks. There are also some who advocate letting the water "breathe", "offgas" for at least 24 hours before using. I've never done this mostly due to time constraints, just always making water at last minute.

totally understand your confusion and frustration. As a collective effort such as in a forum like this its inevitable that there will be different ideas bouncing around for sure. But I think you are correct in your original beliefs on membrane replacement. If you calculate rejection rate at less than 96% I'd consider that they best way to determine if you need to replace. no guesswork or anecdotal methods there at all.

 

[Hockeypunk1]

Ok cool please keep us posted. Does look like that skimmer working pretty hard there. I had another question I forgot to ask way earlier. do you flush your DI and discard at least a half gallon or so before you use them?

Hey there Adam, is this a common practice for you? Do you flush yours every time you make water? I've had an ongoing diatom issue along with cyano that just makes my tank look awful. Doesn't seem to bother the fish or coral mostly cosmetic. I just purchased a silicate test kit and an additional stage that I plan to put a carbon block. Recently I changed the ro membrane that looked spent. I really didn't think it was diatoms since my tank is about 1 1/2 years old. I looked at a sample under microscope and it was diatoms I had thought it was a bacteria bloom or something. I never run my rodi past 0 tds. My nutrients run about 5 nitrate and 0-0.03 PO4 on hannah. I've been working on having nutrients as my tank was struggling being too clean

 

[bubbaque]

Hey there Adam, is this a common practice for you? Do you flush yours every time you make water? I've had an ongoing diatom issue along with cyano that just makes my tank look awful. Doesn't seem to bother the fish or coral mostly cosmetic. I just purchased a silicate test kit and an additional stage that I plan to put a carbon block. Recently I changed the ro membrane that looked spent. I really didn't think it was diatoms since my tank is about 1 1/2 years old. I looked at a sample under microscope and it was diatoms I had thought it was a bacteria bloom or something. I never run my rodi past 0 tds. My nutrients run about 5 nitrate and 0-0.03 PO4 on hannah. I've been working on having nutrients as my tank was struggling being too clean

Was your tank "clean" before you started adding nutrients?

 

[Battlecorals]

Hey there Adam, is this a common practice for you? Do you flush yours every time you make water? I've had an ongoing diatom issue along with cyano that just makes my tank look awful. Doesn't seem to bother the fish or coral mostly cosmetic. I just purchased a silicate test kit and an additional stage that I plan to put a carbon block. Recently I changed the ro membrane that looked spent. I really didn't think it was diatoms since my tank is about 1 1/2 years old. I looked at a sample under microscope and it was diatoms I had thought it was a bacteria bloom or something. I never run my rodi past 0 tds. My nutrients run about 5 nitrate and 0-0.03 PO4 on hannah. I've been working on having nutrients as my tank was struggling being too clean

It his a very good idea to run at least a few gallons through new DI before you use it. The Maxcap s especially. I always flush the maxcaps's till i read .00 on my comm-100. They only need to be flushed/rinsed when they are new though.

 

[Z-man]

Interesting read!

GFO will never be used on my tanks since it was once recommended and all my chalices lost their flesh. I still use a small amount of carbon to help with any chlorine that might seep into the system during water changes.

One other point about water not mentioned is your body oils. The less you stick your hands in the tank, the better. Sounds a bit stupid, but if you can cut back on that, you'll see even better extension and colors.

 

[Hockeypunk1]

Was your tank "clean" before you started adding nutrients?

Yes extremely, I would say sterile. I never registered no3 or po4 above 0. All my sps were pale and not growing. I would experience alot of stn and all my coraline turned white and wouldn't grow. As soon as I added potassium no3 all my corals reacted overnight and within a week had color. I was no3 limited and my tank drank it up as fast as I could add it.

 

[Hockeypunk1]

I have around 20 or so sps and all are doing great now but 1 red millipora frag. It never has polyp extension and looks to be stn around the base. Its been green since I bought it. Strangely, after I bought that frag I won the mother colony in a raffle. The mother colony has done really good besides not looking like a millie. It was completely browned out and is slowly turning reddish tips and green body. It definitely doesn't have the crazy millie polyp extension

 

[Battlecorals]

I have around 20 or so sps and all are doing great now but 1 red millipora frag. It never has polyp extension and looks to be stn around the base. Its been green since I bought it. Strangely, after I bought that frag I won the mother colony in a raffle. The mother colony has done really good besides not looking like a millie. It was completely browned out and is slowly turning reddish tips and green body. It definitely doesn't have the crazy millie polyp extension

My rule of thumb is that is there's only one piece doing odd stuff I consider it a fluke, and try ride it out as long as possible. However, if I see the same symptoms in another, or more pieces then I will be a little more aggressive in my efforts to solve it. especially in your case beating the odds and the mother doing better than the frag, Id say there probably nothing about the system related to the issues with the frag.

Sounds like it's struggling to acclimate for the most part.

 

[tripdad]

Ok, update time. 12 days after GFO and carbon removal, Cyano outbreak but seems to be tapering off, will wait and see. PE has increased on all "healthy" corals, no change on struggling acro frags. Some tip color has returned on example two posted earlier but doesn't show in photo so I won't bother posting it. All in all, minimal negatives and some definite positives so I will stay the coarse for now. On another front, I installed a new water filter system for the whole house on Sunday. It dropped the initial TDS by 50 points but more surprising is the after RO membrane, it went from 5-6 to 2ppm solid, of coarse zero after DI stage. It is designed to remove all iron, sulfur, methane, etc. from the well water. Whatever it is removing it made an impact on the RO efficiency so that's good. I will update again later, Thanks Adam for your suggestions.

 

[rushbattle]

Just to add to this discussion, I agree in general with Adam's assertions. Starting with good water is an absolute necessity. However, sometimes it is the saltmix! I bought a box of HW that was extremely low in K and it killed a few of my prized BC specimens before I could figure out what was going on. Acros were the least happy with the low K levels, the other corals seemed to tolerate it much more easily. Again, I am agreeing with Adam, but it is good to examine everything else that you can if you are sure that you are starting with the fundamentals (water source, flow, major ion levels and stability, acceptable light, etc.) and you are still seeing mysterious results. I started a thread about the K level in the Chemistry forum:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/hw-and-potassium.307204/

 

[Battlecorals]

Ok, update time. 12 days after GFO and carbon removal, Cyano outbreak but seems to be tapering off, will wait and see. PE has increased on all "healthy" corals, no change on struggling acro frags. Some tip color has returned on example two posted earlier but doesn't show in photo so I won't bother posting it. All in all, minimal negatives and some definite positives so I will stay the coarse for now. On another front, I installed a new water filter system for the whole house on Sunday. It dropped the initial TDS by 50 points but more surprising is the after RO membrane, it went from 5-6 to 2ppm solid, of coarse zero after DI stage. It is designed to remove all iron, sulfur, methane, etc. from the well water. Whatever it is removing it made an impact on the RO efficiency so that's good. I will update again later, Thanks Adam for your suggestions.

HI there, thought id bulb the with a quick check in and see how things were going for you so far

 

[tripdad]

HI there, thought id bulb the with a quick check in and see how things were going for you so far

Hello Adam, Sorry for the lack of updates, work has been nuts. All healthy acros are showing better, more consistent PE. Tissues look fatter and healthier. Struggling frags are still struggling but not getting worse. Overall I'm happy with the change but I cannot rid the tank of cyano at this time. I have been very limited on time so just bearing with it till things get a little easier then I'll attack it in earnest. I have yet to add any new acros since the change so I don't know of a healthy new intro would continue being healthy. I'll get back to buying corals soon and we'll see.

 

[tripdad]

A quick update, I have added a red planet frag from OR A to the tank. I chose this as they are normally well healed and very healthy, as this one is. I hope this removes a variable about source and healed up or not. We shall see how it goes. As an aside, there is some growth on existing corals, not all but some.