Bad batch of Instant Ocean? Alkalinity through the ROOF!!!

[DogDoc]

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I just did a search for "IO and precipitate" because of a problem I had during my last water change. Lo and behold - I find this 21page thread.

Purchased a bag of IO salt last month. Noticed that when I mixed it there was a precipitate in the water, and a reasonable thick precipitate on the walls of the bucket I was mixing with. Yes, it was a bit cloudy. I just figured it was some precipitated Ca (which, it was) and used it for the water change. Several dead snails, a very unhappy finger leather, and some ticked off acro. Haven't seen the emerald crabs in a while. One of the fire gobies and my mandarin all jumped out of the tank within 24 hours of each other. I'm sure that was something else (like the coral banded shrimp) and is not related, but it certainly added to my stress this time . The alkalinity three days after the change was the highest it's ever been. About 15 and for no apparent reason. Yikes - how high was it on day one?! The tank has been going through one of those "off" cycles since the water change. I remember thinking the tank looked "shocked" after the change. Luckly I've lost very little, but it's always frustrating when the delicate balance of the tank gets thrown. Takes weeks to undo 5min worth of stress.

I'm scheduled to do a water change tomorrow, but I'm going to pick up a new bag of salt mix first. I'll test the old bag in a gallon jug and see what the dKH is.


Hmmmmmmmm.... Never a dull moment with the reef

 

[Megalodon]

DogDoc, how did things turn out for you? Did you have a really high dKH?

 

[DogDoc]

Mixed a test gallon and it was fine. dKH of 16 using the salifert kit. All seemed fine. Still did a change with a new bag of reef crystals. Normal alk, normal water, normal change.

One thing I did differently this time was that I waited until I had ALL my water filtered before adding the salt. Last time I added all the salt with about 1/2 the water to go. Wonder if I precipitated stuff out then and it just didn't go back in. That doesn't make sense.

It is also possible that one of the gallons of RO water I used in the last change I had already mixed in some Klark Superbuffer dKH. I use it to keep my alk up and will sometimes mix top off water with it. Don't remember doing that this time, but...That would have spiked the alk, and would have been my fault.

Still having trouble trusting the IO because I REALLY did have a problem after that last cloudy batch, but since the results aren't reproducible, I can't say anything from them... I CAN, however, say that I will be VERY, VERY careful in the future!

 

[reefmadness]

Aquarium Systems today, covered my losses with a cheque. It came by itself today without any warning. I had submitted a detailed list of my losses to my LFS several weeks ago and was aware that they had forwarded it on to A/S. I personally had not spoken or heard from A/S since I sent a Salt sample in to them back on Oct. 10th. As I begin the rebuilding process, this will at least remove the anxiety related to the $$ lost in this unfortunate exercise. A special thanks to the guy's @ J & L Aquatics for going to bat for me. Lastly, ............ I don't care what brand of Salt your useing, if you open a new bag or bucket, ........ test it.

 

[swims withthe fishes]

I can't beleive i just read all 17 pages of this!!
I learned a valuable lesson the easy way thanks to all of you guys. You just can't get that anywhere else!

 

[millisec]

I've used instant ocean literally since I started 14 years ago and the only time I ever had a problem was when I tried other salts. The worst ever was CoralLife that almost destroyed my tank with huge outbreaks of red algae.

Anyway that was till now... this tank was resetup the end of August with IO. Pretty simple 90g, full of rock, sandbed, sump, skimmer and Neptune. Mostly soft tank has been great and most, especially xenia, growing out of control.

My Neptune AQ Pro was recalibrated for PH when I setup and my range is about 7.8 at night to a high of about 8.2 daytime. Two days ago I noticed my PH was staying down around 7.7-7.8 daytime. I cleaned and checked the probe which was fine. I immediately added a big dose of kent superbuffer with little effect. I later added a fairly large dose of lime water and got PH up around 8.0-8.1 which in hours was dropping again. Repeat on the superbuffer with some improvement. Still low today at around 8.0 with lights on a couple hours and more lime water was added. Just checked and PH back up to 8.19 and I'll wait to see if it starts dipping again. I've also been adding magnesium and no new IO water has been added recently.

Don't think I've seen anything quite like this in my 14 years of keeping a reef. I'm on my way to pick up a new carbonate hardness test kit right now.

If this is a IO problem I really feel for those that don't have realtime PH monitoring. Without it I probably would have lost a good $3000 in livestock. I for sure have that annoying Neptune alarm on now.

Any thoughts anyone...

 

[SPC]

Hi millisec,

My only thought is that a normal low of 7.8 would have had me worried to begin with. If my PH begins to approach 8.0 I start looking for reasons. Do you have any idea why it normaly drops to 7.8 at night?
Steve

 

[millisec]

Hi millisec,

My only thought is that a normal low of 7.8 would have had me worried to begin with. If my PH begins to approach 8.0 I start looking for reasons. Do you have any idea why it normaly drops to 7.8 at night?
Steve

Well what I would ask you is do you monitor PH realtime? IME it's normal for PH to drop at night (no light, no lit fuge) to a low of about 7.8-7.9 and climb back to a norm of about 8.2 lights on. Using test kits most have no clue as to the normal lights on/off PH swings and just quote daytime values.

 

[justletmein]

After adding the Ca reactor mine would normally drop to about 7.8 at night. Never seemed to cause any problems.

 

[SPC]

Well what I would ask you is do you monitor PH realtime?

And my answer would be, yes indeed I do:lol: . I have used a Pinpoint PH monitor for over 3 years now, I check it 3 or 4 times a day. IMO it is an essential piece of equipment for a reef tank.

IME it's normal for PH to drop at night (no light, no lit fuge) to a low of about 7.8-7.9 and climb back to a norm of about 8.2 lights on.

It might be normal, but I won't let it happen in my tank, and really never concidered this an option when dealing with corals. I do have a refugium on reverse light and also drip kalk, this seems to keep the PH closer to what my animals would experience in nature.

Using test kits most have no clue as to the normal lights on/off PH swings and just quote daytime values. [/QUOTE] :lol:[/b]

True, for those who use test kits .
Steve

 

[millisec]

Damn I just got back and PH down to 7.81. I got a salifert kit and dKH is off the charts, it stops at 16, and it took me down to .78 on the second syringe to get a color change. If I figure the chart right dKH must be around 19.5.

So far no signs of tank distress and I'm off to hidden reef to get some new salt.

This really blows...

Based on what I have read this is the IO problem.

 

[Scooterman67]

Well, is there a verdict yet on the testing?
Is the posted problems getting resolved you think by now?
I'm fixing to get some salt, I usually get the IO 200g, should I go for it again, or get a smaller portion for now?

 

[millisec]

Well, is there a verdict yet on the testing?
Is the posted problems getting resolved you think by now?
I'm fixing to get some salt, I usually get the IO 200g, should I go for it again, or get a smaller portion for now?

Can't say for sure... I'm still slowly but surely correcting my problem. I did about 25% water change with tropic marin and the situation was corrected for the moment. Probably going to do 1-2 more 25% changes to get things totally stable. I've used and liked IO for many years but it will be a while before I trust them again.

IMO they have too much competition these days and are cutting corners to compete and further mass produce. I usually buy the 200g buckets, which have a list price of about $100, and the price is all the way down to $35 at several places I buy from. Used to be $14 for a 50g mix was pretty good and some sold for as much as $26. At the LFS here the 50g bags are now less than $10. "That Fish Place" alone must have had a tractor trailer load when I got my last bucket.

Its like the guy at the LFS said "you get what you pay for". I think I'm going to stick with Tropic Marin for now.

 

[Scooterman67]

How are your test results with Tropic Marian, I heard nothing but good about them but seen several reports of them high in Phosphates and low on a number of others?

 

[millisec]

I have not tested raw TM. I've used it before w/o problem but usually stuck with IO because of good performance and price. The only thing I've really concerned myself with at the moment is getting PH stabilized and my hardness/alk are down from astronomical values but PH is starting to flux again and I'm going to do another 25% water change tonight.

 

[Scooterman67]

If you get time, please test new TM mix & post!
I'd like to see the results!
TM is almost twice as much here, so changing over would be expensive to say the least!

 

[millisec]

If you get time, please test new TM mix & post!
I'd like to see the results!
TM is almost twice as much here, so changing over would be expensive to say the least!

Buy IO then and test it before you use it... Theres nothing really to test or compare between IO and TM worth mentioning. IO caused a problem and using a different brand corrected it. Not even sure what the real culprit is in the bad batch(s) of IO. As far as I know the only real indicator of the bad IO is very high carbonate hardness and there is probably more to it than that. Basically I think whatever the real culprit is, is beyond a test kit.

 

[magnum420]

Have any of our European friends out there tested the new TM Pro salt? Been hearing alot about it, but it is not available here yet. I emailed TM about this salt and they said they have no immediate plans to bring it here, but from the email it sounded like they will in the future.

Thanks
MAg

 

[Scooterman67]

I purchased a bucket of IO last night, the water was clear in no time and stayed clear. I'll run test on it tonight.

 

[spham]

Just want to update everyone.

Here a short summry of my problem incase noone wants to read through 18 pages.

I bought a bucket of IO a few months ago and came upon this thread so I decided to test my new bucket of IO. To my finding the KH was off scale (too high). Few days later I bought a new IO bucket and tested it, the KH was 16dKH. Contacted Aquarium System a few days later and told them about my problem, they gladly replace my bad bucket of IO. Two weeks later I decided to do another water change with the IO with 16dKH. Tested the new mix just to be sure, and the KH was off scale (guess most of the KH seattle to the bottom of that bucket). Open up the bucket that AS have replace and tested the KH, again KH is off scale. So to this point I have 3 bad bucket of IO. Called AS and told them about my problem. They said it was impossiable that they have sent me a bad batch of salt and ask me to send in the sample of the bucket they have replace for me. They sent out 2 more bucket of IO to my house. Guess what, one bucket was bad and the other one have a KH of 16dKH. I did a water change with the 16dKH and will do another wc in two weeks. Hopefully this bucket will be good.

Just to make a long story short:

I bought 2 bad bucket of IO.
AS sent me 2 bad bucket of IO, maybe 3 (will test it again in 2 weeks when I do another wc)

Now I have gotten so fustrated with AS I don't even want to call them anymore. I have gotten to the point where I have switch salt brand. I know some of you will not belived me, saying that I'm lieing just to get free salt. All I can say is, if you don't belive me, you are welcome to my house for 4 free bucket of IO salt. If you pay for shipping I'll even send it to you.

I'll call AS again tommorow and tell them about my problem. If they say they going to replace my salt, I'll tell them they can stick it up their *** , eat it, drink it, heck, resell it for all I care cause I'm not going to buy it again.

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