Could a compromised magnet be poisoning my sps?

jda said:
Post a few quick photos and some water parameters and see if anybody can help.

If you have colonies, then they are going to start to die from the bottom up with three kessil lights - they cannot cover well enough to keep SPS colonies healthy after a while. If the N and P are higher, then this can be an issue too. If you still have frags, then it is VERY easy to look for pests - nobody who ever has had pests originally thought that they did, so please look well.
Click to expand...

3 wide angle kessils on a 4 foot tank is fairly broad coverage. I've only seen shading on the SPS furthest to the front and it's the same spot on all of them. Essentially the corals grow great except for that 5 degrees on the base.

Looked for pests... Haven't seen anything and I'm pretty careful about dipping when introducing new corals.

Params are pretty typical.
8KH
430 Ca
1400mg
P and Nitrate, very low
Temp 78.5
Salinity 1.025

Although I'm bringing the Alk up to 9 to see how that works out. I've also switched from ME A&B to Seachem as the Seachem has trace elements where the ME does not....

Since removing the magnet, the ORP has gone up a bit and my clam is opened wider than I've ever seen it. Could be a coincidence.... Who knows.
 
anthonys51 said:
My point. It was there for months. And then after 60 days it caused your stuff to die. Also not to sound mean but if you didn't notice a very rusty magnet maybe your maintenance schedule is something to be deserted


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Click to expand...

I've been having base up STN for months and months now. With no explanation.

Maintenance is en point. My LFS comes out once a month and I manage it in between. Routine water changes with RODI water and Fritz salt, all being monitored with an Apex. Weekly testing for main parameters and I have a healthy refugium going in the sump.

In this case the front and back covers were still stuck to the magnet for most of this so it wasn't possible to tell it was compromised till the rust go so tall it plumped the cover right off. As I mentioned initially, I had the magnet in the tank but never used it and should have pulled it out since it wasn't ever in use. Had I not left it in the tank, it wouldn't have rusted. Had I been using/handling it, I would probably have noticed. But essentially left it stuck to the side panel of glass unused and cleaned around it.
 
deputydog95 said:
3 wide angle kessils on a 4 foot tank is fairly broad coverage. I've only seen shading on the SPS furthest to the front and it's the same spot on all of them. Essentially the corals grow great except for that 5 degrees on the base.



Looked for pests... Haven't seen anything and I'm pretty careful about dipping when introducing new corals.



Params are pretty typical.

8KH

430 Ca

1400mg

P and Nitrate, very low

Temp 78.5

Salinity 1.025



Although I'm bringing the Alk up to 9 to see how that works out. I've also switched from ME A&B to Seachem as the Seachem has trace elements where the ME does not....



Since removing the magnet, the ORP has gone up a bit and my clam is opened wider than I've ever seen it. Could be a coincidence.... Who knows.
Click to expand...



Think he is a t5 guy The sps t5 people don't think you can get even spread with led. No matter what light you have. And they are correct to a point. Led tend to focus there par in a spotlight like beam. So he is basically saying you need 6 kessil to get the coverage of one 48 inch ati t5 fixture.
As far as your numbers they look good but that doesn't really give us the whole picture.
If your alk was 7 last week 8 this week 7 next week and 8 today that's bad but still 8 today If on the other hand it was 7.8 , 8.1 , 7.9 then 8. It's good. You see how both end up at 8.


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Well looks like you have your answer. You believe it's the magnet. Some of us don't. Hopefully it is and your tank takes off.

Also you never sent a picture of your tank

Also how many gallons of water do you change a week

Ps apex doesn't do crap when test for water parameters. Ph , orp, salinity are the only things they test for. It's cool to watch but not a game changer to know. I haven't tested ph in 6 years, could care less about orp, and salinity is stable with my ato


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Typically 10 gallon water changes every week, to two weeks at the most.

Alk only varies by a few tenths from test to test. Using the Hannah which is nice as I get an actual number that is repeatable.

Just got to the office so this was the first opportunity for a pic.

Bear in mind I ran a jamming sps tank for over 3 years before moving in to this tank. And another sps tank before that one for 3 years. I don't know everything by any means but I'm not a complete rookie either.

Fwiw, I like the apex. ORP can be helpful if something goes sideways and the water gets polluted from a fish die off etc...

It holds the heater temp much tighter then the controller in my heater.

Leak alarms and email notifications for any parameters or a power outage is nice too.
2f84ce4101083e9186fc45edf8dd133f.jpg


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Well, I also couldn't figure out why my sps were stn'n from the base up for 2-3 months. My parameters were consistent and alk was around 8-8.5. Checked my frag rack after reading this thread and the magnet holding it was bulging and split open with rust pouring out of it. I agree that maybe rust isn't the issue, but maybe other chemicals used to make the magnet. Hopefully my huge beautiful collection will start the healing process.
 
NaturalReef said:
Well, I also couldn't figure out why my sps were stn'n from the base up for 2-3 months. My parameters were consistent and alk was around 8-8.5. Checked my frag rack after reading this thread and the magnet holding it was bulging and split open with rust pouring out of it. I agree that maybe rust isn't the issue, but maybe other chemicals used to make the magnet. Hopefully my huge beautiful collection will start the healing process.
Click to expand...

I think I mentioned this above, but I've seen other threads that have mentioned that these magnets are covered in nickel and copper is used as part of the adhesion process to bond the nickel the magnet.

No beuno if that's the case.... As the magnet is rustic, it would be logical to assume it's leaching these heavy toxic metals in the tank.

I don't have another explanation in my case....

Time will tell with the magnet out. If it stops and things start healing, then it would safe to assume that it was the magnet. I will say I've noticed tremendous polyp extension today. More than I've seen in a long time. Everything looks quite fuzzy.
 
deputydog95 said:
Typically 10 gallon water changes every week, to two weeks at the most.

Alk only varies by a few tenths from test to test. Using the Hannah which is nice as I get an actual number that is repeatable.

Just got to the office so this was the first opportunity for a pic.

Bear in mind I ran a jamming sps tank for over 3 years before moving in to this tank. And another sps tank before that one for 3 years. I don't know everything by any means but I'm not a complete rookie either.

Fwiw, I like the apex. ORP can be helpful if something goes sideways and the water gets polluted from a fish die off etc...

It holds the heater temp much tighter then the controller in my heater.

Leak alarms and email notifications for any parameters or a power outage is nice too.
2f84ce4101083e9186fc45edf8dd133f.jpg


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Click to expand...



Maybe someone took a big dump and the gas poisoned the tank.
Is close to men's room.
Just saying lol


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Again, if you suspect copper or nickel, all will bind to aragonite or get skimmed out fairly quickly. Copper is ineffective in a tank with aragonite. Yes, the magnet needs to go. Yes, you can run some polyfilter for a few days if it makes you feel better. There is about a 1% chance that something will change because of this - 99% chance that it is something else.

None of those acros are large enough to worry about the bottom-up dying from point-source LED shading... so forget that I mentioned that as a possibility without knowing anything else.

What does "very low" mean for nitrate and phosphate? Do you have a hannah ultra-low checker for either?
 
deputydog95 said:
Pretty sure we'd have a few human fatalities too if the dump was that bad though :-)

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Click to expand...



Can I ask why you put the mp40 in the back.
I read on there website if you have 2 to put on the side first. Did you try that


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anthonys51 said:
Can I ask why you put the mp40 in the back.
I read on there website if you have 2 to put on the side first. Did you try that


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Sure.

They're actually Mp10's. Two on the back panel. On left and one right.

I run a gyre on the side panel so there's ton of flow between the 3 circulation devices and the return.


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deputydog95 said:
Sure.

They're actually Mp10's. Two on the back panel. On left and one right.

I run a gyre on the side panel so there's ton of flow between the 3 circulation devices and the return.


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Click to expand...



Yes I didn't see gyro. Yes that's enough flow sorry I missed it


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With test kits I bought 2 for every important test

Each person has a different set of skills , eye sight and lighting.

What I did was test with both and see witch one worked for me

I did Red Sea alk , Hanna checker.
Found both where accurate but digital was easier for me
Phosphates I did salifert and Milwaukee. Found I couldn't tell the difference in color with salifert and my phosphates where actually 2.06 and was only reading .50. Milwaukee was better plus digital
With nitrates I used salifert and Red Sea. Both where very close in reading just find the color was easier to read on the Red Sea


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anthonys51 said:
Also how old is the tank seems you have a diatom problem




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The tank is about 15 months old.

And yes, the diatoms persist. I vacuum the top half of the gravel each time, which clears it up for a couple days, and then it comes back with a vengance.

Not sure sure what the deal is there....

Phosphates are reading almost non-detectable.
 
jda said:
Again, if you suspect copper or nickel, all will bind to aragonite or get skimmed out fairly quickly. Copper is ineffective in a tank with aragonite. Yes, the magnet needs to go. Yes, you can run some polyfilter for a few days if it makes you feel better. There is about a 1% chance that something will change because of this - 99% chance that it is something else.

None of those acros are large enough to worry about the bottom-up dying from point-source LED shading... so forget that I mentioned that as a possibility without knowing anything else.

What does "very low" mean for nitrate and phosphate? Do you have a hannah ultra-low checker for either?
Click to expand...

Have been running the PolyFilter for about a week or two now. Is turning tan, so no indication of heavy metals. Just organics.

I have the red sea kits and they reads almost non detectable. I'm running a solid skimmmer and have a healthy fuge with chaeto in the sump.
 
So far things aren't looking any better. I've tried cutting back some of the pieces that were STN'ing from the base up and re gluing them. They've continued to die off so I'm not cutting anymore.

I guess at this point I've got to just let it go and see what happens. This is very frustrating....
 
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