drummereef's 180g in-wall build

[drummereef]

Wait, no results?

Looks the same.. or did it multiply?

I have seen this before.

The pics are from 2 different rocks. One that I hadn't basted, the other was a day after basting - just to show what it looks like. The pic after basting was a little more pronounced than what it looks like in real life.

Silicates or a spectrum of bulbs maybe?

I'm really thinking silicates are getting in from somewhere, either in my RO/DI or the IO saltmix itself - although the "experts" swear there wouldn't be enough silicate in IO salt to cause this. I have my doubts though... :hmm3:

Sounds like Dino's, have you tried any peroxide treatments? I hear it works but never tried it myself. I remember you talking about this earlier in this thread but assumed you had beat it. It's been along time, you gotta suspect its something leaching out of that rock but you would think it would've ran its course by now.

I haven't dosed H202 for a long time, but tried it in the past with no success. This stuff didn't seem even phased by it. I'm beginning to think it's silicates more and more... :hmm2:

Brett, they look like myrionema hydroids !! If this is a correct ID ... I´m sorry my friend.
It´s impossible to erradicate unless you take the hole system down and clean averything.

Sorry ...

No worries Vlado, definitely not hydroids. There's no "polyps", just a filamentous mat of brown slime. LOL Believe me, I had hydroids in my 40g and wouldn't wish them on my worst enemy! Go back to page 1 of my thread and look at the pic of my 40g. The brown patches were hydroids. Boo! :lol:

Brett, What are you running your alk/mag at? I have stuff that appears to be about the same. I upped my alk and mag to try and help kill off bryopsis, but this stuff appears to be dying off as well with it.

I also have been dosing lacl3 frequently too.

Have you given any thought to some impurities in anything you are dosing, or using on a daily basis? Your pickling lime solution may have something in it that could cause it. Just a long shot thought.

I know you said your TDS is fine but when was the last time you changed out your pre filters and membrane on your RO?

Interesting find Josh. My Alk is ~9.6, mag is high >1500. My Salifert test kit was apparently old or failing and didn't catch it until after I had dosed some Tech-M. I will say the little bit of Bryopsis that lives in my overflow hasn't gotten any worse though! :lol:

My TDS is 000 coming out of the RO/DI, tested with 2 different meters. I run a dual DI and I changed out the prefilters/carbon stages just a couple months ago so I wouldn't think it could be that. I'm dosing BRS Kalkwasser - which could be the culprit but it seems to only get worse after water changes - or topping off with new saltwater.

Everyone says that GFO removes silicate from the water column... I just wonder how effective it REALLY is on silicates versus PO4 - which it is lowering in my case. I haven't dosed Lanthanum Chloride for a while after reading it's hard to get PO4 under 0.25 using that method. Right now my PO4 is 0.03 using GFO. I tried to research another silicate removal method but have yet to find anything substantial. Some recommend Sera Silicate Clear but I'm not having any luck finding it. Any ideas? :strange:

 

[cromedogg33]

I may be completely wrong but don't silicates promote diatoms more than anything? I've dosed the zeo sponge power in my tank before and I believe that's a silicate compound of some sort.

I could definately tell when I put one to many drops in my tank just based on the diatom bloom that would happen on my glass.

Not sure where I'm going with this, but perhaps you could actually dose silicates to see if it's hurting or beneficial... I know that sounds a bit odd, but I know Zeo tanks will use small amount of silicates.

 

[cromedogg33]

Another thought after diggin around the chemistry forum.

From Highland Reefer:

It is my understanding that GFO is effective when used in fresh water, but the pH needs to be held around 9.0. How this might change in salt water, I don't know. I would expect that GFO used at the average reef tank pH might pull some silicate out, but perhaps not a lot.

GAC has been recommended to help pull silicate out which would probably be in an organic form.

FWIW, I believe that any silicate released by the product you plan to use will be used up quickly by diatoms, causing a bloom which can be eliminated by skimming and filter bags.
{end}

One quick and probably painless thought that you could do is get another DI canister or two and put GFO in them and put them POST deionization filtering.

I'm assuming your RO/DI unit already has a carbon filter in it which should be removing SOME. It may be worth a shot because the water coming out of your RO/DI is definately fresh water and GFO should work extremely effectively. This might clarify or provide at least a minor step to finding out the problem.

 

[drummereef]

I may be completely wrong but don't silicates promote diatoms more than anything? I've dosed the zeo sponge power in my tank before and I believe that's a silicate compound of some sort.

I could definately tell when I put one to many drops in my tank just based on the diatom bloom that would happen on my glass.

Not sure where I'm going with this, but perhaps you could actually dose silicates to see if it's hurting or beneficial... I know that sounds a bit odd, but I know Zeo tanks will use small amount of silicates.

I believe that is correct, diatoms and silicate go hand in hand. I have however see pics of some forms of diatoms that look a lot like this stuff, not the typical "brown dust" most people associate with a typical diatom bloom. I'm not sure I'm brave enough to dose silicates, considering I think a couple of my corals are on the edge of getting really ticked off by this stuff. :lol: Other than GFO I just haven't heard of a good method of reducing it when the tank isn't efficiently uptaking it.

Another thought after diggin around the chemistry forum.

From Highland Reefer:

It is my understanding that GFO is effective when used in fresh water, but the pH needs to be held around 9.0. How this might change in salt water, I don't know. I would expect that GFO used at the average reef tank pH might pull some silicate out, but perhaps not a lot.

GAC has been recommended to help pull silicate out which would probably be in an organic form.

FWIW, I believe that any silicate released by the product you plan to use will be used up quickly by diatoms, causing a bloom which can be eliminated by skimming and filter bags.
{end}

One quick and probably painless thought that you could do is get another DI canister or two and put GFO in them and put them POST deionization filtering.

I'm assuming your RO/DI unit already has a carbon filter in it which should be removing SOME. It may be worth a shot because the water coming out of your RO/DI is definately fresh water and GFO should work extremely effectively. This might clarify or provide at least a minor step to finding out the problem.

Ha! I read that thread last night. As much as I appreciate the efforts of the guys in the Chem Forum I've found there to be limited answers to issues like these. There's variables that typically aren't taken into account and/or not studied on a scientific level. Like for instance, could it be that base rock simply lacks the organisms / micro fauna that uptake excess silicate or iron? Even after seeding the rock on many levels; live sand additions, Chaeto from various sources, etc... There still seems to be a lack of filter feeders that uptake these elements. I dunno, just putting thoughts out there... :headwally:

 

[cromedogg33]

Well GFO works better on freshwater, and I think that's proven to be a significant amount. May be worth a shot hanging off your ro/di.

 

[drummereef]

Well GFO works better on freshwater, and I think that's proven to be a significant amount. May be worth a shot hanging off your ro/di.

Indeed my friend, will do. If I remember correctly I had put a bag of GFO in my newly mixed saltwater (before doing a water change) but I don't think I tried it in just freshwater. Thanks bro!

 

[drummereef]

Hey Josh, I think I remember but did you say you haven't had any luck with Chemiclean getting rid of this stuff correct? And you think it's the same stuff as what's in your tank for sure?

 

[cromedogg33]

I did it such a long time ago that I wouldn't feel comftorable telling you yes it's the same stuff at this point.

This was the stuff I was fighting almost 2 years ago when the tank was initially setup.

It's not the same stuff we have now. This was a combo of GHA, cyano, dyno. Chemiclean did help rid of the bacterial problems, but I wouldn't use the stuff again unless I was utterly desperate.

 

[drummereef]

I did it such a long time ago that I wouldn't feel comftorable telling you yes it's the same stuff at this point.

This was the stuff I was fighting almost 2 years ago when the tank was initially setup.

It's not the same stuff we have now. This was a combo of GHA, cyano, dyno. Chemiclean did help rid of the bacterial problems, but I wouldn't use the stuff again unless I was utterly desperate.

Gotcha thanks! What's your NO3 and PO4 right now? I've probably asked you before... sorry.

 

[Reefocd]

Hi Brett,

I am planning a sump build and wanted to ask, now that you've had your system up for some time, are you happy with sump height? You must have your return output in DT very near surface. How many inches above the normal nine does the water level rise when return pump is shut off? Thanks!

 

[ChillingBoy]

Wow took me a year to skim through this thread :crazy1: . Awesome tank, so nice and clean, don't know how you do it. :eek1: keep up the good work!!!!!!!:bounce1::bounce1:

 

[drummereef]

Hi Brett,

I am planning a sump build and wanted to ask, now that you've had your system up for some time, are you happy with sump height? You must have your return output in DT very near surface. How many inches above the normal nine does the water level rise when return pump is shut off? Thanks!

My sump height works fine as far a power outages goes... Rule #1 is make the sump big enough to handle the overflow in case of an outage. If you don't submerge your LocLine under the water surface, it will create an air gap so when the power goes out display water won't be siphoned into the sump. The other method is drilling a small siphon hole on the bottom side of the LocLine, which also works. With internal pumps, like Vortechs or Tunze, I don't see a need to submerge the LocLine anyway. As far as how much is rises, that's determined by how much plumbing you have. Anything above the sump will drain when there's an outage. Also consider the few gallons that your overflows contain, if there happens to be a slow leak under in the plumbing. All that considered, it's relatively hard to determine exactly how much will drain, especially if you haven't plumbed the tank yet. I'd say with all the plumbing I have I drain maybe 5-10 gallons, but again it's hard to say exactly. But the best rule I can think of is to build as big a sump as your space will allow. The bigger the better IMO. Hope this helps.

Wow took me a year to skim through this thread :crazy1: . Awesome tank, so nice and clean, don't know how you do it. :eek1: keep up the good work!!!!!!!:bounce1::bounce1:

Thank you ChillingBoy. I appreciate the kind words.

 

[drummereef]

UPDATE:


So it's been a stressful few days lately. It's amazing that with all the thought, setup, execution put into a tank that stuff just happens to go wrong...

First, I added a new module to my Apex setup which caused all H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks to break loose. Namely, it completely bricked one of my EB8's! I was up until 3am putting all my devices back in "manual" mode which was loads of fun! After spending an hour on the phone the next morning with Neptune Systems the Tech was able to fix the issue and get everything back operational. Apparently the issue is with a faulty Display Module causing multiple system errors. So I'm sending it back to be repaired....

THEN, one of my Vortech MP40's decided to crap out. After trouble shooting for an hour or so the problem was a dead power cable?!?!?! I thought for sure it was the power supply but no, the actual power cable is broken. What??? I've never in the history of using electronic devices had a power cable go bad, especially one that never gets plugged/unplugged. Crazy. So I dug through a few boxes and found a backup cable, plugged it in, and the Vortech powers up perfectly.


So needless to say I was pretty ticked off at my tank for a couple days. :lol: I have some new goodies on their way so hopefully I'll get over my reef grudge.

 

[tj1627]

UPDATE:


So it's been a stressful few days lately. It's amazing that with all the thought, setup, execution put into a tank that stuff just happens to go wrong...

First, I added a new module to my Apex setup which caused all H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks to break loose. Namely, it completely bricked one of my EB8's! I was up until 3am putting all my devices back in "manual" mode which was loads of fun! After spending an hour on the phone the next morning with Neptune Systems the Tech was able to fix the issue and get everything back operational. Apparently the issue is with a faulty Display Module causing multiple system errors. So I'm sending it back to be repaired....

THEN, one of my Vortech MP40's decided to crap out. After trouble shooting for an hour or so the problem was a dead power cable?!?!?! I thought for sure it was the power supply but no, the actual power cable is broken. What??? I've never in the history of using electronic devices had a power cable go bad, especially one that never gets plugged/unplugged. Crazy. So I dug through a few boxes and found a backup cable, plugged it in, and the Vortech powers up perfectly.


So needless to say I was pretty ticked off at my tank for a couple days. :lol: I have some new goodies on their way so hopefully I'll get over my reef grudge.

Sorry to hear about the troubles. A dead power cable? Really? I beat the snot out of the 100s of power cables I've used over the years. I probably would have been stumped by that one as well.

Just remember: When your tank gets you down, buy a frag. You'll fell better

 

[reeftanknewbie]

Brett,
Sounds like one for the record books. Never heard of a cable going bad especially on a system like yours that is so clean and protected. Glad to heard sleep and stress were your only losses. Hope things turn around for you soon.

 

[dkeller_nc]

Brett - I'm new to this forum, so I haven't read through all 186 pages of this thread.

I'm not much of a biologist (though with a few years of reefing experience), so I can't help with the I.D. of the brown ?algae? growing on your rocks.

But I do have a chemistry background, and have a couple of suggestions. First, I would recommend against running your RO/DI through a GFO filter. In seawater, ferric oxide has an incredibly low solubility, which is why folks can use the solid form in a reactor to remove phosphates without "dosing" the tank with iron.

However, highly purified water is a very aggressive solubilizer (you may remember the comment in high school chemistry - water is the "universal solvent"). While the amount of iron that the RO/DI water will solubilize from solid ferric oxide will still be quite low, it's definitely measurable with sophisticated equipment such as an ion chromatograph.

And iron, at least in the ocean, is a very effective promoter of diatom, dinoflagellate and algae blooms.

If you've questions about how effective your RO/DI system is, and therefore how pure your water is that you use for makeup/dosing/salt mix, start with thinking about your feed tap water. RO membranes are characterized by a "ion reject percentage" rather than an absolute TDS coming out of the purified side of the membrane. In locales with municipal water supplies that are fairly soft (low divalent cations, like Ca & Mg) and low total dissolved solids, an RO membrane with a high ion reject ratio such as 98% will have an output that is quite pure.

However, when fed a source such as well water or from a municipal source that is hard and/or has high TDS, the output of the RO membrane may not be so pure. Moreover, if you live in a city that uses chloramine to disinfect the water supply, it's possible that some amount of ammonia is making it out of your purified water system. While such a low amount of ammonia wouldn't hurt your animals (for one, your biological filtration base would almost instantly convert any free ammonia to nitrates), it is a fertilizer, so adding it continually may be "fertilizing" your tank.

I looked up St. Louis' municipal water quality report, and at least for 2011, it would appear that the water is pretty hard with a fairly high TDS.

If you decide that your RO/DI is a significant source of nutrients being added to your tank, there are some things that you can do to make your RO/DI system more effective without spending a huge amount of money. One of the most effective things you can do without adding any extra purification media is to slow down the flowrate going through the system. Generally speaking, the slower the flow, the higher the purity of the water coming out of such a system, though there is a point of diminishing returns.

Another effective technique for improving the ion reject ratio of your RO membrane is to install a salt-regenerated water softener. These systems replace divalent cations such as calcium and magnesium and divalent anions such as sulfate in the feed water with sodium and chloride. And the ion reject ratio for an RO membrane is generally far higher for sodium than it is for other "hard water" cations and anions.

If you are indeed on the St. Louis municipal system (rather than a well), you may need to add an up-front chloramine remover to your system. I should note here that this doesn't need to be catalytic carbon - all carbon will remove chloramines from water if the flow is slow enough and the carbon bed is large enough, it's just that catalytic carbon is a lot more effective per pound than "normal" granulated carbon.

Hope this helps, and - nice tank!

 

[drummereef]

Sorry to hear about the troubles. A dead power cable? Really? I beat the snot out of the 100s of power cables I've used over the years. I probably would have been stumped by that one as well.

Just remember: When your tank gets you down, buy a frag. You'll fell better

Seriously, a bad freakin' cable. I couldn't believe it. I thought for sure it was the actual power supply - never in my life have I had a cable go bad! It hadn't been kinked or anything, just a wierd fluke. I'm going to order a couple replacement power cables from Monoprice and just upgrade both of them so I don't run into this again. So weird. :lol:

Brett,
Sounds like one for the record books. Never heard of a cable going bad especially on a system like yours that is so clean and protected. Glad to heard sleep and stress were your only losses. Hope things turn around for you soon.

Indeed, still recovering but I have a few new additions to post up that are making me feel a lot better. Thanks reeftank.

Brett - I'm new to this forum, so I haven't read through all 186 pages of this thread.

I'm not much of a biologist (though with a few years of reefing experience), so I can't help with the I.D. of the brown ?algae? growing on your rocks.

But I do have a chemistry background, and have a couple of suggestions. First, I would recommend against running your RO/DI through a GFO filter. In seawater, ferric oxide has an incredibly low solubility, which is why folks can use the solid form in a reactor to remove phosphates without "dosing" the tank with iron.

However, highly purified water is a very aggressive solubilizer (you may remember the comment in high school chemistry - water is the "universal solvent"). While the amount of iron that the RO/DI water will solubilize from solid ferric oxide will still be quite low, it's definitely measurable with sophisticated equipment such as an ion chromatograph.

And iron, at least in the ocean, is a very effective promoter of diatom, dinoflagellate and algae blooms.

If you've questions about how effective your RO/DI system is, and therefore how pure your water is that you use for makeup/dosing/salt mix, start with thinking about your feed tap water. RO membranes are characterized by a "ion reject percentage" rather than an absolute TDS coming out of the purified side of the membrane. In locales with municipal water supplies that are fairly soft (low divalent cations, like Ca & Mg) and low total dissolved solids, an RO membrane with a high ion reject ratio such as 98% will have an output that is quite pure.

However, when fed a source such as well water or from a municipal source that is hard and/or has high TDS, the output of the RO membrane may not be so pure. Moreover, if you live in a city that uses chloramine to disinfect the water supply, it's possible that some amount of ammonia is making it out of your purified water system. While such a low amount of ammonia wouldn't hurt your animals (for one, your biological filtration base would almost instantly convert any free ammonia to nitrates), it is a fertilizer, so adding it continually may be "fertilizing" your tank.

I looked up St. Louis' municipal water quality report, and at least for 2011, it would appear that the water is pretty hard with a fairly high TDS.

If you decide that your RO/DI is a significant source of nutrients being added to your tank, there are some things that you can do to make your RO/DI system more effective without spending a huge amount of money. One of the most effective things you can do without adding any extra purification media is to slow down the flowrate going through the system. Generally speaking, the slower the flow, the higher the purity of the water coming out of such a system, though there is a point of diminishing returns.

Another effective technique for improving the ion reject ratio of your RO membrane is to install a salt-regenerated water softener. These systems replace divalent cations such as calcium and magnesium and divalent anions such as sulfate in the feed water with sodium and chloride. And the ion reject ratio for an RO membrane is generally far higher for sodium than it is for other "hard water" cations and anions.

If you are indeed on the St. Louis municipal system (rather than a well), you may need to add an up-front chloramine remover to your system. I should note here that this doesn't need to be catalytic carbon - all carbon will remove chloramines from water if the flow is slow enough and the carbon bed is large enough, it's just that catalytic carbon is a lot more effective per pound than "normal" granulated carbon.

Hope this helps, and - nice tank!

Excellent post dkeller, much appreciated. :thumbsup: Indeed I am in the St Louis area and have exceptionally hard water with a relatively high TDS, depending on the time of year. My municipality also uses Chloramines to purify so your points are well taken about it the ammonia becoming a "fertilizer" in the tank.

How does one go about slowing the water through the RO/DI? And, I'm assuming the water softener is a whole-house softener? I know my parents have run one for decades in their house but I do not have one installed here - although I could likely get it done relatively inexpensively. Hmmm...

I do agree, that additions of iron may likely be the cause of the bloom. Perhaps there's iron making it through my RO/DI when I mix new saltwater? Looks like Red Sea makes an Iodine, Potassium, Iron test kit that might be valuable in this situation? Thoughts?

 

[shaggss]

I do agree, that additions of iron may likely be the cause of the bloom. Perhaps there's iron making it through my RO/DI when I mix new saltwater? Looks like Red Sea makes an Iodine, Potassium, Iron test kit that might be valuable in this situation? Thoughts?

I have used both the RS K test and the Salifert. I like the Salifert as it is extremely easy and quick with a very definitive end point, though I do not have a revenue solution the check its accuracy.

 

[dkeller_nc]

How does one go about slowing the water through the RO/DI? And, I'm assuming the water softener is a whole-house softener? I know my parents have run one for decades in their house but I do not have one installed here - although I could likely get it done relatively inexpensively. Hmmm...

Ideally, you want to install a valve on both the product and waste lines and slow the flow that way - valving down the feed to an RO/DI system will reduce the pressure across the RO membrane, which is not what you want (from the perspective of production). In a sense, your RO/DI system already has a restrictor on the output side - the size of this restrictor sets the balance between product and waste. For an RO system without a boost pump, these restrictors are typically set to yield 10% - 20% product, and 80% - 90% waste. That's done for two reasons - the first is that the purity of the output of the RO membrane is affected by the waste/product ratio (higher product = less pure), the second (and more important) is to ensure that the concentrated ions that have low solubility like calcium, silica, and iron don't precipitate out of solution and foul the membrane.

The precipitation of relatively insoluble minerals is why almost any commercial RO system contains either an up-front water softener, a chemical anti-foulant injector pump, or both. The addition of these items means that a commercial RO system con produce up to 90% product and 10% waste.

I do agree, that additions of iron may likely be the cause of the bloom. Perhaps there's iron making it through my RO/DI when I mix new saltwater? Looks like Red Sea makes an Iodine, Potassium, Iron test kit that might be valuable in this situation? Thoughts?

It's possible that your feed water is high enough in iron so that some of it is making it through your RO/DI system, but it's probably not much. The ion rejection ratio of a RO membrane varies depending on the ion - sodium and potassium are very nearly completely eliminated, and while most RO membranes are less efficient at iron rejection, it's still pretty high. My guess is that the residual iron concentration in the product water is low enough that no chemistry kit is going to pick it up - you'd need more sophisticated analysis, such as an ion chromatograph.

The problem is that even trace amounts of iron are very effective fertilizers in a marine environment:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_fertilization

If your water is indeed very hard and contains a lot of iron, I'd consider the idea of a whole-house water softener. Not only will it ensure that your reef tank water is very pure, it will also go a long way towards making your plumbing fixtures, dishwasher, water heater and washing machine last a lot longer, not to mention your RO membrane.

 

[d2mini]

UPDATE:


So it's been a stressful few days lately. It's amazing that with all the thought, setup, execution put into a tank that stuff just happens to go wrong...

First, I added a new module to my Apex setup which caused all H-E-Double-Hockey-Sticks to break loose. Namely, it completely bricked one of my EB8's! I was up until 3am putting all my devices back in "manual" mode which was loads of fun! After spending an hour on the phone the next morning with Neptune Systems the Tech was able to fix the issue and get everything back operational. Apparently the issue is with a faulty Display Module causing multiple system errors. So I'm sending it back to be repaired....

THEN, one of my Vortech MP40's decided to crap out. After trouble shooting for an hour or so the problem was a dead power cable?!?!?! I thought for sure it was the power supply but no, the actual power cable is broken. What??? I've never in the history of using electronic devices had a power cable go bad, especially one that never gets plugged/unplugged. Crazy. So I dug through a few boxes and found a backup cable, plugged it in, and the Vortech powers up perfectly.


So needless to say I was pretty ticked off at my tank for a couple days. :lol: I have some new goodies on their way so hopefully I'll get over my reef grudge.

That's crazy! haha
Luckily it was nothing major, all fixable. But frustrating, i'm sure! :deadhorse1: