drummereef's 180g in-wall build

[dkeller_nc]

Brett:

One other thought about the "algae problem" in regards to nutrients. I looked back through about 10 pages of this thread to try to determine how many fish you had in the tank.

I did notice a fairly large yellow tang in one of the photos, and if you're keeping him/her well-fed, my guess is that the food would be most of the source of organic nutrients/iron/phosphate in your tank rather than residual iron getting through your RO/DI system.

It -looks- like you have a relatively shallow sand bed in your tank. My suggestion is that if you've a fairly high fish load and like to feed your fish well (don't we all?), then you may have a substantial detritus load in the bed unless you're vacuuming it with one of these on a regular basis:

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=23954

With any sand bed, the top 1 inch or so is a nitrification factory, since it accumulates detritus and is well-oxygenated by diffusion. With a deep sand bed, there's also a layer below the top inch or so that takes up this nitrate and turns it into nitrogen gas via anaerobic bacteria. But with a shallow bed, you have the nitrification without the de-nitrification.

I'm not advocating for a DSB necessarily, I'm just noting that you'd probably have to maintain a shallow bed differently than a DSB. That is, you'd need to vacuum a reasonable portion of it every week or so to remove organic material.

My guess is that your test kits are reading very low nitrate, but it's still possible to have a large nitrate source in the tank and have near zero nitrate concentration in the water. Specifically, a large bioload of algae can remove most of the nitrate from the water to support its growth. So you have lots of algae but still have very clean water.

 

[drummereef]

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.

Gotcha, thanks for the info Shaggss.

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.



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.

Very interesting dkeller. I have a valve on the feed side of my RO/DI but I haven't ever heard about valving the product/waste side down to allow better rejection rates. Interesting... I do agree about the water softener, as we have very hard water here. That might just do the trick.

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

I was making me want to... :headwally: LOL

Brett:

One other thought about the "algae problem" in regards to nutrients. I looked back through about 10 pages of this thread to try to determine how many fish you had in the tank.

I did notice a fairly large yellow tang in one of the photos, and if you're keeping him/her well-fed, my guess is that the food would be most of the source of organic nutrients/iron/phosphate in your tank rather than residual iron getting through your RO/DI system.

It -looks- like you have a relatively shallow sand bed in your tank. My suggestion is that if you've a fairly high fish load and like to feed your fish well (don't we all?), then you may have a substantial detritus load in the bed unless you're vacuuming it with one of these on a regular basis:

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=23954

With any sand bed, the top 1 inch or so is a nitrification factory, since it accumulates detritus and is well-oxygenated by diffusion. With a deep sand bed, there's also a layer below the top inch or so that takes up this nitrate and turns it into nitrogen gas via anaerobic bacteria. But with a shallow bed, you have the nitrification without the de-nitrification.

I'm not advocating for a DSB necessarily, I'm just noting that you'd probably have to maintain a shallow bed differently than a DSB. That is, you'd need to vacuum a reasonable portion of it every week or so to remove organic material.

My guess is that your test kits are reading very low nitrate, but it's still possible to have a large nitrate source in the tank and have near zero nitrate concentration in the water. Specifically, a large bioload of algae can remove most of the nitrate from the water to support its growth. So you have lots of algae but still have very clean water.

I do siphon the sand bed but it's been very difficult to do it effectively, i.e. siphon by removing water from the tank, because any new additions of saltwater would cause another bloom. I do, albeit infrequently, siphon into a filter bag but it's likely only removing larger detritus particles. It's like I'm stuck between doing water changes and getting an algae bloom because of it. Obviously frustrating as you could imagine.

 

[drummereef]

So in the interest of time... is there a way to remove excess Iron once it's in the aquarium? I primarily use GFO for PO4 removal which probably isn't helping the Iron issue (if presumably it is Iron causing the algae/dinoflagellate problem).

Anything specifically that absorbs excess Fe?

 

[drummereef]

UPDATE:


New additions as promised... Salty Underground is top-notch! :thumbsup: It's nice having a tank with some active fish again.

 

[drummereef]

So my current stock list is:

1 Yellow Tang
1 Melanurus Wrasse
2 Ocellaris Clowns
1 Cleaner Wrasse
1 Diamond Goby
12 Blue/Green Chromis

 

[tj1627]

I do siphon the sand bed but it's been very difficult to do it effectively, i.e. siphon by removing water from the tank, because any new additions of saltwater would cause another bloom. I do, albeit infrequently, siphon into a filter bag but it's likely only removing larger detritus particles. It's like I'm stuck between doing water changes and getting an algae bloom because of it. Obviously frustrating as you could imagine.

Brett,

I ran into a similar situation in my 55. I couldn't siphon enough of the sandbed before I'd removed all of the water I wanted to exchange for the WC. I found a decent solution to it, however.

I run filter socks in my sump, so (while the return pump was still running), I started to vacuum the sandbed, but instead of emptying the siphon tube into a bucket or drain, I used one of the tube clips that came with it and snapped it onto the filter sock rim. That way all of the water i siphoned just went into the filter sock in the sump. Filter sock caught all of the detritus I was removing, and when I was done I switched out the socks.

Even if you don't usually run socks, you could put one in your sump around the siphon line just temporarily while you do the maintenance.

HTH

-Tim

 

[Sugar Magnolia]

[/IMG]

The little clown on the right looks like it has an underbite. :lol:

The tank looks really nice Brett!

 

[drummereef]

Brett,

I ran into a similar situation in my 55. I couldn't siphon enough of the sandbed before I'd removed all of the water I wanted to exchange for the WC. I found a decent solution to it, however.

I run filter socks in my sump, so (while the return pump was still running), I started to vacuum the sandbed, but instead of emptying the siphon tube into a bucket or drain, I used one of the tube clips that came with it and snapped it onto the filter sock rim. That way all of the water i siphoned just went into the filter sock in the sump. Filter sock caught all of the detritus I was removing, and when I was done I switched out the socks.

Even if you don't usually run socks, you could put one in your sump around the siphon line just temporarily while you do the maintenance.

HTH

-Tim

Thanks Tim, that is exactly what I do. I did another siphon last night into one of my socks. I used a 10 micron filter sock to catch as much small stuff as possible. It's one of the socks I was using when I dosed Lanthanum Chloride.

The little clown on the right looks like it has an underbite. :lol:

The tank looks really nice Brett!

Hahaha, it's a brand new variety called the "bulldog clown" I think that one is the female as the larger one on the top (in the pic) is showing some dominance bahavior. Both are eating well so I hope they grow up to be big fat bulldog clowns.

 

[d2mini]

The little clown on the right looks like it has an underbite. :lol:

The tank looks really nice Brett!

:lol: Or a really old fish that took his dentures out. :thumbsup:

Nice additions, Brett!

 

[drummereef]

:lol: Or a really old fish that took his dentures out. :thumbsup:

Nice additions, Brett!

Haha! I'm going to get her a little fish cane so she can put the smack down on her boyfriend. LOL

 

[drummereef]

UPDATE:


So I've added some new toys to the setup. I needed to upgrade my method of dosing because I was at the limit of what my Kalk dosing setup could maintain. I was mixing Kalk every 2 days and it was becoming a serious issue to keep up with. So I decided on a Geo 618 Calcium Reactor, Aquarium Plants Carbon Doser Regulator and a 5 LB CO2 tank. Still need to clean up the wire management but here's the setup so far.


Aquarium Plants Carbon Doser Regulator and 5 LB CO2 Tank.

Closeup of the Regulator. So far it's working as advertised. Very easy to target settings and is very consistent.

Geo 618 Calcium Reactor with 1 gallon of ARM Coarse Media. I'm very impressed with the build quality of the reactor. Thing is built like a tank! George at Geo is a fantastic guy. Very quick to reply to questions and seems generally interested in his customers having success with his products. :thumbsup:

And a size comparison of my SWC 250A skimmer and the Geo 618 Reactor. I ended up placing the reactor in-sump since I had the space and if there are any leaks they could be easily contained.

 

[aquaph8]

Awesome new pics, your corals are looking great. Some day I go with some orange clowns, my whole family gives me grief for not having them. Ive always had black clowns. Geo is an awesome company, I have their kalk reactor and love it. Now that you got it all set up, come clean my sump. :hammer: I wish mine looked that clean.

 

[tj1627]

I SEE A WIRE!!!!! j/k :lol:

I don't run one myself, but friends of mine who do love them. Are you planning on using a second reaction chamber at all? As I understand it, if you start having too strong of a pH drop in your tank, you can use a second reaction chamber to react any leftover CO2.

 

[psteeleb]

love the clowns - great color

great add on the CaRx, keeping it in sump is the way to go, I've had several minor very small leaks / salt creep issues surface around the recirc pump (cheap MJ) that are just a pain to clean up but not a real drain on the system. I may have to see if I can rework an area of my sump to do the same

Also nice upgrade on the regulator, I've heard from several people that think they are well worth the extra money, it's another thing I have on my wish list.

As for a second chamber on the reactor; I find mild kalc dosing keeps the pH elevated enough but if I was to do something I'd just build a small box out of eggcrate and window screen (or get fancy and make an acrylic box), fill it with media and run the effluent through. It would have the same result, for way less money and be far easier to reload and clean.

 

[dkeller_nc]

I do siphon the sand bed but it's been very difficult to do it effectively, i.e. siphon by removing water from the tank, because any new additions of saltwater would cause another bloom. I do, albeit infrequently, siphon into a filter bag but it's likely only removing larger detritus particles. It's like I'm stuck between doing water changes and getting an algae bloom because of it. Obviously frustrating as you could imagine.

Something seems a bit "off" here - you really shouldn't get an actual algae bloom from doing a water change (at least a reasonable water change - up to 15%).

If this is actually the case, I'd strongly suspect that you have some water or salt issues. What you might want to investigate is a testing lab for a one-off test of your water. In some states, you can actually have this done for little money through an agricultural extension office. If you have to have a private lab do it, it might run you $150 or so for major contaminating ionic species in water. What you want is an ion chromatograph method (you might actually have to specify this), or better, ICAP (inductively coupled argon plasma). Most water labs should have both methods available.

What you will get back is an absolutely unimpeachable profile of your purified water - and one heck of a lot more accurate and sensitive than any chemistry kit.

By the way - it's dangerous to run the kind of cylinder you're using for CO2 without a securing strap. While CO2 cylinders aren't as pressurized as something like a nitrogen or helium tank, it'll still create a rocket if you knock the main valve off by hitting it with something. If you strap it, it'll still scare the crap out of you, and flood the room with CO2 (not a good thing, of course), but it won't go through a wall.

 

[drummereef]

Awesome new pics, your corals are looking great. Some day I go with some orange clowns, my whole family gives me grief for not having them. Ive always had black clowns. Geo is an awesome company, I have their kalk reactor and love it. Now that you got it all set up, come clean my sump. :hammer: I wish mine looked that clean.

Haha, thanks Brett. I love the b/w clowns too. I decided on the orange just because I didn't have any brightly colored fish. For as common as they are they do brighten up the tank surprisingly well.

I SEE A WIRE!!!!! j/k :lol:

I don't run one myself, but friends of mine who do love them. Are you planning on using a second reaction chamber at all? As I understand it, if you start having too strong of a pH drop in your tank, you can use a second reaction chamber to react any leftover CO2.

Haha. Yeah, I need to reroute some wiring again - primarily my return pump. I ran out of available outlets but just got my EB4 that was on back order. I'm going to put the heaters behind the skimmer so there's more room in the return side for the reactors. That way I can free up some receptacles on the right side of the sump.

I haven't seen a significant pH drop as of yet, running fairly consistent from 8.0-8.10 roughly. I thought the tank was running higher in general but my sump probe had apparently drifted out of calibration. I wasn't too worried about regular calibration since the sump probe was just monitoring. I'll be much more diligent now.

love the clowns - great color

great add on the CaRx, keeping it in sump is the way to go, I've had several minor very small leaks / salt creep issues surface around the recirc pump (cheap MJ) that are just a pain to clean up but not a real drain on the system. I may have to see if I can rework an area of my sump to do the same

Also nice upgrade on the regulator, I've heard from several people that think they are well worth the extra money, it's another thing I have on my wish list.

As for a second chamber on the reactor; I find mild kalc dosing keeps the pH elevated enough but if I was to do something I'd just build a small box out of eggcrate and window screen (or get fancy and make an acrylic box), fill it with media and run the effluent through. It would have the same result, for way less money and be far easier to reload and clean.

OK I will keep the DIY 2nd chamber in mind, great idea btw. The regulator seems rock solid. I've timed the bubbles and they are extremely consistent based upon the little red light that blinks on the unit. Still fussing with the effluent a bit. Tonight I put the needle valve back on the reactor's feed - after the ball valve. Seems to be stable now (no internal bubbles) possibly because the reactor is "pressurized" and is somewhat dialed in. I have moderate pressure coming into the needle valve, then I've turned the needle down to just above where I need the effluent to be. Then I fined tuned the small ball valve to the desired drip rate on the effluent tubing. That little pinch valve I ordered should be here tomorrow so I'm going to replace the effluent valve with this. I think it will be much more accurate and easier to dial in a specific ml/min rate. I'll keep you posted.

Something seems a bit "off" here - you really shouldn't get an actual algae bloom from doing a water change (at least a reasonable water change - up to 15%).

If this is actually the case, I'd strongly suspect that you have some water or salt issues. What you might want to investigate is a testing lab for a one-off test of your water. In some states, you can actually have this done for little money through an agricultural extension office. If you have to have a private lab do it, it might run you $150 or so for major contaminating ionic species in water. What you want is an ion chromatograph method (you might actually have to specify this), or better, ICAP (inductively coupled argon plasma). Most water labs should have both methods available.

What you will get back is an absolutely unimpeachable profile of your purified water - and one heck of a lot more accurate and sensitive than any chemistry kit.

By the way - it's dangerous to run the kind of cylinder you're using for CO2 without a securing strap. While CO2 cylinders aren't as pressurized as something like a nitrogen or helium tank, it'll still create a rocket if you knock the main valve off by hitting it with something. If you strap it, it'll still scare the crap out of you, and flood the room with CO2 (not a good thing, of course), but it won't go through a wall.

I still think it's residual Dinoflagellates. The way it effects the corals has been a tell-tale sign. Not for certain unless I send a sample off of course. From my research, Dinos will definitely get worse after a water change - which again is what I've experienced. Now, this isn't to say that a water test wouldn't be a good idea, but there's plenty of guys in the reef clubs out my way that are on the same municipal water and have similar if not the same RO/DI units. I can't see what the variable would be except for a biological imbalance in my tank which caused the Dinos to begin with. There could have been some work done on some pipes in my area which caused acute unfavorable tap water quality but I don't know. I would assume the RO/DI would be capable of handling it. Hmmm... :hmm4:

Another thought is I was dosing quite a bit of Kalkwasser in my tank. I wonder if the the solution wasn't completely clear when dosing and/or the dosing pump was picking up some impurities off the bottom of the bucket. Either way, it's getting marginally better since I've taken the Kalk doser offline. :hmm6: And I added 12 Trochus snails that might be making a small dent as well.

 

[dkeller_nc]

I still think it's residual Dinoflagellates. The way it effects the corals has been a tell-tale sign. Not for certain unless I send a sample off of course. From my research, Dinos will definitely get worse after a water change - which again is what I've experienced. Now, this isn't to say that a water test wouldn't be a good idea, but there's plenty of guys in the reef clubs out my way that are on the same municipal water and have similar if not the same RO/DI units. I can't see what the variable would be except for a biological imbalance in my tank which caused the Dinos to begin with. There could have been some work done on some pipes in my area which caused acute unfavorable tap water quality but I don't know. I would assume the RO/DI would be capable of handling it. Hmmm... :hmm4:

Another thought is I was dosing quite a bit of Kalkwasser in my tank. I wonder if the the solution wasn't completely clear when dosing and/or the dosing pump was picking up some impurities off the bottom of the bucket. Either way, it's getting marginally better since I've taken the Kalk doser offline. :hmm6: And I added 12 Trochus snails that might be making a small dent as well.

Well, it's possible that if you were dosing a turbid solution of kalkwasser (i.e., directly introducing the solids into the sump/tank) that the kalkwasser powder had some impurities in it. That's a good reason to mix kalkwasser up off-line and let it settle. The extreme pH of kalkwasser renders most metallic impurities insoluble, so they settle out. I suspect that's why folks can get away with using agricultural lime for this purpose.

If you've dinos, do you have a sterilizer in your system? I'm just thinking out loud here, but I can two sides to this - running a sterilizer for a few hours a week might substantially help to knock down the free-swimming stage of the dino life cycle, and so might help. Running the sterilizer flat-out continuously, especially if it's a high wattage one, might oxidize most if not all of the organic matter in your water column before your skimmer can remove it. This might not be a good thing - it could add substantial nitrogen and/or phosphate to your system.

 

[dkeller_nc]

Brett - There's an article on iron and reef tanks in the latest Reef Hobbyist magazine. Thought you might want to check it out. I do disagree with the author, btw, that iron is effectively removed by activated carbon. Activated carbon is extremely effective in removing hydrophobic organic materials, but not so useful at removing ionic solutes. I suppose it's possible that someone has observed iron concentration reduction in aquarium water after putting carbon in-line because of some carbon's high phosphate content.

 

[drummereef]

Well, it's possible that if you were dosing a turbid solution of kalkwasser (i.e., directly introducing the solids into the sump/tank) that the kalkwasser powder had some impurities in it. That's a good reason to mix kalkwasser up off-line and let it settle. The extreme pH of kalkwasser renders most metallic impurities insoluble, so they settle out. I suspect that's why folks can get away with using agricultural lime for this purpose.

If you've dinos, do you have a sterilizer in your system? I'm just thinking out loud here, but I can two sides to this - running a sterilizer for a few hours a week might substantially help to knock down the free-swimming stage of the dino life cycle, and so might help. Running the sterilizer flat-out continuously, especially if it's a high wattage one, might oxidize most if not all of the organic matter in your water column before your skimmer can remove it. This might not be a good thing - it could add substantial nitrogen and/or phosphate to your system.

Brett - There's an article on iron and reef tanks in the latest Reef Hobbyist magazine. Thought you might want to check it out. I do disagree with the author, btw, that iron is effectively removed by activated carbon. Activated carbon is extremely effective in removing hydrophobic organic materials, but not so useful at removing ionic solutes. I suppose it's possible that someone has observed iron concentration reduction in aquarium water after putting carbon in-line because of some carbon's high phosphate content.

Indeed. I usually allowed the Kalkwasser to settle anywhere from 2-4 hours before the dosing pump would kick on. But, that didn't discount the fact that the down-tube in my Kalk bucket might have been picking up some of the built up slurry on the bottom of the bucket. :facepalm: Not for certain, but was a possibility.

Thanks for the heads up, I will check out the article. One side note about running carbon... I haven't run carbon in months because it was making the algae/dinos (or whaterver it is) worse. I could see a significant difference in the decline of the corals when I would put carbon in the sump, either in my reactor or a passive filter bag - even when running very small amounts of it. I primarily ran ROX 0.8 carbon. This being said, I had a severe imbalance of PO4 to NO3 form months if not years, where PO4 was high and NO3 was undetectable. Seeing there was this imbalance and the low levels of NO3 in the water column were (I assume) unavailable for the corals to uptake, running carbon was extremely harsh on the tissues of my corals, causing all kinds of issues. I've recently re-balanced the ratio of NO3 to PO4 somewhat (2.5 / 0.03) and am trying to maintain those levels accordingly. The new fish should make it somewhat easier to maintain moderate NO3 as well I'm assuming - extra bioload.

 

[cromedogg33]

Brett,

Have you taken a look at some pictures/articles of calothrix?