Jstn
Member
This is my lab mates tank here in lab.
So for the last few months the tank was doing so, so, not great. As of recent its has been dropping down and all the coral has been ****ed for the last 2 months (some starting to die), in addition a TON of cyano.
The tank is around 8 months old, so first he started with a used tek fixture with old bulbs, we have replaced all of them to ATI new builbs over a month ago. Nothing changed, so next got new BRS rox carbon, still no improvement. He hasn't been testing parameters so we got an Alk kit (salifer), test 7.0, low but not terrible, so he started dosing and got that to 8.0. I tested Ca and Mg with my test kit at home, 450, 1300 respectively. So the big three are good. Salinity on his swing arm read 35ppt, i tested it with my refractometer and it was 32, a bit low, we since corrected that (he needs to buy a refractometer but money is tight in grad school) So next I though it was the water source, since we get it out of RODI tap in lab, maybe it was bad. I purchased a tds-3, the water in all the taps read between 0-2, so bad water is possibly out. A sixline did die a few weeks back (after the begining of decline), but additional water changes haven't done a thing.
Any other ideas, help is really appreciates, cause we are both getting very frustrated by this.
Tank specs
29 gal, 4x24 tek light, (two blue +, ATi coral plus, and Figi purple)
5-10 gal per week water changes.
Two clowns (small), fed flake (been cutting back ALOT on feeding)
Thanks for your help.
Also he doenst have the highest flow from just an ac70 and k2 powerhead.
using API test, nitrates seemed acceptably yellow .

So for the last few months the tank was doing so, so, not great. As of recent its has been dropping down and all the coral has been ****ed for the last 2 months (some starting to die), in addition a TON of cyano.
The tank is around 8 months old, so first he started with a used tek fixture with old bulbs, we have replaced all of them to ATI new builbs over a month ago. Nothing changed, so next got new BRS rox carbon, still no improvement. He hasn't been testing parameters so we got an Alk kit (salifer), test 7.0, low but not terrible, so he started dosing and got that to 8.0. I tested Ca and Mg with my test kit at home, 450, 1300 respectively. So the big three are good. Salinity on his swing arm read 35ppt, i tested it with my refractometer and it was 32, a bit low, we since corrected that (he needs to buy a refractometer but money is tight in grad school) So next I though it was the water source, since we get it out of RODI tap in lab, maybe it was bad. I purchased a tds-3, the water in all the taps read between 0-2, so bad water is possibly out. A sixline did die a few weeks back (after the begining of decline), but additional water changes haven't done a thing.
Any other ideas, help is really appreciates, cause we are both getting very frustrated by this.
Tank specs
29 gal, 4x24 tek light, (two blue +, ATi coral plus, and Figi purple)
5-10 gal per week water changes.
Two clowns (small), fed flake (been cutting back ALOT on feeding)
Thanks for your help.
Also he doenst have the highest flow from just an ac70 and k2 powerhead.
using API test, nitrates seemed acceptably yellow .