Jonas 3.13, 150G of Miracles fun
- Thread starter ojonas81
- Start date
Lilmatty5dimes
New member
awesome tank and great pics. good luck with your surgery and hope you have a speedy recovery.
JMorris271
New member
What ^ said.
gordonheimer
New member
Tank looks great! Are you happy with the radions?
Hope all goes well with surgery!
Hope all goes well with surgery!
jeffreylam1132
New member
Glad to see you're back and online again. Wish you all well and speedy recovery. Looking forward to all those awesome pics again. 
So my idea of getting a MP40 before the surgery to ensure flow in the tank while recovering did not work as planned. Yesterday morning I found that it had stalled. Tested a few things and spent time with the EcoTech support (great people by the way) and we finally concluded that the wetside was broken. Seems like the magnet got "fused" somehow to the plastic casing. A new wetside will be shipped out from EcoTech today and should hopefully arrive tomorrow. Sucks to have the pump go bad that fast but I am impressed over the customer support and dedication that EcoTech has.
Other than that the tank is running OK. Still have issues with high salinity (1.029) and high phosphate (~0.15). Working to lower these but not easy when you are not allowed to lift more than 5-10lbs for 4 weeks. Relying on my beautiful wife to add top off water etc.
Other than that the tank is running OK. Still have issues with high salinity (1.029) and high phosphate (~0.15). Working to lower these but not easy when you are not allowed to lift more than 5-10lbs for 4 weeks. Relying on my beautiful wife to add top off water etc.
Forgot to add that my clown fish pair have started to lay eggs. First batch came just before surgery and it has been a new one each week since then more or less. They are not very good in guarding the eggs as the shrimp keep steeling them. This last batch has survived a couple of days not so maybe they are learning as they go?
Another batch of water measurement today and it is looking better. Need to get the salinity down though as well as the phosphate but it is better than what it has been.
Sg: 1.029
Alk: 8.4
Ca: 421
Mg: 1400
PO4: 0.1
The replacement wet side from EcoTech arrived today for my MP40. So after 3 days of no flow in the tank I am back in business there too. Not a day too soon. Lets hope this wet side will work longer. EcoTech did handle it all very good although wish I did not have to be without flow for that many days.
Sg: 1.029
Alk: 8.4
Ca: 421
Mg: 1400
PO4: 0.1
The replacement wet side from EcoTech arrived today for my MP40. So after 3 days of no flow in the tank I am back in business there too. Not a day too soon. Lets hope this wet side will work longer. EcoTech did handle it all very good although wish I did not have to be without flow for that many days.
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I cannot catch a break it seems like. Woke up this morning to that my loaner return pump was shut off for unknown reasons. Everything else was working as it should (except the equipment that will automatically shut off should the return pump shut off (based on water level).
Logged into my Apex and it all looked good there until I went into the programming section for each outlet. All the code was gone. The tank still worked as it should and it obliviously was running the correct code as my dosers were doing their job etc. Fusion told me that I had a firmware upgrade to install which I went ahead and did (according to the documentation). The firmware upgrade went well and everything was looking ok. They I did the web pages upgrade and all of a sudden I could not communicate with the Apex unit anymore. No matter what I have tried it just won't communicate. I have opened a support ticket at Neptune but since it is weekend and they are based in California I probably won't get any response back until noon time on Monday the earliest.
Got everything but the ATO and dosers up and running again. The heaters won't work correctly either right now. Contemplating unplugging them just in case. Why does everything has to happen at the least convenient time (in my case here during my recovery)?
Also had an issue with my two Vortechs this morning. They would only stay powered on for 90 seconds before the driver shut down and I had to cycle the power to it for them to be running for another 90 seconds. Luckily a driver reset fixed that issue. Guess they still were connected to the Apex WXM module and something strange happened that the driver did not like?
Let's just hope that Neptune support can help me on Monday because it would suck to have to get a new unit just because I updated the software according to their instructions (done that many many times before with a lot of success).
Logged into my Apex and it all looked good there until I went into the programming section for each outlet. All the code was gone. The tank still worked as it should and it obliviously was running the correct code as my dosers were doing their job etc. Fusion told me that I had a firmware upgrade to install which I went ahead and did (according to the documentation). The firmware upgrade went well and everything was looking ok. They I did the web pages upgrade and all of a sudden I could not communicate with the Apex unit anymore. No matter what I have tried it just won't communicate. I have opened a support ticket at Neptune but since it is weekend and they are based in California I probably won't get any response back until noon time on Monday the earliest.
Got everything but the ATO and dosers up and running again. The heaters won't work correctly either right now. Contemplating unplugging them just in case. Why does everything has to happen at the least convenient time (in my case here during my recovery)?
Also had an issue with my two Vortechs this morning. They would only stay powered on for 90 seconds before the driver shut down and I had to cycle the power to it for them to be running for another 90 seconds. Luckily a driver reset fixed that issue. Guess they still were connected to the Apex WXM module and something strange happened that the driver did not like?
Let's just hope that Neptune support can help me on Monday because it would suck to have to get a new unit just because I updated the software according to their instructions (done that many many times before with a lot of success).
So the Apex unit seems to be broken. Not sure how and why but ordered a replacement unit from Neptune today (got a special deal from them) and will later send in the bad unit for evaluation/repair if needed. Should get the replacement unit on Wednesday best case. Will keep dosing manually until then.
When it rains it pours they say. Well my issues keeps coming. Skimmer stopped working today. Realized that I never really cleaned it since I got it so hopefully the pump just need a deep cleaning. Will try to do that tomorrow. I really need to step up my cleaning routines it looks like. Been slacking for too long. Tank does look OK though so hopefully it will manage some time without the skimmer.
Also suspect that I may have ick in the tank as well. My Hippo tang has showed some signs of it. The other fish seems fine so far. Problem is that I will never be able to catch the Hippo, especially not until I am fully recovered so contemplating how to proceed. I hope I won't wake up tomorrow to another issue. Think I have had enough of them for now.
When it rains it pours they say. Well my issues keeps coming. Skimmer stopped working today. Realized that I never really cleaned it since I got it so hopefully the pump just need a deep cleaning. Will try to do that tomorrow. I really need to step up my cleaning routines it looks like. Been slacking for too long. Tank does look OK though so hopefully it will manage some time without the skimmer.
Also suspect that I may have ick in the tank as well. My Hippo tang has showed some signs of it. The other fish seems fine so far. Problem is that I will never be able to catch the Hippo, especially not until I am fully recovered so contemplating how to proceed. I hope I won't wake up tomorrow to another issue. Think I have had enough of them for now.
Took the skimmer completely apart yesterday and did a deep cleaning. Let the pump run in a strong vinegar solution for 2h before reassembling the skimmer again. Runs like new again. Should have done this much sooner. Lesson learned. As soon as I am back in full business I will go over all the other equipment as well for a deep cleaning, the sump included as it has accumulated a lot of detrius over during the lift of the tank.
Pictures of the skimmer below.
Pictures of the skimmer below.
Got the replacement Apex unit from Neptune today. Tank is back in almost full automatic mode. Only thing that does not work at the moment is the Display unit (not sure why). I also have the reactors offline as they need a major cleaning. Got new media holders to use, just need to get it done. Hopefully by tomorrow. Glad to be back in automatic mode but curious to know what went wrong with the original unit. Will send it to Neptune for evaluation and see what they say.
Ich keeps taking fish from me. Lost both mandarins to it. Manages to catch my two clowns (which looked terrible yesterday) and the Hippo tang and put them in my hospital tank. Will treat them with copper and hope they will make it through. Did not manage to catch any other fish. The Yellow tang has ich symptoms as well but the other fish looks healthy (4 chromis, 2 gobies, the remaining Lyretail anthias and the two Kaudern's cardinal fish). Know that in order to completely eradicate ich from the tank is had to be completely fish-less for at least 8 weeks (will shot for 10). Not sure how to catch the remaining fish though.
Another issue that I cannot really explain is that my corals (some of them at least) are RTN-ing. Did a complete water test yesterday and nothing really sticks out. Any ideas would be helpful.
Sg: 1.028 (slightly high but is coming down slowly)
Alk: 7.7
Ca: 385 (slightly low but not terrible bad. Working on getting it up to 430 range)
Mg: 1400
NH3: 0.00
NO2: 0.00
NO3: 0.50
PO4: 0.1 (would like it slightly lower but not too bad)
Will bring water sample (both tank and RO/DI) to my LFS today to verify my measurements as well.
I am out of ideas. Ich should not have an effect on corals as far as I understood it.
Another issue that I cannot really explain is that my corals (some of them at least) are RTN-ing. Did a complete water test yesterday and nothing really sticks out. Any ideas would be helpful.
Sg: 1.028 (slightly high but is coming down slowly)
Alk: 7.7
Ca: 385 (slightly low but not terrible bad. Working on getting it up to 430 range)
Mg: 1400
NH3: 0.00
NO2: 0.00
NO3: 0.50
PO4: 0.1 (would like it slightly lower but not too bad)
Will bring water sample (both tank and RO/DI) to my LFS today to verify my measurements as well.
I am out of ideas. Ich should not have an effect on corals as far as I understood it.
Had my water being tested at my LFS this afternoon and for the most part they had the same readings as I did. Main difference was the alkalinity which I have constantly measured to 7.7 using my Red Sea test kit (bought this year and has not expired). The LFS got two separate readings of 10.2 and 10.3. That is a big difference from what I got but I do not know if it is my kit or theirs that is bad. Regardless since I have been measuring constant values all along no major fluctuation of the values has happened regardless if the true value is 7.7 or 10.2. Both are within a "normal" range too.
