My 280g Custom upgrade.....

[SPotter]

Slow and steady. Great job Steve. And you just reminded me about the LC treatment. What is the ratio of LC to RO/DI water again?

Thanks wayne. I also forgot to add that I hooked a new pressure washer up to my water storage tanks and pressure washed them with rodi too.

Sent from my SCH-I510 using Tapatalk 2

 

[danfeig]

Over the last two weeks I have done the following to my rock.....

*Dipped in muriatic acid
*Scrubbed, rinse and soak in RODI for 5 days
*Changed the water and soaked agin for 48hrs in a 50/50 vinegar/rodi bath
*Changed the water and started treating with Lanthanum Chloride on a daily basis.

Results....for the last 3 days I have been testing po4 @ .01 ppm on the milwaukee martini phosphate tester.

Today I gave the rocks a really good rinse to remove and precipitate from the LC, drained/cleaned the bins and filled them back up with fresh salt water. The bins have a few power heads, a heater and mag pump for circulation. I will keep my fingers crossed and see how this works out.

I am thinking about adding live rock to the system as well. I am converting the tank that was plumbed into my system as a water change tank into a rock sump so I will be needing additional rock and thought it would be good to use live rock for this in addition to what ever other rock I have that doesnt make its way back into the dt.

Awesome! I will keep my fingers crossed for you!!!

When you make a fresh batch of saltwater next time, use your martini phosphate tester and check the batch too.

 

[Newbie Aquarist]

What is the ratio of LC to RO/DI water again?

 

[SPotter]

What is the ratio of LC to RO/DI water again?

There seems to be a lot of different ratios floating around Wayne. When I was doing treatments on my tank I was using 3ml/2l of water. I know there are guys using 5ml/1l of water. While treating the rocks in the bin with no livestock I was just adding LC directly to the bins at about 10ml per dose. You have to be careful because the precipitate that develops as a result of the LC can be harmful to livestock.

 

[biecacka]

Good work. I'm about to do bleach/RoDi dip then muriatic acid. No more algae for me....I hope
Corey

 

[SPotter]

I took some pictures of some corals that I moved to the frag tank a while ago. Pics are taken with my new iPhone5.












Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Newbie Aquarist]

Is that a setosa? One of the largest I have seen.

 

[Newbie Aquarist]

There seems to be a lot of different ratios floating around Wayne. When I was doing treatments on my tank I was using 3ml/2l of water. I know there are guys using 5ml/1l of water. While treating the rocks in the bin with no livestock I was just adding LC directly to the bins at about 10ml per dose. You have to be careful because the precipitate that develops as a result of the LC can be harmful to livestock.

Thanks for the info. I will slow drip it like one every two seconds. Got my 10 micron socks all ready.

 

[SPotter]

Is that a setosa? One of the largest I have seen.

Yup....seems like one of the only sps I can't kill. It's really grown a lot in the last few months.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Dustin1300]

That is a nice looking Setosa, been a relatively slow grower for me in the past.

Wayne, I drip 2-3 mL/2L when I dose LaCl. When I get my full system up and running I'll be setting up a couple 10 micron socks in a tray to catch the precipitate. I'll then constantly dose the LaCl solution into the output pipe of my skimmer.

 

[SPotter]

That is a nice looking Setosa, been a relatively slow grower for me in the past.

I had it for a year and it really did nothing until september and pretty much has tripled since then.


Im still trying to figure out how I want to dose LaCl3 over the long term. I just cleaned out the rock bins yesterday and it was amazing how much of the precipitate had built up on the powerheads, heater and the bottom of the bins.

 

[Newbie Aquarist]

There seems to be a lot of different ratios floating around Wayne. When I was doing treatments on my tank I was using 3ml/2l of water. I know there are guys using 5ml/1l of water. While treating the rocks in the bin with no livestock I was just adding LC directly to the bins at about 10ml per dose. You have to be careful because the precipitate that develops as a result of the LC can be harmful to livestock.

That is a nice looking Setosa, been a relatively slow grower for me in the past.

Wayne, I drip 2-3 mL/2L when I dose LaCl. When I get my full system up and running I'll be setting up a couple 10 micron socks in a tray to catch the precipitate. I'll then constantly dose the LaCl solution into the output pipe of my skimmer.

Thank you both. I will start that soon. My phosphates are creeping up and I cut down on feeding.

 

[SPotter]

Rock project....time to raise the white flag

Rock project....time to raise the white flag

Well just when I thought I had conquered the po4 issue with the rock things have progressively gotten worse this week.

Here are the daily test results after adding saltwater to the curing bins...

Feb 1 .01ppm
Feb 2 .01ppm
Feb 3 .02ppm
Feb 4 .03ppm
Feb 5 .05ppm
Feb 6 .07ppm

This is all happening while running 1/2 cup of GFO on the bins that have a total volume of about 50g. I just cant imagine how long it will take to remove the po4 or get the level down to a point where I comfortable with it and not exhausting gfo on a weekly basis.

 

[Dustin1300]

I'm really surprised at these numbers. There's no question why you were having issues in your tank. I could look back and find this answer but where did you get this rock?!

 

[SPotter]

I'm really surprised at these numbers. There's no question why you were having issues in your tank. I could look back and find this answer but where did you get this rock?!

Yeah I am equally surprised and disappointed in them because I really like the rock but this has been an exhausting process already and no idea how long it will take to totally release the po4. I realize I could be just a couple of weeks away from the rock exhausting all of the po4 from it and I could
be several months away as well. My concern is that this rock is so pourous that I am afraid I will be facing this issue again in a few yrs. The rock is 100 lbs of BRS Pukani and 50 lbs of BRS Shelf rock.

When I set up my first system I used a combination of Marco and Vanuatu live rock from Live Aquaria and I am going to go back to that combination (not vanuatu too expensive) but I will use more live rock than dry rock this time around. I realize its going to be $$$ and I will need to recure the live rock but it worked well for me once so I am going to do it again.

 

[Newbie Aquarist]

I am sure you have read this as everyone else but its the Pukani rock. Plus if you are doing the LC treatment it possibly could be giving you a false reading as it collects the precipitate it is still phosphate in the water. That is my thinking and I could be wrong. I hope I didn't confuse you.

 

[SPotter]

I am sure you have read this as everyone else but its the Pukani rock. Plus if you are doing the LC treatment it possibly could be giving you a false reading as it collects the precipitate it is still phosphate in the water. That is my thinking and I could be wrong. I hope I didn't confuse you.

Yeah it seems like its hit or miss with the Pukani. Some guys have had no problems with it and others have taken tanks down over it. There's a debate going on right now about whether or not LC precipitate will cause false po4 readings and its not supposed to. However, before putting the rock back into new saltwater, I thoroughly rinsed the rocks with rodi and dunked them several times to remove the precipitate from the rocks. I then cleaned the bins out to remove any sediment that built up from the LC. While there are no absolutes in this hobby, I am convinced its the rocks.

 

[Dustin1300]

If you are looking at Marco rock check out directly from the source buying his sliced rock. You can do some cool aquascaping with the cutting he can perform.

 

[danfeig]

Steve, a few questions for you...What is the PO4 level of the water, before you add it to the rocks? Secondly, have you been changing the water in the bins or letting it soak in the same water? Finally and this is more out of curiosity, what brand of GFO are you using?

I am one of those guys that used over 300lbs of Dry Pukani rock and never had an issue.

 

[SPotter]

Steve, a few questions for you...What is the PO4 level of the water, before you add it to the rocks? Secondly, have you been changing the water in the bins or letting it soak in the same water? Finally and this is more out of curiosity, what brand of GFO are you using?

I am one of those guys that used over 300lbs of Dry Pukani rock and never had an issue.

Hey Dan, for the first two weeks it was in rodi and po4 was measuring 0 and I did 100% wc's on the 7 and 14 day marks with a couple of 50% water changes in between the 100% changes. I switched over to saltwater this past week and unfortunately had not tested the water before putting it into the bins but did test a fresh batch that was made a few days later and that was .03 on the martini and zero on salifert. That's when I put new BRS gfo in the reactor for the bins. I have not changed any of the water in the bins this week since because I wanted to clean the storage tank that I use to mix salt which I did yesterday. It's now filled with fresh rodi and I will be adding salt tonight to do a water change tomorrow.

I had been able to get the water in the bins down to .01 but that was with the help of 3 cups of gfo and dosing LaCl3 daily.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk