My Aquaforest cube, just the way I like it!

[DiscusHeckel]

Took some led shots with my phone so only a few corals actually show.

This favites coral will extend its tentacles up to 6 inches or even longer in the dark if the water flow is high. I would not keep any acro within this diameter.

 

[Piper27]

That's a jack-o'-lantern lepto with filaments out. I have had a few favites colonys before and defiantly won't ever keep thoes in an sps tank. They are eviiiiiillll... Even the lepto I keep on the bottom far away from any acros.

 

[Piper27]

Help me out guys...

So suddenly I have been having issues with nitrates creaping up. I haven't changed anything on my rodi unit which has been working for years. All filters were good and I even changed out the prefilters. Still getting about 4ppm nitrates per salifert kit. I am wondering if somehow I am getting chloramines which hampered my ro filter but it's new too and still getting 3tds after the ro unit. Other than that I have no clue why I would be getting any reading at all. Anyone have any ideas? It's defiantly coming straight out of my rodi unit. I am also afraid phosphates are coming out too but don't have a test kit for it on me. I will have to check everything again tomorrow since I changed all prefilters. I did check right after I changed them though.

I have seen a color shift on a few acropora which worried me so I checked things and found my rodi top off tank had white bubble bacteria growth at the top of the water. This is when I checked my source water. I had two acros rtn in the matter of hours which looked like a bacteria infecting just ripped through them. Others look ok for now. This could have happened because I upped my carbon source some to drop the nitrates back down, which reached the same as what was coming out of my ro unit, 4ppm. That took care of the nitrates and phosphates in the tank but could have caused the rtn. Or more than nitrates are getting through. I am getting 3ppm after ro and 0 after di like always though...

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[Piper27]

This is what my top off looked like...

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[Rakie]

Ouch! Scrub out that ATO with some Vinegar, let it dry completely and hit it again with a light bleach solution and 2 rounds of rinsing -- Or another vinegar scrub.

Otherwise, as far as the tank goes all you can do immediately are run Carbon and a BIG water change.

 

[justy]

If you have changed out you filters recently i would carefully check the the length of each filter and compare it to your old ones i had a situation when i swapped my fillters and noticed that one of the o rings on the carbon filter was not making contact with the filter body and water was bypassing the filter. Removed and measured it and it was about 5 mm smaller than my old one! Installed another o ring off my old fillter. This sorted the problem.
Its a long shot but worth checking out,

 

[Piper27]

Ouch! Scrub out that ATO with some Vinegar, let it dry completely and hit it again with a light bleach solution and 2 rounds of rinsing -- Or another vinegar scrub.

Otherwise, as far as the tank goes all you can do immediately are run Carbon and a BIG water change.

I scrubbed it with vinegar but no bleach. I can't do any water changes because the ro water has the nitrates and I am worried more than that could be going through.

 

[Piper27]

If you have changed out you filters recently i would carefully check the the length of each filter and compare it to your old ones i had a situation when i swapped my fillters and noticed that one of the o rings on the carbon filter was not making contact with the filter body and water was bypassing the filter. Removed and measured it and it was about 5 mm smaller than my old one! Installed another o ring off my old fillter. This sorted the problem.
Its a long shot but worth checking out,

Hmm, good tip thank you I will check that, but if it was I would think the ro filter would be going bad and showing higher tds. Did yours do that?

 

[Piper27]

I am worried because I can tell something is off and the way the last two acros rtned scares me.

 

[milsaltnewbie07]

I am worried because I can tell something is off and the way the last two acros rtned scares me.

Are you dosing any micro E. I was dosing balling 123, with energy and micro E. Thankfully Perry noticed it, and advised me to stop it . Apparently is way to much copper for your system.

 

[Piper27]

Nope I haven't even been using the energy for a while either. I don't believe the micro e has much copper in it anyways, probably just trace amounts. I would guess the energy has the most in it. I should probably send a test out of my tank and ro water just to check where things are at.

 

[milsaltnewbie07]

Nope I haven't even been using the energy for a while either. I don't believe the micro e has much copper in it anyways, probably just trace amounts. I would guess the energy has the most in it. I should probably send a test out of my tank and ro water just to check where things are at.

Yea that would be your best bet then. Good luck with it man. Sucks to have such a nice tank through this

 

[Piper27]

Yea something always happens, especially after you get something really nice

 

[Piper27]

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[Rakie]

Whats up with that picture piper? I can't tell but is the gill plate looking funky or is that just lighting?

A good plan B when you don't know whats up is Triton. Always Triton. Dave (o2manyfish) who is the system designer for all the aquariums at Unique Corals gave us a mini lecture on them at a club meeting. He says there were tanks crashing for no apparent reason, every testable param seemed perfect, etc etc -- Only to find out the tank had a rusty impeller from a Power Head or something like that.

 

[Piper27]

I have all external pumps and new vortech so I should be ok, I check all skimmer pumps bi monthly most of the time and did a week ago. The butterfly looked great and acts good, the picture is horrible and in all blue leds so not a good representation I will check when I get home though.

 

[Rakie]

I have all external pumps and new vortech so I should be ok, I check all skimmer pumps bi monthly most of the time and did a week ago. The butterfly looked great and acts good, the picture is horrible and in all blue leds so not a good representation I will check when I get home though.

He's probably fine, I misread it as there was something affecting your fish now too.

 

[Piper27]

Ahh, no fish are fine. I think the deaths were nutrient related. I have no readable nutrients for the first time in a while and my alk is at 8.5. I think upping my carbon source dropped nutrients to quick. Plus the two that died, one never colored up and looked bad all the time. The second always collected detritus in the middle no matter what I did and it probably gave up.

I got a zero nitrate reading after running the water for a few min and testing off it. I knew you get less effectiveness of your filters off running your ro line straight to your top off tank but I didn't know you could get nitrates building up... Doesn't make sense. I am going to run a line off one of my storage tanks to gravity feed my top off so I can fun the ro filter once a week for a larger amount of gallons and see if nitrates show.
Also maybe when I shut my return off the top off lump kicked on and off and could have siphoned saltwater back to it which sat and created bacteria. My only guess on that. Still don't understand how I can get a reading on 0 tds water. I will watch it after the change and see what happens.

 

[Rakie]

From what I've been told RO/DI units need to run for a few minutes before you keep any of the water. It's what I've been doing since I got mine, but I'm no authority on this.

 

[Piper27]

Never heard of running it for a while before keeping water. Maybe when you install a new membrane. All I have read is its best to run a few gallons each time and not have it running straight to your ato and filling when a float valve drops every few hours or what have you. Certainly won't hurt to be safe though and I am no expert either. I normally fill it when it gets low but sometimes I forget to turn it off and it runs the wrong way for a little while. Hopefully everything works better when I change it up and stop forgetting to shut off the fill valve.