SPS corals dieing, can you help me solve this multivariable problem?

[jabel]

I was fighting the same issue for more than a year. I lost over 90% of my sps to this slow death and I looked at everything. Here are the 3 major things that fixed the problem and you already gotten some advice on each.
1) Double check our major test kits: salinity, alk and pH (probe)
2) High alk (above 9) and low nutrient (phosphates) systems seem to have problems. Do a quick search on RC and you will find 30 related stories. Here's where double checking your alk test comes in.
3) Change RODI rilters regularly and check with you water co to see if they are adding chloramines. You can have chloramines and still get a 0 TDS reading. If you do then you will need to load up on charbon filters in you RODI system. Not expensive, but a must.

Out of all of this the chloramines have had the biggest impact. I'm thinking that they build up over time in the tank with water changes and this slowly stresses the sps out. Any further stress from pH/alk swings can push them over the edge.
Turns out my water co just started adding and ramping up the chloramine addition to our water this year and that directly correllates to the time of my problems.
Good luck.
Jeff

 

[ruprecht]

Taqpol,

It could be that your alkalinity is out of balance. Alkalinity between 7-11 dKH can be fine if your ions are in the correct proportion. A slow rise from 8-10 is not all that bad. Read this article and think about all that you have done in the past few months and how it would have affected the overall balance. My guess is that initially your 2 part dosing exceeded your tanks requirements and threw things out of whack and you have been chasing numbers trying to get things back to normal.

For more alkalinity reading:
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/feb2002/chemistry.htm
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/mar2002/chem.htm
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/oct2003/chem.htm
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-04/rhf/feature/
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/index.php

 

[Roll221]

Out of all of this the chloramines have had the biggest impact. I'm thinking that they build up over time in the tank with water changes and this slowly stresses the sps out. Any further stress from pH/alk swings can push them over the edge.
Turns out my water co just started adding and ramping up the chloramine addition to our water this year and that directly correllates to the time of my problems.
Good luck.
Jeff

Have you called you local water treatment facility to see if they are using Chloramines in your water? Do this! If they are I am betting this is your problem. My tank did the same thing jebel said, I just think they built up over time and the tank just could not process them anymore. If you do have Chloramines you can still have 0 TDS, and your RO is not taking them out of the water by its self. Bulk Reef Supplies carries the catalytic carbon and carbon block filters you need to get this nasty stuff out of your RO/DI water!