Independence Day was pretty exciting for me. The previous evening I got 3 acro frags: millipora, tenuis, and ??. I'll get some pics once they've had time to acclimate and once the polyps are better extended. The tenuis opened immediately, the millipora opened after a few hours, and the ?? is still trying to decide if it's happy in my tank or not. That night I fed the tank and when the pumps were supposed to turn back on, the CL pump did not. Another seizure (ugh). Author's comment - Why is it called "seizing" when something stops completely? If a person has a seizure, there are vigorous and nearly continuous movements. Our language is quite peculiar sometimes. Just 3 months previously I completely cleaned this pump out with muriatic acid - it was as good as new at that time. It was late and I was tired, so I put a couple MaxiJets into the tank and tackled the problem early in the morning on July 4th.
Remember I mentioned that it was impossible to remove the SCWD without removing the light rack? Well out of necessity I figured out a way to do it. There was nobody to help me, and since I was going to have to disassemble the Mag12 CL pump, I figured I may as well remove the SCWD and clean it out since it had been making a "whirring" sound. This began 2 weeks ago, just before I left for vacation. To make a long (and not all that interesting) story short, I removed the SCWD, the CL drain pipe which was already covered in coralline algae since cleaning it less than 3 months ago, and the Mag12 for a thorough muriatic acid wash. When I drained the closed loop before disassembly the water smelled like it came right out of a public toilet. It was a horribly nasty smell. There was a fair amount of detritus that drained into the bucket, and I suppose this represented material that settled into the T'd off section of the closed loop. Perhaps this has been contributing to some immesurable phosphates/nutrients in my system, as the macroalgae (caulerpa, halimeda and valonia) continue to proliferate in my tank.? I think I'm going to start to drain the closed loop during my water changes to avoid this detrital buildup in the future.
The inside of the pump was covered with calcium deposits, so much in fact that I snapped the end of the impeller off when trying to remove it. Fortunately I had a spare :smokin: and replaced the part. With my relatively high pH and regular additions of copious B-Ionic, TurboCalcium and baking soda, I guess I'll have to plan on cleaning out all of my pumps/powerheads every 2 months in order to avoid this type of problem in the future. That's not too ominous, I guess. Unfortunately the SCWD continues to make that funny sound, so I'm thinking of getting a spare SCWD as well in case this one decides to crap out on me.
. I'm going off to get some new stuff today. Depending on how they look, I will most likely get some GSP and a frogspawn. All the corals I have bought so far have been doing extremely well. I might also try out an ocellaris clown; I have been waiting for a nice small one to come in. BTW, the only reason I spent 40 bucks on my first fish is because the goby was the most timid of the fish I want to get, and is sometimes a jumper, so I thought I would add him first and let him settle in before adding more active fish. It has been a few weeks since the death of the yasha goby, so maybe I will have better luck with the ocecllaris.
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