ARM MEDIA WHAT ARE WE DISSOLVING IN THE REACTOR

chicago · Mar 5, 2022

This issue has been talked about a bit.. ARM v REBORN v ect. As most know hard to get coral sticks to melt now a days.. but to my direct question.... I pulled out some of the darker off color bits and pieces in my last ARM Coarse order. Talk a look at the pics.. Is this aragonite or something else we are melting and if so.. issues to be concerned with. Notice the some pieces have like pitch black in them... note these are a few of the darker pieces I pulled out.. ? Will this even melt at 6.2 or so.?

PeterC99 · Mar 5, 2022

I gave up on Arm and switched to Reborn. Melts at a much higher ph (6.5 vs 6.2). May have to wait a bit for the Reborn but worth it!

JMetaxas · Mar 5, 2022

Reborn for me. I filled my Ca+ reactor with both Reborn and the ARM stuff. The Reborn is all gone with hardly any of the ARM.

chicago · Mar 5, 2022

and if anyone cares to take a look.. here is a pic of reborn... showing the good and what I call maybe bad.. sea shells.. in the end.. how bad is it to melt the shells.. I think that is a preference and depends on our phosphate levels.

PeterC99 said:
I gave up on Arm and switched to Reborn. Melts at a much higher ph (6.5 vs 6.2). May have to wait a bit for the Reborn but worth it!

Was the arm even melting at 6.2???

chicago · Mar 5, 2022

The darker pieces... any thoughts what exactly we are melting

X-37B · Mar 5, 2022

chicago said:
and if anyone cares to take a look.. here is a pic of reborn... showing the good and what I call maybe bad.. sea shells.. in the end.. how bad is it to melt the shells.. I think that is a preference and depends on our phosphate levels.

Was the arm even melting at 6.2???

Most shells contain alot of po4.
I have around 90lbs left of coral bones and I pick out the shells when prepping it for my carx.

When I run out of the bones I will go back to Tunze manmade media.
The Tunze media only delivers alk&ca. I buy it every once in awhile and have plenty instock.
It is a very clean media. I used it for a year in a Tunze 3171 which is on the small size but very efficient with their media.

SamsReef · Mar 5, 2022

To all the reborn users, do check phosphate from the effluent. Sure the media dissolves at higher ph compared to other media but it is a major phosphate factory. There is a reason BRS stopped carrying reborn….
I got a 44 lb box reborn, rinsed it, got it up and running and the phosphate was out of range on my Hanna checker…so it was at least 20 times more than my desired level. If I cycle 20 gallon every day of that crap, it’s Will kill my sps tank. It’s now occupying space in my garage…

ARM also adds little bit of phosphate but very minor(effluent was 20 ppb when my saltwater is at 15 ppb phosphorous). It does require ~6.0 ph to get to 25 dKh. I had to add a refugium to keep my ph up but this problem is waaay easier to solve than dealing with that kind of phosphate level constantly being added to the tank.

Hope that was helpful.
Sam

Yodeling · Mar 5, 2022

Hmm I use ARM extra coarse and it doesn’t look anything like that. It looks very consistent throughout. Pretty sure it’s all calcite/limestone. No black rocks or anything.

ARM EC dissolves at pretty low PH. I’d say 5.9 - 6.3 depending on your setup/demands.

JMetaxas · Mar 6, 2022

SamsReef said:
To all the reborn users, do check phosphate from the effluent. Sure the media dissolves at higher ph compared to other media but it is a major phosphate factory. There is a reason BRS stopped carrying reborn….
I got a 44 lb box reborn, rinsed it, got it up and running and the phosphate was out of range on my Hanna checker…so it was at least 20 times more than my desired level. If I cycle 20 gallon every day of that crap, it’s Will kill my sps tank. It’s now occupying space in my garage…

ARM also adds little bit of phosphate but very minor(effluent was 20 ppb when my saltwater is at 15 ppb phosphorous). It does require ~6.0 ph to get to 25 dKh. I had to add a refugium to keep my ph up but this problem is waaay easier to solve than dealing with that kind of phosphate level constantly being added to the tank.

Hope that was helpful.
Sam

I’ve checked it and have found PO4, but my tank doesn’t have a problem with that. I have to dose Brightwell NeoPhos daily anyway.

SamsReef · Mar 6, 2022

JMetaxas said:
I’ve checked it and have found PO4, but my tank doesn’t have a problem with that. I have to dose Brightwell NeoPhos daily anyway.

That’s good to hear. For any “normal” tank, this would be near impossible without heavy usage of GFO, biopellet, refugium, constant water changes etc…I wanted to make sure people are aware of super high phosphate in reborn as their marketing material is misleading

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 7, 2022

SamsReef said:
ARM also adds little bit of phosphate but very minor(effluent was 20 ppb when my saltwater is at 15 ppb phosphorous). It does require ~6.0 ph to get to 25 dKh. I had to add a refugium to keep my ph up but this problem is waaay easier to solve than dealing with that kind of phosphate level constantly being added to the tank.

About how much effluent do you dose each day? It may not be as significant as you assume.

JMetaxas · Mar 7, 2022

Actually the funny part of what they say below is how Reborn is washed in RO water and doesn't need rinsing. That's ridiculous. It's filthy !

SamsReef said:
That’s good to hear. For any “normal” tank, this would be near impossible without heavy usage of GFO, biopellet, refugium, constant water changes etc…I wanted to make sure people are aware of super high phosphate in reborn as their marketing material is misleading

SamsReef · Mar 7, 2022

Randy Holmes-Farley said:
About how much effluent do you dose each day? It may not be as significant as you assume.

50 ml per min with 200+ ppb is roughly 20 gallon a day. I would consider that a lot when my target is to keep the tank at 10 ppb phosphorus

Sam

Randy Holmes-Farley · Mar 8, 2022

SamsReef said:
50 ml per min with 200+ ppb is roughly 20 gallon a day. I would consider that a lot when my target is to keep the tank at 10 ppb phosphorus

Sam

Assuming that is correct, it's less than you add each day from foods. Is it an important contributor, probably yes.