Calling On Tropic Marine For Help!!!

[JonEB]

Bummer for this guy… I’ve never bought salinity in a cardboard barrel before… seams odd. It always comes in really classy thread sealed vapor tight plastic buckets. All my corals thrive with this stuff.

 

[JonEB]

aquavitro - salinity

Not many companies have a guaranteed analysis this good.

 

[wolfen281]

Bummer for this guy… I’ve never bought salinity in a cardboard barrel before… seams odd. It always comes in really classy thread sealed vapor tight plastic buckets. All my corals thrive with this stuff.

It looked pretty horrible. I guess the point is...all empire fall.

 

[Spieg]

FWIW, pharacutical compounds are never delivered in a dump truck. Peple have been using TM salt for many years and never expeienced brown stuff in the mixing bin...clearly something has changed recently.

 

[Jeffcb]

FWIW, pharacutical compounds are never delivered in a dump truck. Peple have been using TM salt for many years and never expeienced brown stuff in the mixing bin...clearly something has changed recently.

Rail car?

 

[areefer01]

FWIW, pharacutical compounds are never delivered in a dump truck. Peple have been using TM salt for many years and never expeienced brown stuff in the mixing bin...clearly something has changed recently.

I believe that is what they are looking into as it relates to the facility in Turkey. There is a lot of ground to cover which is why they halted production there. They will do a lot of testing using their own processes and chems. Material, facility, processes, who touches what, etc. We just need to let them work through the process.

In the mean time if you like the product continue to buy it but request at source of purchase location. Germany = good. Turkey should not be available.

 

[Sesty22]

Saw this in my feed earlier.

 

[IKD]

Saw this in my feed earlier.

Thanks for sharing. No comment about whether that salt is safe to use or not. Previously they said it is safe to use, so hoping they would update or confirm that position.

 

[Jbell370]

After reading the posts I figured I could add to this with my own pics as I've been using TM since day one with this tank, AWC 5g per day puts me around 1 bucket per month.

This container is my storage, the mix container has slight brown clay like, nothing crazy, but after mixing it goes here before being used by the AWC. Kind of sickly.

I contacted my LFS as he takes my empty buckets, the last 2 were Turkey, the current empty is Turkey and the 3 new ones are also Turkey.

Guess time for a clean out and find German TM.

 

[ReeferSamster]

Makes me smile even harder knowing I haven't been paying for the unicorn salt all this time, and still using plain old purple box IO. Which also has some "brown crud" in it. But i have learned to deal with it fairly easy.

I've experimented with different salts, but always went back to IO. Its $11 bucks for 50 gallon bags! (Which is strange because 200 gallon box costs +$75!. I think Amazon has a glitch)

Anyway, I've noticed IO having brown residue in the past 20 years, except for the most 2 years, when I got a new mixing drum/container, when I make batches of 100 gallons, I only see white crud (settling out of solution).

Did IO improve or change their formula?

 

[Cell]

I believe that is what they are looking into as it relates to the facility in Turkey. There is a lot of ground to cover which is why they halted production there. They will do a lot of testing using their own processes and chems. Material, facility, processes, who touches what, etc. We just need to let them work through the process.

In the mean time if you like the product continue to buy it but request at source of purchase location. Germany = good. Turkey should not be available.

In fairness, the expectation was that this stringent testing was done before release of the batch, not after. If your average reefer was opening an affected bucket of salt and immediately noticing a smell or mixing it and immediately noticing a difference in color or opacity, how did the QC team miss it? It's very concerning. At some point, whatever happened here will need to be reconciled with previous claims.

I know this post will be cut and pasted, and in some instances my comments may be misrepresented. However, this issue is important enough that I would still like to try to address it. I also apologize for the length of this post. But there is a lot I need to say.

Tropic Marin has been one of the most respected salt manufacturers for well over 50 years. In addition to our loyal hobbyists, our products are used by zoos, aquariums, and research facilities around the globe. This positions us extremely well to identify any systemic issue with our products. We have tens of thousands of buckets and boxes of salt in the marketplace that were manufactured in our new facility in Turkey. Much of that product has gone to commercial accounts including many research facilities working with extremely sensitive organisms. We have not seen one complaint from any of those accounts. Contacting them directly for feedback has not turned up any concerns. This is in addition to our internal ICP and HPLC testing of many batch samples.

...

There has been no change in the formula of Tropic Marin salt. This is true for both of our German facilities AND for our facility in Turkey. There has been no compromise in raw materials grades, mixing procedures or quality controls in ANY of our facilities, including our one in Turkey. There should be no differences in salt made from ANY of the Tropic Marin manufacturing facilities. We have done extensive and exhaustive testing of our salt products from our Turkish facility and find NO differences in comparison to the salt manufactured in our German facility. We encourage any user of Tropic Marin products to contact us directly, at the email or phone number above, with any complaints or concerns. We will be more than happy to help address your issue.

I sincerely hope that this post in taken as intended and shows the commitment that Tropic Marin has to our customers and to the the continued quality of our products.

In the past year and a half, Tropic Marin has expanded the capacity in its two facilities located in Germany. We have also added a new manufacturing facility in Turkey. All of our manufacturing facilities utilize the same grade of raw materials, the same stringent manufacturing and mixing standards, and the same extremely tight quality control monitoring. All of the manufacturing and monitoring is controlled and supervised by our long standing staff from Germany. The salts manufactured by Tropic Marin are indistinguishable in relation to which facility they come from...

If all of this is true, then there should be legitimate concern over German produced batches, not just Turkish, because apparently they are all getting the same grade materials and are under the supervision of the same people. This may also indicate a rather large blind spot in the QC process. Did you do the smell test?

 

[areefer01]

In fairness, the expectation was that this stringent testing was done before release of the batch, not after. If your average reefer was opening an affected bucket of salt and immediately noticing a smell or mixing it and immediately noticing a difference in color or opacity, how did the QC team miss it? It's very concerning. At some point, whatever happened here will need to be reconciled with previous claims.

What leads you to believe there wasn't any testing before the release? Who said there wasn't? They let hobbyists know, then stopped production, and they have been, and continue, to investigate. Reads to me that they are going above and beyond. The chain of events that lead up to all this I don't know nor claim to. I can only speak for what I have read in a few places.

Now let us take a look at the hobbyist side and those who lost coral and or fish or both. What are they doing?

 

[Jbell370]

I can say there has been no effect on my fish, even the old guys I have are fine, healthy and fat, bright colors. I've lost a few corals, but others have grown considerably.

 

[Jeffcb]

I contacted Red Sea Customer Support and the brown residue from Red Sea Blue Bucket salt. Here is their response.

Moises Herrera (Red Sea Group) Feb 2, 2022, 18:56 GMT Good afternoon Jeffrey, Thank you for contacting us, and I am happy to assist with your inquiry. Coral Pro and Red Sea Salt are made of natural raw materials harvested from the Red Sea by a solar evaporation process. Sometimes, these raw materials may contain small amounts of inert insoluble components that can accumulate on the water surface (as a fine brownish film) or may “tint” the water giving it a yellowish color. Most of these inorganic insoluble are actually of Fe2O3 (ferric oxide) origin and therefore contributes to the general water quality by acting as a flocculating and binding substance for small organic molecules, floating bacterial films, and free orthophosphate (allowing them to be more easily removed from the aquarium water by the protein skimmer). Since the raw materials are harvested naturally the level of insoluble may change significantly from one batch to another based on the time of the year and other environmental conditions.

All salt mix's have this I think. Some more than others. I make a lot of salt water. This is my 65 gallon tank after one year making a little over 2200 gallons. Unsightly yes, harmful no. If it bothers you it can easily be filtered out when you transfer the water out of your vat.

 

[Acros]

I contacted Red Sea Customer Support and the brown residue from Red Sea Blue Bucket salt. Here is their response.

Moises Herrera (Red Sea Group) Feb 2, 2022, 18:56 GMT Good afternoon Jeffrey, Thank you for contacting us, and I am happy to assist with your inquiry. Coral Pro and Red Sea Salt are made of natural raw materials harvested from the Red Sea by a solar evaporation process. Sometimes, these raw materials may contain small amounts of inert insoluble components that can accumulate on the water surface (as a fine brownish film) or may “tint” the water giving it a yellowish color. Most of these inorganic insoluble are actually of Fe2O3 (ferric oxide) origin and therefore contributes to the general water quality by acting as a flocculating and binding substance for small organic molecules, floating bacterial films, and free orthophosphate (allowing them to be more easily removed from the aquarium water by the protein skimmer). Since the raw materials are harvested naturally the level of insoluble may change significantly from one batch to another based on the time of the year and other environmental conditions.

All salt mix's have this I think. Some more than others. I make a lot of salt water. This is my 65 gallon tank after one year making a little over 2200 gallons. Unsightly yes, harmful no. If it bothers you it can easily be filtered out when you transfer the water out of your vat.

Great info. Thank you for sharing.

 

[PeterC99]

I contacted Red Sea Customer Support and the brown residue from Red Sea Blue Bucket salt. Here is their response.

Moises Herrera (Red Sea Group) Feb 2, 2022, 18:56 GMT Good afternoon Jeffrey, Thank you for contacting us, and I am happy to assist with your inquiry. Coral Pro and Red Sea Salt are made of natural raw materials harvested from the Red Sea by a solar evaporation process. Sometimes, these raw materials may contain small amounts of inert insoluble components that can accumulate on the water surface (as a fine brownish film) or may “tint” the water giving it a yellowish color. Most of these inorganic insoluble are actually of Fe2O3 (ferric oxide) origin and therefore contributes to the general water quality by acting as a flocculating and binding substance for small organic molecules, floating bacterial films, and free orthophosphate (allowing them to be more easily removed from the aquarium water by the protein skimmer). Since the raw materials are harvested naturally the level of insoluble may change significantly from one batch to another based on the time of the year and other environmental conditions.

All salt mix's have this I think. Some more than others. I make a lot of salt water. This is my 65 gallon tank after one year making a little over 2200 gallons. Unsightly yes, harmful no. If it bothers you it can easily be filtered out when you transfer the water out of your vat.

This makes lots of sense - great information!

2,200 gallons of saltwater a year? Are you running a municipal aquarium?

 

[Spieg]

All salt mix's have this I think. Some more than others.

No... No they don't. Not all salt mixes are made from dehidrated salt water.

 

[drawman]

No... No they don't. Not all salt mixes are made from dehidrated salt water.

Exactly. Brown crud is not equivalent here.

 

[Hans-Werner]

Not all salt mixes are made from dehidrated salt water

Do you really think so? Do you know halite? Where does it come from? Where do most salts come from, no matter whether purified to pharmaceutical quality or mined raw materials?

 

[Hans-Werner]

... different approach: Just look into Wikipedia --> sodium chloride --> production or Wikipedia --> salt --> production.