787will
Well-Known Member
Hey all!
So im in the process of getting everything ready to set up my 125g again after moving in our new home, so one of the first things im doing is getting all my old rock back into shape. Even though ive been in the hobby a few years now this is a first for me, ive always previously used live rock or new base rock.
So my 125 was taken down about 18month ago and the rock was just left to dry and sit outside for that time so the first thing i did was to pressure was all the old stuff off it then then bleach it for 24hrs. After that i rinsed let all the rock air dry for 4-5days to allow the chlorine to evaporate.
That worked great rock is all clean and looks like new base rock.
Now for the last couple of weeks ive been soaking the rock in RODI water to see if it would leach anything and unfortunately it kicking out a butt load of PO4. So much for a quick clean and soak and it would be ready again! LOL
So a quick browse on the old interweb show that this can be a common problem with old rock, so any advice from the reefers that have done this before would be appreciated.
What should i continue to do? Keep soaking the rock changing the water out until the PO4 stops leaching? How long could that take?
Lanthanum chloride seems to come up a lot, should i try this? Will it speed up the process or is it just a bandaid? What brand would be good? Ive seen pool and spa stuff is good for when you are just curing rocks.
Or could this just be a never ending headache and cause problems when its back in the aquarium? do i need to bite the bullet and just buy new live rock or base rock?
Thanks all!
So im in the process of getting everything ready to set up my 125g again after moving in our new home, so one of the first things im doing is getting all my old rock back into shape. Even though ive been in the hobby a few years now this is a first for me, ive always previously used live rock or new base rock.
So my 125 was taken down about 18month ago and the rock was just left to dry and sit outside for that time so the first thing i did was to pressure was all the old stuff off it then then bleach it for 24hrs. After that i rinsed let all the rock air dry for 4-5days to allow the chlorine to evaporate.
That worked great rock is all clean and looks like new base rock.
Now for the last couple of weeks ive been soaking the rock in RODI water to see if it would leach anything and unfortunately it kicking out a butt load of PO4. So much for a quick clean and soak and it would be ready again! LOL
So a quick browse on the old interweb show that this can be a common problem with old rock, so any advice from the reefers that have done this before would be appreciated.
What should i continue to do? Keep soaking the rock changing the water out until the PO4 stops leaching? How long could that take?
Lanthanum chloride seems to come up a lot, should i try this? Will it speed up the process or is it just a bandaid? What brand would be good? Ive seen pool and spa stuff is good for when you are just curing rocks.
Or could this just be a never ending headache and cause problems when its back in the aquarium? do i need to bite the bullet and just buy new live rock or base rock?
Thanks all!
