HIGH END Tenuis Hoarder

[James_O]

You can’t do that to me man, you stopped my heart there for a second!

Absolutely amazing tank! I’m in shock.

 

[SBB Corals]

I run my skimmer only at night. It does draw through a scrubber. I like to see my nightly low at 8.2. At 9a it shuts off and by 7p ph rises to 8.45-8.5 when the skimmer turns on again. Fresh media does impact the low to 8.3 and in that case the skimmer will turn off 1-2 hours earlier to keep things consistent.

I would like to only run my skimmer at night.. but i like to keep my skimmer going 24.7 .. I saw this video below on brs and will try this method

the part i'm talking about on minute 3:07 using an electronic selondoid.

this video is all around just awesome though

 

[SBB Corals]

You can’t do that to me man, you stopped my heart there for a second!

Absolutely amazing tank! I’m in shock.

thank you sir!

 

[ScottB]

PH Discussion

I would like to have a discussion on PH in this thread so please share all you comments and suggestions and info about your PH so we can all try and learn something. There is a lot of great SPS reefers on R2R and I would love to learn from you and hear about your PH methods.

I will go 1st.

Currently my PH is running between 8.1 and 8.54.

I thought this was naturally very high so I recalibrated my Neptune PH meter and it was actually correct. I know it is correct because I stuck the probe Directly into the 7 and 10 Calibration solution and it was reading very accurate.

PH at 7 packet

PH meter showing its accurate at 7

PH Packet at 10

PH meter showing accurate at 10

I live in a city so figured my ph would be low. My house was built in 1870 so I have been told the insulation is very low so this helps. I also dose heavy ESV Ionic 2 part solution. Currently i am dosing 170ML per day Alk. I don't use any other methods to increase PH.

Recently i got a CO2 Scrubber and Hooked it up just to see what would happen.

I wanted to see if I could make the corals look better. I have been told that many people use a co2 scrubber and within days they see new shoots of growth on corals. Anyway i hooked up and started to see some RTN signs within 48 hours. I think I may have started to see new shoots though. A few days ago i started feeding heavier using Oyster feast. So at the same time I hooked up the co2 scrubber my po4 also went from .06-.19. So the RTN most likely was from the higher po4. Anyway I took the scrubber off line and stopped feeding the oyster feast. My po4 now is slowly dropping and is now .15.. once my po4 drops back down to normal levels i will hook up the scrubber again to see what happens. I guess we are constantly testing things trying to make things better

Another experiment I want to try once the po4 comes down is hooking up the co2 Scrubber only at night to try and balance out the pH going from 8.1-8.55 is a big daily swing.. so i think if i hook up the scrubber only at night it will balance this out..

Please share your PH stories and what you do to increase it or decrease it..... and how this has helped your growth.

thank you all for reading and participating in this thread

Plandauesq​

I don't use any UV sterilizer and I hope this answers your question

I have been round and round with pH since switching from ESV to CaRx. It was not a large drop, but my levels were never that high to begin with. It is not an issue too much with ambient CO2. I measure 405-440 ppm most of the time.

Here are my ranges under various setups:

1) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber: 7.9 - 8.15

2a) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber: 7.8 - 8.15
2b) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber, Kalk stirrer: 7.9 - 8.2

3) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber, plus Kalk stirrer:
8 - 8.35

There are a couple of snags/issues with setup #3
a) I get a strange interaction between the ESV calcium dose and the kalkwasser that causes my skimmer to go totally bonkers. Bubbles on the floor bonkers. Deal breaker.
b) I am sick of mixing/refilling 2 part at this kind of volume. Between the two systems it is over 220ml a day.

I will go back to the setup #2B with the CaRx once I repair it. I messed up the regulator, causing it to over-pressurize the reactor literally blowing the lid off of it. I can get even higher pH, I was just baby-stepping the kalkwasser dose amount so I could get a sense of things and not overdose. I am running it from my APEX, with pH being a virtual output that can shut down the DOS when pH gets too high.

 

[SBB Corals]

I have been round and round with pH since switching from ESV to CaRx. It was not a large drop, but my levels were never that high to begin with. It is not an issue too much with ambient CO2. I measure 405-440 ppm most of the time.

Here are my ranges under various setups:

1) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber: 7.9 - 8.15

2a) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber: 7.8 - 8.15
2b) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber, Kalk stirrer: 7.9 - 8.2

3) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber, plus Kalk stirrer:
8 - 8.35

There are a couple of snags/issues with setup #3
a) I get a strange interaction between the ESV calcium dose and the kalkwasser that causes my skimmer to go totally bonkers. Bubbles on the floor bonkers. Deal breaker.
b) I am sick of mixing/refilling 2 part at this kind of volume. Between the two systems it is over 220ml a day.

I will go back to the setup #2B with the CaRx once I repair it. I messed up the regulator, causing it to over-pressurize the reactor literally blowing the lid off of it. I can get even higher pH, I was just baby-stepping the kalkwasser dose amount so I could get a sense of things and not overdose. I am running it from my APEX, with pH being a virtual output that can shut down the DOS when pH gets too high.

thanks for the writeup this is great info.. thanks for sharing!

 

[TonyP]

I started a CO2 Scrubber about 8 months ago. I was in your same boat, my acros started to lose PE and color within 2-3 weeks. I disconnected it because I thought it may have been the cause but I also increased my dosing of Oyster Feast at the same time (50% more). With the Oyster Feast, I can remember hearing my wife telling me to leave the tank alone; it was perfect. But the greed for more growth and color was calling me and she was right.

My PO4 shot up to 0.24. Is it possible that the negative effect of a high PO4 concentration on our SPS is made worse at higher PH levels?

I use Ocean’s Blend 2 part CAL and ALK and put my CO2 Scrubber back online. I run my skimmer nearly 24/7 and maintain PH level range from 8.1-8.4. I ran several tests, adjusting the amount of scrubber media levels to the canister until I hit the daily range that I wanted. I have a huge canister and I only have to fill it ¼ of the way. Things I’ve noticed since starting the CO2 Scrubber:

• Faster heal time of my mother colonies with I cut them.
• Faster plug encrusting of new frags.
• Old SPS frags that had little to no movement for the longest time have come to life.

For the most part, I’ve always had great SPS growth and PE but I didn’t have the coloration that I felt my SPS were capable of. That drove me to add the CO2 Scrubber but when I read some past SBB posts, it helped me realize that keeping NO3 at near zero was my issue. Thank you Shane for that info, it has improved my tank dramatically – until I did the extra Oyster Feast.

I’ve been running Seachem PHOSNET to slowly bring it back to the .03-.06 range.

I also dose 10ml of Strontium during my monthly water changes (I’m not sure it that helps with the rapid growth that I experience but that’s what I’m telling myself to believe).

I dose ME Corals Nitrate supplement, I’ve been contemplating switching to NEONITRO but had one question. Does NEONITRO work as a stand-alone product or will I have to add MICROBACTER7 and REEF BIOFUEL or KATALYST as well?

 

[Marc2952]

I have been round and round with pH since switching from ESV to CaRx. It was not a large drop, but my levels were never that high to begin with. It is not an issue too much with ambient CO2. I measure 405-440 ppm most of the time.

Here are my ranges under various setups:

1) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber: 7.9 - 8.15

2a) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber: 7.8 - 8.15
2b) CaRx, reverse light cycle, CO2 scrubber, Kalk stirrer: 7.9 - 8.2

3) ESV two-part at 8ish dkh, reverse cycle refugium light, ALK dose during lights out, plus scrubber, plus Kalk stirrer:
8 - 8.35

There are a couple of snags/issues with setup #3
a) I get a strange interaction between the ESV calcium dose and the kalkwasser that causes my skimmer to go totally bonkers. Bubbles on the floor bonkers. Deal breaker.
b) I am sick of mixing/refilling 2 part at this kind of volume. Between the two systems it is over 220ml a day.

I will go back to the setup #2B with the CaRx once I repair it. I messed up the regulator, causing it to over-pressurize the reactor literally blowing the lid off of it. I can get even higher pH, I was just baby-stepping the kalkwasser dose amount so I could get a sense of things and not overdose. I am running it from my APEX, with pH being a virtual output that can shut down the DOS when pH gets too high.

Thats a whole lot of dosing, do you dose alk every hour and calcium every half hour?

 

[ineption]

I have nothing against brightwell! In fact I think most of there products are great.

However my research points out that brightwell Neonitro is simply blend of sodium nitrate and potassium nitrate which are readily available & are very cheap Rand Holmes Fariey our trusted chemist in a roundabout way has agreed with this .

I have too been dosing brightwell neonitro until I figured that it's way overpriced & time to find a alternative I purchased above mentioned salts which are essentially fertilisers used for plants (zooxanthellae is a photsintetic organisms too) used James planted tank calculator & now I have enough to last me meh 10 years maybe more the best thing about it is no ill effects on my tank corals don't even know

Shane since you spend so much on brightwell send it for icp I bet you it will come back as small amount of Pattasium and nitrate and sodium. This are all inorganic salts. I doubt brightwell would include organic nitrates as there are more harder to store.

Sorry for long post, but I feel this will save few people few bucks on otherwise very expensive hobby happy reefing

 

[Marc2952]

you can dose alot of neonitro.. the key is your system has to become saturated with it before it will hold a steady reading. you can double up on the dose until it reads 20 and becomes saturated. then back off the dose a bit to maintain it.. this is literally the trick for it

Gotcha so you recommend just increasing nitrates and phosphates then just get the tank dirty with feeding so much.

 

[ScottB]

Thats a whole lot of dosing, do you dose alk every hour and calcium every half hour?

I concentrate my ALK dosing to be during lights out. Helps a tad with pH. Calcium during the light cycle.

 

[blstravler]

PH Discussion

I would like to have a discussion on PH in this thread so please share all you comments and suggestions and info about your PH so we can all try and learn something. There is a lot of great SPS reefers on R2R and I would love to learn from you and hear about your PH methods.

I will go 1st.

Currently my PH is running between 8.1 and 8.54.

I thought this was naturally very high so I recalibrated my Neptune PH meter and it was actually correct. I know it is correct because I stuck the probe Directly into the 7 and 10 Calibration solution and it was reading very accurate.

PH at 7 packet

PH meter showing its accurate at 7

PH Packet at 10

PH meter showing accurate at 10

I live in a city so figured my ph would be low. My house was built in 1870 so I have been told the insulation is very low so this helps. I also dose heavy ESV Ionic 2 part solution. Currently i am dosing 170ML per day Alk. I don't use any other methods to increase PH.

Recently i got a CO2 Scrubber and Hooked it up just to see what would happen.

I wanted to see if I could make the corals look better. I have been told that many people use a co2 scrubber and within days they see new shoots of growth on corals. Anyway i hooked up and started to see some RTN signs within 48 hours. I think I may have started to see new shoots though. A few days ago i started feeding heavier using Oyster feast. So at the same time I hooked up the co2 scrubber my po4 also went from .06-.19. So the RTN most likely was from the higher po4. Anyway I took the scrubber off line and stopped feeding the oyster feast. My po4 now is slowly dropping and is now .15.. once my po4 drops back down to normal levels i will hook up the scrubber again to see what happens. I guess we are constantly testing things trying to make things better

Another experiment I want to try once the po4 comes down is hooking up the co2 Scrubber only at night to try and balance out the pH going from 8.1-8.55 is a big daily swing.. so i think if i hook up the scrubber only at night it will balance this out..

Please share your PH stories and what you do to increase it or decrease it..... and how this has helped your growth.

thank you all for reading and participating in this thread

Plandauesq​

I don't use any UV sterilizer and I hope this answers your question

Do you dose 170ml of both ESV ALK and Cal? I’ve been finding that I need a little more ALK then CAL.

 

[Marc2952]

Do you dose 170ml of both ESV ALK and Cal? I’ve been finding that I need a little more ALK then CAL.

Same here i have to dose 5 ML more alk then Cal to keep them stable.

 

[SBB Corals]

I started a CO2 Scrubber about 8 months ago. I was in your same boat, my acros started to lose PE and color within 2-3 weeks. I disconnected it because I thought it may have been the cause but I also increased my dosing of Oyster Feast at the same time (50% more). With the Oyster Feast, I can remember hearing my wife telling me to leave the tank alone; it was perfect. But the greed for more growth and color was calling me and she was right.

My PO4 shot up to 0.24. Is it possible that the negative effect of a high PO4 concentration on our SPS is made worse at higher PH levels?

I use Ocean’s Blend 2 part CAL and ALK and put my CO2 Scrubber back online. I run my skimmer nearly 24/7 and maintain PH level range from 8.1-8.4. I ran several tests, adjusting the amount of scrubber media levels to the canister until I hit the daily range that I wanted. I have a huge canister and I only have to fill it ¼ of the way. Things I’ve noticed since starting the CO2 Scrubber:

• Faster heal time of my mother colonies with I cut them.
• Faster plug encrusting of new frags.
• Old SPS frags that had little to no movement for the longest time have come to life.

For the most part, I’ve always had great SPS growth and PE but I didn’t have the coloration that I felt my SPS were capable of. That drove me to add the CO2 Scrubber but when I read some past SBB posts, it helped me realize that keeping NO3 at near zero was my issue. Thank you Shane for that info, it has improved my tank dramatically – until I did the extra Oyster Feast.

I’ve been running Seachem PHOSNET to slowly bring it back to the .03-.06 range.

I also dose 10ml of Strontium during my monthly water changes (I’m not sure it that helps with the rapid growth that I experience but that’s what I’m telling myself to believe).

I dose ME Corals Nitrate supplement, I’ve been contemplating switching to NEONITRO but had one question. Does NEONITRO work as a stand-alone product or will I have to add MICROBACTER7 and REEF BIOFUEL or KATALYST as well?

Great writeup!

That is so funny and a major coincidence that we tried the co2 scrubber and starting doing Oyster feast at the same time LOL..

I know for sure that increase in po4 is a coral killer. You can see it on your triton that when your po4 rises above .10 the Alk consumption goes down and the alk Rises. Then when the po4 Comes down you can literally see the alk consumption go up and the alk go down again. I am literally experiencing this right Now. I stopped the oyster feast last week and now my po4 is coming down....Once my po4 is back down to .08 I will put on the co2 scrubber again. I am hesitant to try it during the day since my peak PH is already 8.55 but I deff want to try and run it at night.

I am considering switching to ME coral Nitrate as the owner Mark is a friend of mine and i know its much cheaper then Neonitro. I am just so hesitant to change what has been working. But the cost is really starting to add up at 175ML per day... and that is only one one system. I am basically dosing 300ML per day across my 3 systems now. I use it as a stand alone product and don't add MICROBACTER7 and REEF BIOFUEL or KATALYST or any of that. If you are currently using Me coral and switch I would be very interested to hear the results.. please let us know if you do!!!!

 

[SBB Corals]

I have nothing against brightwell! In fact I think most of there products are great.

However my research points out that brightwell Neonitro is simply blend of sodium nitrate and potassium nitrate which are readily available & are very cheap Rand Holmes Fariey our trusted chemist in a roundabout way has agreed with this .

I have too been dosing brightwell neonitro until I figured that it's way overpriced & time to find a alternative I purchased above mentioned salts which are essentially fertilisers used for plants (zooxanthellae is a photsintetic organisms too) used James planted tank calculator & now I have enough to last me meh 10 years maybe more the best thing about it is no ill effects on my tank corals don't even know

Shane since you spend so much on brightwell send it for icp I bet you it will come back as small amount of Pattasium and nitrate and sodium. This are all inorganic salts. I doubt brightwell would include organic nitrates as there are more harder to store.

Sorry for long post, but I feel this will save few people few bucks on otherwise very expensive hobby happy reefing

great post and dont be sorry for the long post as i wish it was longer

I really do need to consider switching to a homemade solution and i know how easy it is to make. I am just so hesitant to switch it because i know how great it has worked.. I really think i am going to take the plunge and either make my own blend or switch to Me coral Product. I'm literally wasting away money on Neonitro...

 

[SBB Corals]

Gotcha so you recommend just increasing nitrates and phosphates then just get the tank dirty with feeding so much.

Be careful for po4 I don't think you will need to dose and any overdose will be very bad for the tank. If your po4 is 0 then try it but at very little dose. for Neonitro yes deff do it it raise no3. It is super gentle and the coral can handle up to anywhere between 4 and 30 so you wont overdose it IMO. The idea is you dose no3 or p04 instead of feeding heavy to keep the tank clean. I think many people overfeed trying to get the no3 and po4 up. THis will just leave a lot of rotting food in the tank and can slowly lead to other issues like Algae ect.

 

[SBB Corals]

Do you dose 170ml of both ESV ALK and Cal? I’ve been finding that I need a little more ALK then CAL.

THe amounts are never the same. Alk is Always More. Currently I am at 170ML alk and 130 Calc. Im sure every tank is different but for me we have 3 systems and the alk is always more..

 

[blstravler]

THe amounts are never the same. Alk is Always More. Currently I am at 170ML alk and 130 Calc. Im sure every tank is different but for me we have 3 systems and the alk is always more..

I’m in the same boat 130ml ALK and 90ml Calc. If I dose equal parts at 130ml my Calc creeps up to high for my liking.

 

[SBB Corals]

I’m in the same boat 130ml ALK and 90ml Calc. If I dose equal parts at 130ml my Calc creeps up to high for my liking.

what is your PH range?

 

[blstravler]

what is your PH range?

The below is pretty typical for me. After I unhooked the Calcium Reactor I also had to unhook the outside airline to my skimmer as my PH was approaching 8.6 - low PH is one thing I do not miss about running a Calcium Reactor at all.

 

[ScottB]

DIY nutrient solutions:

During my low bioload days, I was dosing these to keep nutrient in the systems. The good ole dinoflagellate days.

Trisodium Phosphate at 2 grams / liter

Sodium Nitrate at 85 grams / liter

Trial and error to determine how much of each to maintain, but in general, the PO4 solution was much weaker. Over a couple months, I dosed 2 liters of it versus maybe 2-300 ml of nitrate. The solution ratios came from ukplantedtank website. RHF approved the two dry sources.