I hear that eventually, every tank will crash...

Sharkbait19 · Aug 4, 2021

I haven’t had a true crash (knock on wood), but almost did. When I rescaped, I must have put a lot of nitrogenous crap into the water, which got all my corals looking iffy. The stress caused my Aussie torch to go down with bjd. This was months ago and I still see some effects, but it is mostly back to normal now. So not a true crash, but seemed like it was on the brink of it.

Doctorgori · Aug 4, 2021

I’ve had 5 or 6 in 33yrs:
- power outage
- Kalk overdose
- DSB meltdown
- wide alk swing
- H2O2 overdose
- unknown

Doctorgori · Aug 4, 2021

Sshannon said:
So far it hasn't happened to me. But I hear the horror stories where it comes out of nowhere. Mostly from people with a deep sandbed that don't vacuum it regularly. Thoughts?

yup and here is the thing with that; it’s kinda playing with fire…just like no water changes (which can and do work) but how many times has blame been misplaced?

But yes I agree that proper diligence and good preventive maintenance can a will make a zero crash tank totally possible

Reefhab · Aug 5, 2021

brandon429 said:
barring hardware failures and poisoning events, there's a biological means of preventing a crash and it will make any reef tank live indefinitely with no limited biological lifepan. its how we keep pickle jar reefs alive for twenty years etc.

Old tank syndrome is vanquished in reefing now

the cause of old tank syndrome is compounding whole waste particles that blanket the interstitial sand grain zones and plug up the channels in live rocks- in some cases it's sheer overgrowth allowed from various invasions that plugs up the surface area on live rock combined with a thin veneer of...

www.reef2reef.com

keeping detritus out of a system keeps it ageless, that's the whole proof on file.

even if detritus-keeping folks disagree, that's based on their tank and we're basing claims on other people's work. We can specifically make anyone's reef permanently ageless if you'll evacuate vs store up detritus, even though this claim greatly angers detritus-storers there's a difference between what's repeatable and what's ideal and what is linkable using examples other than the writer's tanks. what works for the public is the hidden secret sauce.

What is a pickle jar reef?

Jekyl · Aug 5, 2021

Reefhab said:
What is a pickle jar reef?

A very small reef.

brandon429 · Aug 5, 2021

Pickle jar sounds catchier than beta vase lol

Micro systems age much faster than larger systems. They’re ultimate age testing setups. A 100 gallon reef lets you cheat on export for years and years before eutrophication / aging / old tank syndrome all synonymous sets in

a large reef lets us think hands off/no cleaning and export works for everyone and that self balance happens routinely while the dilution slows down aging but does not stop it

but a micro system will take on aging characters at an advanced rate and a mere two years running micro system will model and reflect in coral growth and also potential algae / cyano what multiple years will show on a larger setup, so, any micro system just shy of twenty years old like this one has cycled multiple times over past the aging habits that crash older systems with the classic old tank syndrome details

one is forced to do the export work all reefs benefit by when determined to keep a tiny system going and going without lifespan limit…no dilution makes the system age at a massive rate and with no care or cleaning just like a large tank these micro systems kept in the average home will crash out in a few years with lax care

but when export out and feed in routine can be applied, they run agelessly and by keeping the reefbowl alive this long it’s taught me the secret to total indefinite life span reefing and every thread I run for cycling or sandbed rinsing/ cleaning (rip cleans) or peroxide algae attacks are produced solely by modeled action from this tiny vase.

100% certain the biology upscaled by this old pico has reversed eutrophication for thousands of large reefs once they took on the catch up export actions required to de age the system and select away from plant invasion / cyano invasion and select into stony coral growth

this system has no biological lifespan limit. It will run next decade exactly the same as it ran in the 2000s

whole waste particle export is the secret to unlimited biological lifespan in reefing. Bacteria are never dosed from a bottle here, natural bacteria are kept active by removing sloughs and crud that would suppress them and lead to coral disease and systemic aging + invasion.

a clean system is an ageless system. This reef isn’t addicted to retail store purchases in order to stay alive other than selling me bagged salt for water changes. Of course using retail food saves me from buying seafood to make my own feed but if they stopped selling retail coral food then I’d use what Paul uses and grind up clams n squid n nori etc from the seafood market and the system would continue on.

Paul B · Aug 5, 2021

At 50 years old mine has never crashed although over the years I did have some problems, mostly because of my mistakes. But it has survived all the hurricanes, blackouts etc in those years.

I have a reverse undergravel filter with dolomite, no sump, no dosers, no UV, no Ozone, no medications, no quarantine, no hospital or observation tank.

Just natural filtration with an algae scrubber and natural foods.

If it crashes today, I will call it a success.

Sump Crab · Aug 5, 2021

been in it a long time.. the only time I had what I'd call a crash was when I was 17 (2005) and put way too many fish in a tank way too fast. Must of had a huge ammonia spike and killed almost all the fish. Never a "crash" since.

burningmime · Aug 5, 2021

I've willingly taken down 2 tanks, but neither had crashed.

Jekyl · Aug 5, 2021

Paul B said:
At 50 years old mine has never crashed although over the years I did have some problems, mostly because of my mistakes. But it has survived all the hurricanes, blackouts etc in those years.

I have a reverse undergravel filter with dolomite, no sump, no dosers, no UV, no Ozone, no medications, no quarantine, no hospital or observation tank.

Just natural filtration with an algae scrubber and natural foods.

If it crashes today, I will call it a success.

I've heard you mention a typhoon of your system. What exactly is that? I want to make sure I'm not missing a step.

brandon429 · Aug 5, 2021

Diatom filtration routine plays a large part in Pauls threads and his tank longevity

a diatom filter is a huge powerful gravel vac that removes whole particle waste and prevents indefinite compounding. To use one is the antithesis to old school dsb care, and then again those systems are old tank syndrome kings, crash prone, and the hands off sandbed total storage approach is dwindling.

Paul actively removes compacting waste from his tank on occasion vs indefinite compounding within. Core to earning fifty years, core to earning twenty years in any reef the public wants to replicate.

that doesn't mean outliers don't exist, we know about zero export reefs

it means any reef the public wants to copy for longevity will be using these export means and not the hands off ways that used to comprise all possible setup approaches. cleanliness has repeatability that storage modes simply do not have. they have all the ots examples and crashes.

Miami Reef · Aug 5, 2021

Most pumps, heaters, chillers etc have an expiration date. The tricky part is that we’ll never know when they will stop working. Keeping tabs on equipment is the best thing we can do. A tank won’t magically crash if one equipment fails unless temperature sky rockets.

Paul B · Aug 5, 2021

Actually Jekyl, I am doing that right now. I just turned around and took this picture. It is clearing up now but 5 minutes ago my tank looked like the front glass was made out of sheet metal.

I didn't need to do this now but it is raining so I can't work on my boat and when I tried to clean my glass with the magnet, I kept hitting a big hammer coral in the front so I wanted to move the entire center of my reef structure back a couple of inches.

To do that I had to remove a large rock from the center back and re locate it so I could move everything.
In doing that I created a storm of detritus.

Most of my rocks I built and they are all large and hard to move, especially when covered with corals and sponge that is like tough shoe leather.
Nothing will last forever without maintenance, even our teeth so this needs to be done on any tank with a substrait except a DSB which I don't consider a viable method to a long lasting tank because you can't maintain it.

While I was at it I decided to trim a lot of sponge from all over the place so the tank was a mess.

When I do this or at least once or twice a year I need to stir up the gravel where I can reach because eventually a reverse undergravel filter will clog.

I use my very old diatom filter but any canister filter will do. I put like a 14" rigid tube on the outflow and powerwash where I can. Then I let the thing run a couple of hours and the water gets crystal clear.

Jekyl · Aug 5, 2021

Paul B said:
Actually Jekyl, I am doing that right now. I just turned around and took this picture. It is clearing up now but 5 minutes ago my tank looked like the front glass was made out of sheet metal.

I didn't need to do this now but it is raining so I can't work on my boat and when I tried to clean my glass with the magnet, I kept hitting a big hammer coral in the front so I wanted to move the entire center of my reef structure back a couple of inches.

To do that I had to remove a large rock from the center back and re locate it so I could move everything.
In doing that I created a storm of detritus.

Most of my rocks I built and they are all large and hard to move, especially when covered with corals and sponge that is like tough shoe leather.
Nothing will last forever without maintenance, even our teeth so this needs to be done on any tank with a substrait except a DSB which I don't consider a viable method to a long lasting tank because you can't maintain it.

While I was at it I decided to trim a lot of sponge from all over the place so the tank was a mess.

When I do this or at least once or twice a year I need to stir up the gravel where I can reach because eventually a reverse undergravel filter will clog.

I use my very old diatom filter but any canister filter will do. I put like a 14" rigid tube on the outflow and powerwash where I can. Then I let the thing run a couple of hours and the water gets crystal clear.

Is this simply vacuuming the substrate or are you pulling material out from under the plates? Mine is 3 years old now and I've never maintained the area under the plates I have.

Paul B · Aug 5, 2021

No, it is not simple vacuuming. As you know I want my tank as natural and like the sea as possible. In the sea, especially in the South Pacific where many of our fish come from typhoons are very common many times a year. I have dove off an Island a couple of days after one and there were Elkhorn corals almost as large as my house up side down. Huge sea fans almost 100 yards up a mountain next to a sailboat.

Many corals overturned. That is what I want to do to my tank occasionally on a much smaller scale of course as I don't want to kill my corals.

But I blow the gravel all the way down to the RUGF where I can. Of course I can't do that in to many places but I do get all the way around the front and back. In between rocks and corals and of course inside any bottles.

There are no very old tanks that don't do real maintenance as what happens in the sea. This IMO needs to be done occasionally. Not just to remove some detritus, but to make more channels for water flow through the gravel to make sure the bacteria are well oxygenated.

I think I mentioned that in my book but I haven't read it in a while so I don't remember.

Here is a video.

Screwgunner · Aug 5, 2021

Just one ,6 way recept went up in flames . Glad I was home.

Jekyl · Aug 5, 2021

Paul B said:
No, it is not simple vacuuming. As you know I want my tank as natural and like the sea as possible. In the sea, especially in the South Pacific where many of our fish come from typhoons are very common many times a year. I have dove off an Island a couple of days after one and there were Elkhorn corals almost as large as my house up side down. Huge sea fans almost 100 yards up a mountain next to a sailboat.

Many corals overturned. That is what I want to do to my tank occasionally on a much smaller scale of course as I don't want to kill my corals.

But I blow the gravel all the way down to the RUGF where I can. Of course I can't do that in to many places but I do get all the way around the front and back. In between rocks and corals and of course inside any bottles.

There are no very old tanks that don't do real maintenance as what happens in the sea. This IMO needs to be done occasionally. Not just to remove some detritus, but to make more channels for water flow through the gravel to make sure the bacteria are well oxygenated.

I think I mentioned that in my book but I haven't read it in a while so I don't remember.

Here is a video.

Thanks for the clarification. Thought I needed to stick a shop vac on the plate ports for a minute there. I already have a similar practice I do. It's just completed by my pistol shrimp and filter floss.