My nitrates will not go down.

[Aidanwolf]

Yes there was alot of crap but that was a while ago,so i am surprised that it still hasnt gone down.

 

[cmcoker]

Yes there was alot of crap but that was a while ago,so i am surprised that it still hasnt gone down.

What about chamber 1? It has a false bottom just above the bottom vents?
I actually knocked that out so a heater would fit, you could probably turkey baste though the vents if you don't want to knock out the false bottom.. I was amazed at the amount of crap settles in there

 

[Aidanwolf]

Yeah i took out the false floor.

 

[mcarroll]

On a tank that old, my guess is that the rocks and/or sand is loaded with detritus to some degree.

Swirl you finger (or something) around in the sand in a few places to see if you get anything tan or brown in color. Pure white aragonite dust is the only thing that it's OK to see come up. Anything else and you have your problem.

You could also take a powerhead and blast the rocks as well as the sand and see what you get.

 

[Aidanwolf]

Just white dust no brown crap.

 

[nl5882]

How much LR do you have? And what type is it?

 

[Aidanwolf]

I think it is florida lime stone live rock.

 

[Socalreefer4816]

Nopox

 

[Ouscazz]

What are your Nitrate readings?

 

[O'l Salty]

You shouldn't be carbon doing or skimming a new tank....

Why no skimmer on a new tank?

 

[Aidanwolf]

They fluctuate 80 and 160 but never any lower I dont know why.

 

[Aidanwolf]

I think I have around 15 pounds of live rock, sorry i didnt put that down before nl5882.

 

[Shaddow_wolf169]

Okay so I had the same issue before with my tank. My issue was flow I was only turning the tank 2-3 times ab hour so a lot of poop and nutrients were staying in the tank. Also if your running an hob filter pulling the cartridge and replacing will new would take a lot of beneficial bacteria out of your tank.

 

[Aidanwolf]

Okay what is a hob filter?

 

[Shaddow_wolf169]

Hang on the back

 

[Aidanwolf]

Oh no i was using the stock biocube filters but then i changed to just filter floss,a carbon bag and purigen.

 

[Ouscazz]

They fluctuate 80 and 160 but never any lower I dont know why.

Well, that's on the high side.. not that it really matters when there's no animals in the tank.
You don't have any consumers in the tank.. maybe you could try to add some mushrooms or Euphyllia?
Since you don't feed the tank, there must be some kind of detritus build up somewhere, in the sand or in the rock work. How deep is your sand bed?

Can you please post all data of your tank, technique, settings, and so on.

 

[cmcoker]

Are you only using the stock return pump? Any powerheads?

 

[Shaddow_wolf169]

That's way to much to throw a coral in a system. Marine pure sales ceramic balls that could fit in your system it will grow new bacteria and and clean your system out. I still think it's a flow issue pushing more water to the filter will help

 

[Shaddow_wolf169]

Your pump should push at least 300g per hour