Please help me to not give up.

[reefpeeper]

Long story short is that i set up a frag tank in June mostly zoa dominated and it has never been the best looking. Tank is a 45g deep blue. Some corals when i add them stay looking fine and others eventually shrink and die. Some just get smaller. Also i would say a good amount are not colored up as good as they should be. Looked better when first purchased. They seem to be too pale looking. Hardly any growth. I do have some chalice and favia. They seem to have gotten dull also. My lights are a viparspectra on one side and an ai primehd on the other. I would say the samething happens under both lights. For flow i have the return pump output and also a cp120 crossflow which is on wave mode. I had no nitrates or phosphates at first, but have since gotten them up. When first added nitrates coral to me looked slightly better , but since declined again. All of the following parameters have been kept pretty steady for the last month or so.
Cal 400
Alk 8.6
Magl 1290
Phos .17
Nitrate 2.5
Sal 1.026
Ph 8.2 if hanna meter is calibrated properly.
U guys have any ideas/suggestions?

 

[theMeat]

Get an api or triton water test. Maybe some metals making issues fir you

 

[Rp8]

nitrates and Phosphates aren't in a critical spot. i have the Vipars also, you have to find a good spot then give some time to see the reaction, i have favias also and they are finicky under the vipars. don't do to much trying to reach the optimal result. could throw things out of wack.

 

[Mrtakeoff53]

Parameters look good except phosphate. It is questionable. I have had 2 instances of coral decline in my tank. Everything went pale and started dying. It was my phosphate. It was 0.68! Even when I brought it down to .2 my corals suffered. It’s now down at .06-.08 and everything is happy and colorful again.
The other thing I’d check is PAR. Rent a meter and make sure your PAR is where you want it.

Did you set up your tank with dead, dry rock? Live sand? Live rock? Not having biodiversity can affect tank stabilization. Just and idea.

 

[Rp8]

Parameters look good except phosphate. It is questionable. I have had 2 instances of coral decline in my tank. Everything went pale and started dying. It was my phosphate. It was 0.68! Even when I brought it down to .2 my corals suffered. It’s now down at .06-.08 and everything is happy and colorful again.
The other thing I’d check is PAR. Rent a meter and make sure your PAR is where you want it.

Did you set up your tank with dead, dry rock? Live sand? Live rock? Not having biodiversity can affect tank stabilization. Just and idea.

+1

 

[reefpeeper]

Parameters look good except phosphate. It is questionable. I have had 2 instances of coral decline in my tank. Everything went pale and started dying. It was my phosphate. It was 0.68! Even when I brought it down to .2 my corals suffered. It’s now down at .06-.08 and everything is happy and colorful again.
The other thing I’d check is PAR. Rent a meter and make sure your PAR is where you want it.

Did you set up your tank with dead, dry rock? Live sand? Live rock? Not having biodiversity can affect tank stabilization. Just and idea.

I have biospheres in the sump. No live rock/sand. Also have a par meter that is part of my seneye. Says most things are at around 150 or so par. I bumped up my phosphate to see if any effect. Was very low before. Maybe i should get a triton test done. Never have really had this problem before.

 

[lavoisier]

How long has the tank been set up? Are you feeding the corals at all? 150 max par for a frag tank seems a little low to me. Is it a full spectrum light?

 

[reefpeeper]

How long has the tank been set up? Are you feeding the corals at all? 150 max par for a frag tank seems a little low to me. Is it a full spectrum light?

Been since june. Yes feed coral with ab+ and coral frenzy. Mostly have all zoanthids that is why par not too high where they are located. I mostly run blues on tank.

 

[lavoisier]

Well, first, I would encourage you not to give up!

You've got lots of experience at this hobby of ours, and we both know that patience is the most valuable (and difficult) virtue for our tanks. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know but make one change and then give it a month or two before changing something else. I agree that getting a lab to test your water would be helpful. Adjusting the par is a simple thing you could do next. My thought would be to try increasing it a bit (200 or 250) and see what effect it has.