Switching from vodka to nopox

Art2249 · Dec 4, 2019

Hi, does anyone know how to switch from vodka to nopox? I've been dosing vodka since June and not getting the desired results. Plus I am seeing cyano. My tank has net 160 gallons and I am currently dosing 7 ml a day. I was afraid to go any higher. Initially, my nitrates were coming down but now I am confused about the actual number. Was using red sea pro test and had to dilute the sample per instructions. 1ml tank water and 15 ml ro. I get between 6 and 8 ppm. However, api shows closer to 20. Also Triton DOC came back at 17. So I am wondering if the red sea test is not so accurate with a diluted sample,. As far as phosphates go, I have to occasionally add phosphate to keep it above zero. I tried Vibrant about a year ago and cleaned up the hair algae. But I didn't like the way some corals looked so I quit using it. Now the hair algae is back. I probably could simply increase vodka dose but I'm afraid to use too much. Plus i already ordered the nopox. thanks in advance for any help.

Marlon C · Dec 4, 2019

Get phos up low phos brings cyano and dino

Randy Holmes-Farley · Dec 9, 2019

If any of the nitrate tests are correct, i wouldn't mess with it by changing to something else.

Aside from the nitrate, what wasn't happening that you want to happen?

But if you switch to NOPOX, I'd start around the same volume as the vodka and expect to need to ramp up.

nolifer · Dec 9, 2019

I found a table, my friend used when he was dosing vodka not sure if it will help you. but what I found with nopox was I had to overdose my tank for my levels to drop when I say overdose I mean I was not taken into account my tank size until the levels started to drop which took about 2-3 weeks. I went from 30ppm nitrate to 10ppm my po4 was 0.01 never had any algae problems or cyano only had cyano when my system was new and trying to find balance. vibrant will take out the cyano or dinos problems as it has done so on my new build. best of luck.

Art2249 · Dec 12, 2019

Randy Holmes-Farley said:
If any of the nitrate tests are correct, i wouldn't mess with it by changing to something else.

Aside from the nitrate, what wasn't happening that you want to happen?

But if you switch to NOPOX, I'd start around the same volume as the vodka and expect to need to ramp up.

Hi Randy thx for the reply. I've been having trouble with nitrate testing as referenced in this post:

need help with nitrate testing.

I'm really baffled by my nitrate results. I have 2 tests, API and Red Sea Pro. The API reads 80 ppm and the Red Sea reads 8 ppm (I am using the high range 1 to 15 dilution). I am doing a water change today and have some fresh salt water on hand. I tested it with API and it read zero. So I tried...

www.reef2reef.com

I have ordered a Salifert nitrate test to try. The reason I'm switching from vodka to nopox is red cyano. But this API nitrate test really has me perplexed. I'm getting readings from 40 to 80. When I use Red Sea nitrate test I get around 8 on the high range. If you read the other post I referenced you can see how i tried diluting the sample so I could use the low range and my results were consistent. Diluting by half gave a reading of 4, 25% to 75% ro gave a reading of 2. So I'm wondering if vibrant, vodka or nopox might be interfering with the API test.