GFO question

[Robb in Austin]

Howdy,

I picked up a dual GFO/Carbon reactor about a month ago, along with the activated lignite carbon and the GFO pellets. Great product!

About 2 days ago I noticed a rust colored film appearing in the water and on the GHA I've been battling. I did a water change today, and also changed the carbon and GFO and noticed this same film on the tubing.

Any ideas on what this is, fines maybe? It didn't seem to affect anything in the tank.


TIA,
Robb

[Snarkys]

hard to say without seeing it in person

[Zylski]

I just picked up one of these too. (I love the product very pleased easy intstallation) I had the same problem, my guess and what i found is the rust colored water is the dust from the gfo pellets. It comes if you adjust your flow rate or you put in new resin. Just give it some time and it should run clear. And make sure you run it in a bucket before you run it back into your tank.

[Robb in Austin]

Snarkys,
Sorry, don't have a pic. Whatever it is, it colored my brine shrimp net rust colored.

Zylski,
It didn't happen at first, was after it was running a few weeks.

I'm assuming it is the fines, maybe from the flow being turned up by accident by The Mrs.

[Snarkys]

fines can be created if the reactor is turned up too high. Comes from the material grinding against itself 24/7. it should be just barely tumbling on the surface .

[Robb in Austin]

Yeah, I had it just tumbling like on the video. The Mrs "adjusted" the tubing and I think she tweaked the flow regulator by accident. When I discovered it the media was 'boiling' pretty good and the timing was about right.

[dknuckles]

Tumbling will grind it in to dust!
I would definitely, do some serious WCs and reduce the flow. If mine moves @ all it pulverizes it.

[bekindtoyurbuds]

I also have a dual gfo/carbon reactor, (i purchased my unit from reef bulk supply) I have also noticed the film like material in the tubing leading to and from the unit. (but that is the only place it is)

But the water is clear coming out with no fines in the water.

It doesn't seem to harm the tank. Basically it looks like the type of algae I get on my glass every few days. With it being inside the tubes there is no way I can clean it, or even think that I would need to, it looks like this is a normal occurrence.

When I bought the unit it came with white tubes for the inlet and outlet (from the tank to the pump and so on....) But being that the white tubing they supplied was not that flexible I opted to purchase clear tubing from a my local hardware store (lowes).

This leads me to believe that this is a natural and common occurrence due to the fact that the kit came with the white tubing (as if almost to hide the algae in tubing) (out of sight out of mind)

Here is are a few pics of what it looks like (note that in the photos the tubes look way darker than they do in person, like I said before it look like the type of algae you have to scrub from your glass every few days)

<a href="http://s177.photobucket.com/albums/w221/bekindtoyurbuds/?action=view&current=DSCN3532.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w221/bekindtoyurbuds/DSCN3532.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

Close up of tubing
<a href="http://s177.photobucket.com/albums/w221/bekindtoyurbuds/?action=view&current=DSCN3533.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w221/bekindtoyurbuds/DSCN3533.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

[Snarkys]

the fines are not going to hurt anything .

Hard to say without being there but since the brown on the tubes is going in and out of the reactor and the same color it is more likely algae growing in the clear tube . This is common on clear tube because light can penetrate it.

We use the white tube because light does not penetrate it as easy. If you need to tube to be more flexible to you can heat the tube in hot water and it becomes pretty easy to shape and as it cools it will hold the shape. .

[Robb in Austin]

Just an update.

It has happened again and there was not a accidental tweak to the valve this time. The film I am seeing looks like that picture above.

When I took the sponges out of the canister insert, they were covered in this film/goo/gunk. It looked and felt like mulm(like from a FW tank filter). So, I wonder if it is a mass of bacteria. That would explain the time lapse until development.


As another BTW, my GHA seems to be receding finally! Bless you BRS!