I'm Stumped, Maybe...?

[Eric The Red]

I thought I finally figured out why my many of my sps were sliming and getting burnt tips but now I'm not so sure.

Here's the story - The problems all started when my tank's demand was no longer being met by Kalk in my ato resevior. I stopped kalk and went with a dosing pump and BRS 2-part back in mid-November. I seemed to have the hardest time dialing in the dosing pump since I would get burnt tips anytime my alk approached 8dkh becasue I was running biopellets, or so I thought. It has been a nightmare tryimng to keep the alk stable. Seems like I was constantly getting burnt tips.

Recently, I decided to get rid of the biopellets and be done with this ordeal. I was running a TLF 150 reactor with GFO mixed with about a half dose of ROX carbon. Very slow tumble. I had a 2nd TLF 150 reactor that I was tumbling the biopellets in. I then took the TLF 150 reactor the biopellets were in and decided to run the ROX in it and the GFO in the other by itself. I knew that you are not supposed to go to a full strenght measure of carbon right away but since I was already running a half dose I thought it would be okay. Not only did I increase the amount of ROX but I also cranked up the flow in the reactor a bit since I didn't have to worry about the super slow flow for the GFO. (Hey, that rhymes!!)


The trates went from 0.025ppm to 5.0ppm and have remained at 5.0 steadily. I'm fine with this becaue I've wanted to stop running biopellets for a long time. The problem is that they are still sliming out and getting burning tips, almost daily.

It was at this time when I realized that all that ROX rollin' in a reactor likely stripped the water. It has been over a week now since I stopped running carbon. I assume it will take some time and wc's to get the water back to normal. I still see the efflo sliming and getting a little burnt but the others seem to be getting better and coloring up nicely.

I think that the burnt tips were originally caused by the biopellet/alk relationship but continued to happen long after the pellets due to the stripping of the water from the ROX.

Here's the million dollar question - Yesterday I did a 20G wc (I routinely do 10G every week on my 90G tank). After the wc, I looked in the tank and saw many of my acros covered in slime. These were ones that I previously never had any issues with even when some were getting burnt tips.

Does anyone have any idea why my acro's would be reacting like this after a wc? I used tropic Marin salt, fwiw...

[rtbm]

could be a problem with the water itself. Something got in the reservoir or your ro is not working properly? Or the parameters of the WC water were way way different than the tank water? Have you tested the alk of the make up water?

[Eric The Red]

I noticed that my Di resin was shot and replaced that a couple weeks ago. i was getting 009 out of the tds meter and now I'm back to 0. Would 009 be considered bad?

[SneekaPeek]

check your ph, I know when di resin is exhausted it will cause the water to turn acidic. Ive seen it too many times in the car wash industry and it is nasty when the water burns a cars paint.

[Eric The Red]

I have a pH probe and I didn't notice the pH right after the wc but it was 8.42 yesterday, which was 24 hours after the wc. The water I used would have been the last batch before the new resin. I'll pay closer attention to that next time, thanks for the idea.

Any other theories?

[ClownNut]

If you run bio pellet and low po4 and no3 reading, you need to keep your alk around 7. I have the same issue when I run zeo and carbon source dosing. The more clean your water is the more you want to keep you alk around natural sea water level 7-7.5 or around 130 ppm if you use Hanna.

[Eric The Red]

I checked the pH in my saltwater resevior and it was at 8.46. However, this is now mostly water that has passed through the nw DI resin. Not sure what the pH was in my newly mixed saltwater befotre the DI resin.

[Eric The Red]

If you run bio pellet and low po4 and no3 reading, you need to keep your alk around 7. I have the same issue when I run zeo and carbon source dosing. The more clean your water is the more you want to keep you alk around natural sea water level 7-7.5 or around 130 ppm if you use Hanna.

I know this and was trying to do so. I had a couple times where it crept up to 8dkh and I noticed some sliming and burnt tips. However, I started noticing the sliming and burning even when my alk was at 7.0. That's what led me to consider the ROX.

[Eric The Red]

Also, it has been over 2 weeks since the biopellets have been gone. My nitrates are at 5.0 and I'm still seeing the issues whether my alk is at 7.0 or 8.0.

[Bello]

What brand DI resin are you using?

[Eric The Red]

It was the original resin that came with my BRS unit. I just replaced it with more of the BRS resin.

[power boat jim]

Does the sliming go on continually or just after the water change?

[Bello]

It was the original resin that came with my BRS unit. I just replaced it with more of the BRS resin.

When I had a similar problem, it was because I failed to replace the DI resin on time. TDS was over 50ppm.

Just thinking that now that you've changed the resin, perhaps a couple largish WC's might help.

[Eric The Red]

Does the sliming go on continually or just after the water change?

It went for about an hour after the wc then went away and I did get burnt tips on a few of my purple sps.

I noticed today that many of the sticks are starting to color back up again. I started dosing aminos and Phol's Extra Special a couple weeks ago when my initial thought was that the problem was ulns. Sadly, I lost a strawberry shortcake colony yesterday. It was one of the hardest hit a couple months ago when things started going downhill and pretty much stayed brown even as others rebounded. Hopefully the worst is over.

I'm only skimming and running GFO. No biopellets or carbon at this time. I will likely go back to a low dose of carbon once the tank is healthy again but the biopellets are gone for good. I'm starting to get pe on some sticks that I never had it on before. I think I had multiple issues going on at the same time and really hope things have finally turned around.

[Eric The Red]

When I had a similar problem, it was because I failed to replace the DI resin on time. TDS was over 50ppm.

Just thinking that now that you've changed the resin, perhaps a couple largish WC's might help.

I am really, really hoping this was my issue because I'm running out of ideas. My tds meter was only registering 009 but maybe it isn't accurate. The resin had been exhausted for a while but, quite frankly, since the tds was only reading 009, I wasn't in a hurry to replace it.

[dr.big]

i have the same problem, everytime i try to the rox i get burnt tips. My alk is at 8.3. What i don t undersand is that i run 1/3 of the dose!

[blackthunda77]

Im not familiar with the ROX version of carbon, But you guys are not tumbling the carbon right? Tumbling carbon like GFO will disintegrate carbon and the dust can/will irritate the corals.

[dr.big]

Im not familiar with the ROX version of carbon, But you guys are not tumbling the carbon right? Tumbling carbon like GFO will disintegrate carbon and the dust can/will irritate the corals.

I had that problem to but i figured it out. I think the problem come from stripping water from inorganic carbon to fast and SPS get light burn witch is really easy with my radions!