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Any Red Sea Coral Pro Users Out There??
- Thread starter blange3
- Start date
danthemanj
FRAG SWAP VENDOR
I think Stan (smcooler) uses this
Edwardw771
NJRC Member
I'm using the Red Sea Pro. Works good for me.
Bill I switched to Coral Pro a while back and it's been good. No issues with it at all.
I was having Nitrate problems when I used Reef Crystals.
I was having Nitrate problems when I used Reef Crystals.
I've had it with ReefCrystals as well. Low Alk, low calcium. Was looking to switch to tropmarin pro or maybe oceanic.
hayabusa2003 said:
Deltec also came out with a new salt that Mott (tom) mentioned. It's called H2Ocean. They had a ton of it at Macna. You may want to try that.
Hey everyone, thanks for all the feedback!
A little history....
Like everyone I went back and forth between IO and Reef Crystals. Not happy with having to supplement so much calcium with IO, not happy about the Reef Crystals scum and scaling in the mix barrel.
Everyone was hot for TM Pro at one time, but it was over my budget. But I figured I don't keep much in the way of SPS so maybe regular TM would work for me, and it did!
I noticed dramitic inprovement in growth and color in all my corals, and I've been using TM for almost 2 years now. I really wasn't looking to change.
Fast forward to today, AO can't get TM economically through their dealers anymore and DFS is frequently out of stock. I like something that is good quality, economical and readily available.
I'm interested in Get Tanked, but my funds don't always match a group buy schedule, and the logistics seemed a little tricky.
Will has Red Sea all the time at a good price and a great sale is coming up. We've got a pretty nice list of tanks here on Red Sea so I think I might give that a shot.
Tom, thanks for the input on H2ocean, I'll do some research on that as well. It's not one I had heard of.
Thanks again for all the input.
A little history....
Like everyone I went back and forth between IO and Reef Crystals. Not happy with having to supplement so much calcium with IO, not happy about the Reef Crystals scum and scaling in the mix barrel.
Everyone was hot for TM Pro at one time, but it was over my budget. But I figured I don't keep much in the way of SPS so maybe regular TM would work for me, and it did!
I noticed dramitic inprovement in growth and color in all my corals, and I've been using TM for almost 2 years now. I really wasn't looking to change.
Fast forward to today, AO can't get TM economically through their dealers anymore and DFS is frequently out of stock. I like something that is good quality, economical and readily available.
I'm interested in Get Tanked, but my funds don't always match a group buy schedule, and the logistics seemed a little tricky.
Will has Red Sea all the time at a good price and a great sale is coming up. We've got a pretty nice list of tanks here on Red Sea so I think I might give that a shot.
Tom, thanks for the input on H2ocean, I'll do some research on that as well. It's not one I had heard of.
Thanks again for all the input.
I know this is not related to your topic but I used RC for yrs and recently switch to Seachem Reef ( now almost 3 months ) and much happier with it and only 10.00 more on RC which is not bad...
Thanks Bill.. I also wanted to try the TMPRo but me doing 20g a week water change will cost me a fortune. i have read some good stuff on seachem so I went ahead and tried it . So far its doing great for me.
hayabusa2003 said:
Just curious, is it possible that you had one of the bad batches? I had a low alk/ low calcium problem once that I couldn't correct no matter how many water changes I did. Once the salt was gone, I bought a new bucket, and the problem miraculously corrected itself. I never even knew there WAS a bad batch problem until recently, but I haven't had that problem since, and I have been using reef crystals for about 2 years now.
blange3 said:Hey everyone, thanks for all the feedback!
A little history....
Like everyone I went back and forth between IO and Reef Crystals. Not happy with having to supplement so much calcium with IO, not happy about the Reef Crystals scum and scaling in the mix barrel.
Everyone was hot for TM Pro at one time, but it was over my budget. But I figured I don't keep much in the way of SPS so maybe regular TM would work for me, and it did!
I noticed dramitic inprovement in growth and color in all my corals, and I've been using TM for almost 2 years now. I really wasn't looking to change.
Fast forward to today, AO can't get TM economically through their dealers anymore and DFS is frequently out of stock. I like something that is good quality, economical and readily available.
I'm interested in Get Tanked, but my funds don't always match a group buy schedule, and the logistics seemed a little tricky.
Will has Red Sea all the time at a good price and a great sale is coming up. We've got a pretty nice list of tanks here on Red Sea so I think I might give that a shot.
Tom, thanks for the input on H2ocean, I'll do some research on that as well. It's not one I had heard of.
Thanks again for all the input.
This is mostly opinion on my part, and I'll state up front I'm not trying to start a "salt war".
I consider IO and Reef Crystals to be marginal salts at best. I would only use them in an emergency where I couldn't get "my brand" of salt.
I believe that it is extremely foolish to switch brands of salt in order to save money. I don't use TM either, although I consider it an OK salt. If the salt is working for you, and you are getting good results, stick with it. Salt is just about the least expensive item with it comes to SW reef systems.
The bottom line comes down to this. Why place your reef at risk to save a few dollars on salt? Remember if you have been doing this any length of time, you have a lot of money tied up in livestock, and you have a lot of effort tied up in the system. If you have had your reef for several years or more, you'll tend to have corals that you could not easily replace no matter how much money you had to spend.
Water quality all starts with the quality of the salt being used. It is the lifeblood of a reef system. IMHO it's just not worth trying to save money on salt.
Switch salt only if you have a problem with your current salt, and the new salt will improve upon things.
As for the various brands of salt, while it's easy to find brands not to use, because they are deficient in some way, I do not believe that it's possible to demonstrate that there in one salt that is better than the others among quality salts. Case in point, I don't like IO or Reef Crystals, yet there are people that have excellent reefs and use them.
NEWSALT said:
+1?? What do you use Dave?
If you read closely, I'm not trying to save a few bucks as much as make sure I have a salt that is readily available all of the time. I believe any salt can work long term when you learn what supporting requirements they have. My progression of salt choices ran from IO to Reef Crystals to TM. Each time my choice cost more than the previous salt.
If I were confident that TM would be readily available to me, then I would stay with it. Very few LFS's in my area now stock TM, so I am acting to maintain the stability of my tanks.
I do agree with you that salt is the least expensive component of our systems. I am amazed at how much people will spend on high tech equipment and supplements to avoid doing more water changes.
And for the record, I have been doing this for some length of time, something like 36 years.
As far as the excellence of my reef, I'll let others chime in. I'm a little biased and only somewhat opinionated. ;D
Since I'm asked so nicely, by two members, The salt I use is Aquacraft's Marine Environment. It is just about unavailable on the east coast as a LFS. I have to order my supply via the net. Naturally, this makes it very expensive. You can order it direct here (offsite link) - http://www.aquacraft.net/s9914.html You can also order it from North Coast Pets, and it will be slightly less expensive (offsite link) - http://www.northcoastmarines.com/salt_mixes.htm If you want to read all stuff about why Aquacraft thinks they make the "best salt", it's all off their home page here (offsite link) - http://www.aquacraft.net/ Needless to say, take everything you read there "with a grain of salt".
Of course, like everyone else, the salt I use is "the best". ;D
Getting serious, while I use ME, I know of no way to demonstrate that the salt is better than any other. The salt testing you do read about on the net is generally not well done, and subject to many flaws. We could have a whole other thread on how good the science is behind most of the aquarium practices in use today.
Since ME not easily obtained, I wouldn't be surprised if I'm the only person on NJRC that uses it. So no matter what you think, you should be able to find many more people that use something else, and think it's way better. ;D
I've found that what works for me is to stockpile the salt myself, and I usually buy six 50 gal bags (2 cases) of salt at a time, and mix it in 50 gal amounts. When I get down to a couple of bags I'll reorder. This way if I ever have an all out emergency I can chaneg most of the water in my 125 gal reef with out worrying about the LFS being open or having what I need. I'd recommend doing that for everyone.
As for time in the hobby, I hate to think about that nowadays. Doing the calculation its 43 years. I set up my first SW tank at age 15. I attribute the success I have today to making just about every mistake possible over this time span. ;D I will say that some of these errors are forgiveable, since at the time I made them, no one else knew what was the "correct procedure" was.
Of course, like everyone else, the salt I use is "the best". ;D
Getting serious, while I use ME, I know of no way to demonstrate that the salt is better than any other. The salt testing you do read about on the net is generally not well done, and subject to many flaws. We could have a whole other thread on how good the science is behind most of the aquarium practices in use today.
Since ME not easily obtained, I wouldn't be surprised if I'm the only person on NJRC that uses it. So no matter what you think, you should be able to find many more people that use something else, and think it's way better. ;D
I've found that what works for me is to stockpile the salt myself, and I usually buy six 50 gal bags (2 cases) of salt at a time, and mix it in 50 gal amounts. When I get down to a couple of bags I'll reorder. This way if I ever have an all out emergency I can chaneg most of the water in my 125 gal reef with out worrying about the LFS being open or having what I need. I'd recommend doing that for everyone.
As for time in the hobby, I hate to think about that nowadays. Doing the calculation its 43 years. I set up my first SW tank at age 15. I attribute the success I have today to making just about every mistake possible over this time span. ;D I will say that some of these errors are forgiveable, since at the time I made them, no one else knew what was the "correct procedure" was.
I'll add my 2 cents. switched from reef crystals to seachem for the same reasons. too much supplication. very happy so far. I go to PA. about once a month to visit friends and go horseback riding.
that fish place is close by. I get it for $41. a 160 gal. bucket
that fish place is close by. I get it for $41. a 160 gal. bucket
Thanks for the link Dave, I'll read up on ME.
So as one old timer to another we both know it's not about finding the perfect salt. Back when we started it was pretty much AO only in those plastic bags with the bottles of liquid trace elements that always leaked during shipping. Or you made your own.
I usually stock up 3-6 months worth at a time, but I do like to have the option of picking up local when I find that the last bucket was really one I was storing mag flakes in! ;D
So as one old timer to another we both know it's not about finding the perfect salt. Back when we started it was pretty much AO only in those plastic bags with the bottles of liquid trace elements that always leaked during shipping. Or you made your own.
I usually stock up 3-6 months worth at a time, but I do like to have the option of picking up local when I find that the last bucket was really one I was storing mag flakes in! ;D