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I run my Phosban reactor at about 20 gallons per hour. I found through trial and error it worked the best for me at that pace. You could try a little test Phyl and see what happens. Fill a 5 gallon bucket up with system water and get another empty 5 gallon bucket. Run the water through the...

Hehe, I change 100 gallons and you say it doesn't count. :) Actually it was just about a 10% water change. I took my 300 gallon outside stock tank offline a few days ago so I'm only at 1000 gallons. I'm going to move the stock tank down into my basement/closet area (some how, some way) this...

If you can easily suck it out then feel free to do so. If anything was going to happen to the pods it would have happened already so if you still see them all is well. They should be just fine. I'd be more worried about the corals then anything else. They don't like the shock of alkalinity...

I just hope I didn't mess anything up by doing it. :) Carlo

You'll never guess what I did today. A highly unusual event for me. I did a water change on my reef. Didn't start out that way however. I've been lazy and haven't ran the PVC from my stingray tank into the basement. So today I finally decided to hook it up correctly. Short story version, I...

I'll chime in with pretty much the same thing. Don't dose both parts of the 2 part any more. ONLY dose the alk part for a while. Try and keep your alk right at 8 dkh and let the calcium fall on it's own down to around 420. Then once you're at those levels dose in equal parts again. 420 calcium...

It probably didn't crash. You most likely had a major precipitation event in the tank from adding to much too fast. It will probably be clear by the time you get home tonight. Retest your alk, calcium and magnesium and take it slow. Ideally, don't dose the 2 parts at the same time if you are...

Good description of the refractometer Boomer. I didn't feel like trying to explain it since it really doesn't matter to much for the typical person once calibrated properly. That's why I took the easy way out with the statement "Without getting overly complicated PSU in our environment can be...

Nope doesn't matter at all. On a reef the salinity is constantly changing. For example in the Fiji/Tonga areas the salinity can be anywhere from 33%-35% depending on runoff, currents, etc. Lagoons are even worse. Carlo

Unless you mix it up very dilute Phil and use it for top off purposes also. Probably not worth it however. Carlo

Without getting overly complicated PSU in our environment can be thought of as the same thing as salinity. If it was only at 36% that wasn't to bad. I've seen much, much worse. One unnamed member :) tested out at 39% with the 35%/53mS solution with his refractometer at my house. Some...

The wet skimming will remove the plankton and DOCs a little faster. It won't be to fast but will help clear things up. If you can't or don't want to skim a little wetter just let it run it's course skimming dry. Carlo

Keep us updated on the clam. I had 6 clams doing great in my prop system. Took them from 1" to about 4" before I moved them into the reef. Within 3 or 4 days all were empty. Somebody in my tank had a few good clam dinners. :( Carlo PS hope your fish hate clams!

Unless I'm reading something totally different I thought John said he got a value of 37 % (right side of refracto dial) when he put the 53mS solution on it to test before calibrating it. If so that is 37 when it should have been 35 for a difference of 2% salinity. Did I miss something? I was...

I always try and get people to calibrate with 53mS (35% salinity) solution because of this. RO/DI water just doesn't work well at all for most refractometers sold in the hobby. The difference of 35% and 37% is a HUGE amount. Think about it this way. For most Fiji/Tonga/Indo type corals you're...

What fish do you have in the tank? With the right type of predator they would go down in number pretty quickly. Carlo

AnDom1, I'd go easy at this point clearing the water. If you go to fast you might shock some of the more sensitive corals in your tank as they seem to adjust to dimmer amounts of light quicker then brighter light. If you are still dosing phyto completely stop. No point at all in adding it since...

Absolutely can happen. You want to raise the ORP value slowly. For example say it was 280 when you start. Bump it up by 10 every couple of days. Ozone from the standpoint of clarity is much worse then adding 5lbs of carbon to the system. If all your corals are looking good move the one coral...

Do you have the ability to rotate the 90 degree elbow (bottom/middle pic) that's on the intake of the pump or is it cemented in place? I'm thinking you could be getting of a vortex going there that is reducing the flow into the pump and causing a slight bit of cavitation giving you the bubbles...

I forgot all about the nitrate reactor you set up (mines on the shelf). How's it been working for you? What do your NO3/PO4 numbers look like these days Phyl? Carlo