Turtle's Deep Blue Sea

[Brew12]

I'm going to be ordering some here on pay day. And DI resin. My meters still showing 0tds, even between my RO and DI... but I'm going to change it all out to be sure I actually have working DI resin in my filter. Saturday I'm pulling every piece of equipment out of my tank and disassembling it as far as possible and checking for corrosion. I'm also going to try and achieve as large of a water change as I possibly can.

I showed the owner of one of the local reef stores this picture and asked him why every SPS that goes in the tank does this, and he said heavy metals. Without knowing anything else about my all of struggles.
View attachment 692456

Sounds like a good plan.

My city adds chloramines to the water so I change out all my RODI filter stuff every 6 months just to be on the safe side. It sucks that some of this stuff can get through a burned out RODI system and still not show up on a TDS meter.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Yea, all my money for Reef Dreams is going to have to go to getting this problem corrected... but there is absolutely no point in buying a bunch of coral right now. It's just going to die, weve proven that.

 

[Brew12]

Yea, all my money for Reef Dreams is going to have to go to getting this problem corrected... but there is absolutely no point in buying a bunch of coral right now. It's just going to die, weve proven that.

You and TheEngineer have two of the most vexing tanks I have seen. Normally it is easy to figure out what people are doing wrong so things can get back on track. And then there are your guys tanks....

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I honestly think it's metals... when I dosed the H2O2, it probably accelerated some oxidation or something and wiped out my zoas. I'll get to the bottom of this soon, I have a good lead now.

 

[Scurvy]

Any luck getting Maui to eat something? How long has it been?

 

[sfin52]

I would like to see a comparison of your tap water to your tank water. I wouldn’t think your tank would be contaminated from the inside but from the exterior. Your using high quality equipment that loads of people are using. I believe it’s the incoming water in some way.

Taking the equipment apart is good way to rule it out. I like that idea. Start simple and work your way back.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Jebao and Bubble Magus high quality... hahaha.

I also think it's tap water and an exhausted DI still showing 0ppm TDS when there is actually things like metals getting thru. I'm still going thru all my equipment this weekend, also going get a ATI test, I was told it includes a vial for RODI where Triton does not.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Any luck getting Maui to eat something? How long has it been?

Since I've actually seen him eat... mid December I believe. When did we get rid of the stainless steel tongs? He stopped eating shortly before that. He still looks the same, doesn't appear to have lost weight, and moves between his skull and the rocks several times a day.

 

[sfin52]

Getting him to feed from something else can be hard but he switched to live fish. Something flashy and moment is a lot better than thawed squid.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I dosed Prazipro into his tank Sunday. Just in case there was some parasite bothering him. I'll put the Chemipure back in this coming Sunday to clean it up. I'm also using kalk on that tank, and the dKH has hung right at 7.4 to 7.6 all last week. One side effect of using kalk is it will precipitate out heavy metals in the water. Or so I've heard. There are two 1" turbo snails, one 1" nassarius snail, and a large coral banded shrimp in that tank. Sensitive inverts doing ok... maybe the kalk is helping or the problem is specific to the Deep Blue. The molly I put in there is still alive, eating algae off the frag racks and the rocks... I think even if I flushed those guys, they would reproduce in my septic tank.

 

[najer]

Jebao and Bubble Magus high quality... hahaha.

I also think it's tap water and an exhausted DI still showing 0ppm TDS when there is actually things like metals getting thru. I'm still going thru all my equipment this weekend, also going get a ATI test, I was told it includes a vial for RODI where Triton does not.

I have no interest in doing water tests or getting it tested, I think getting RO tested is a great idea, never really thought of that!
I change my resin and filters when I get to about 5 tds.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I have no interest in doing water tests or getting it tested, I think getting RO tested is a great idea, never really thought of that!
I change my resin and filters when I get to about 5 tds.

Yea, see I'm still at 0 TDS but something is going on. I've been told in the past to trust my TDS meter and now I'm being told metals and other things can pass right by a TDS meter and not be detected. I KNOW for a fact I had and most likely still have metals in my reef. In this case, an expensive water test is justified. Your tank is beautiful, there is no reason to test. The only reason I had it tested before was because it was free. Well, I had to pay $3 for postage to mail the thing to California.

 

[Brew12]

Yea, see I'm still at 0 TDS but something is going on. I've been told in the past to trust my TDS meter and now I'm being told metals and other things can pass right by a TDS meter and not be detected. I KNOW for a fact I had and most likely still have metals in my reef. In this case, an expensive water test is justified. Your tank is beautiful, there is no reason to test. The only reason I had it tested before was because it was free. Well, I had to pay $3 for postage to mail the thing to California.

A TDS meter is just a conductivity sensor. It applies a known voltage between 2 electrodes and measures the current flow between them. The more conductive the water, the more current it will read. The electrical current is calibrated to read out in ppm TDS. 1 ppm of dissolved iron will conduct less current than 1 ppm of sodium chloride, so it only gives a rough approximation. The biggest problem is that some contaminants are non conductive and cannot be read by a TDS meter. Even some metals such as lead and arsenic won't read on a TDS meter. They also will not be removed effectively by ion resin which is where the carbon filter comes in.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I have 2 carbon blocks, one is a 5 Micron VOC and the other is a 1 Micron Universal. Here's the link the the RO. There's a 2 stage DI after it. Bought them separately because I had an old RO in the house, but it cracked and I just replaced the whole thing in October.

https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/brs-4-stage-ro-only-system-75gpd-2.html

I'm vaguely familiar with conductivity measuring of water. We have water cooling the stator in the generator. There are conductivity meters on that system. I just look at the numbers. Glorified meter reader... hahaha. No really I do more than that(like run a power plant), but that's one of my jobs.

 

[Brew12]

I have 2 carbon blocks, one is a 5 Micron VOC and the other is a 1 Micron Universal. Here's the link the the RO. There's a 2 stage DI after it. Bought them separately because I had an old RO in the house, but it cracked and I just replaced the whole thing in October.

https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/brs-4-stage-ro-only-system-75gpd-2.html

I'm vaguely familiar with conductivity measuring of water. We have water cooling the stator in the generator. There are conductivity meters on that system. I just look at the numbers. Glorified meter reader... hahaha. No really I do more than that(like run a power plant), but that's one of my jobs.

That's the same one I use. I just bought the 150gpd upgrade for it. Its a nice unit.

I think TDS meters would be less deceptive if they read out in Siemens or Micromho's instead of ppm TDS like a conductivity meter should.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

That's the same one I use. I just bought the 150gpd upgrade for it. Its a nice unit.

I think TDS meters would be less deceptive if they read out in Siemens or Micromho's instead of ppm TDS like a conductivity meter should.

Ours read in those micro things... I know what the number is supposed to be because there's a chart the lab posted beside the meter. Hahahaha. Wait, we have a water lab here. With HUGE demineralizer tanks. I'm talking like 1000 gallon full of cation and anion resin, mixed bed, deionizing water polishers. Hmmm maybe I can get them to test my water for me sometime... I'll have to talk with them.

 

[Brew12]

Ours read in those micro things... I know what the number is supposed to be because there's a chart the lab posted beside the meter. Hahahaha. Wait, we have a water lab here. With HUGE demineralizer tanks. I'm talking like 1000 gallon full of cation and anion resin, mixed bed, deionizing water polishers. Hmmm maybe I can get them to test my water for me sometime... I'll have to talk with them.

They probably can't test for what you need since it likely isn't a concern of theirs.

I really dislike micromho's. Resistance is measured in ohm's. Someone decided that they would spell ohm backwards and use it as a unit of conductivity called mho's. Ugh.

 

[najer]

This has really made me think, our water systems get tested weekly, I know where some of them go for testing, might try and find a contact!

 

[siggy]

This tank is cursed... ;Sour;Punch;Rage;Vamp

Tanks shouldn't have this many problems. Never seen anything like it. ;Blackeye

Makes me wonder why the last guy sold that tank ;Walkingdead;Vomit......Well you can spend your frag dollars on raffle tickets for whatever tank setup they are raffling off. I know It sucks but I would Deep 6 the Blues. Best of luck Robin

 

[SashimiTurtle]

They probably can't test for what you need since it likely isn't a concern of theirs.

I really dislike micromho's. Resistance is measured in ohm's. Someone decided that they would spell ohm backwards and use it as a unit of conductivity called mho's. Ugh.

Ohm's law, I know that one... really I'm pretty good with DC electricity. I was an auto mechanic before this job, and my dad was in instrumentation technician in the power industry before he went management, so I got some electrical knowledge from him. AC is a bit confusing at times but I can follow simple circuits and understand basic principles. It gets confusing with vars and multiphase and... This is why I'm an operator and not an electrician.

Makes me wonder why the last guy sold that tank ;Walkingdead;Vomit......Well you can spend your frag dollars on raffle tickets for whatever tank setup they are raffling off. I know It sucks but I would Deep 6 the Blues. Best of luck Robin

Goonies never say die!

Raffle money will be limited as well... Need DI resin for 2 canisters, ATI kit, I'm sure there's something else I need. Oh yea, replacement equipment if anything is busted. We will see. I still have the moray/frag tank, and if I can get DI resin in time, I'll do 2 back to back 90% water changes on it and I can put a few corals in there. The frag racks aren't full...

revhtree will be there at the R2R booth with a Red Sea Max nano I believe. A little bit of a downgrade in size from the Deep Blue, but don't think I won't buy a ticket or two and set up a 5th tank to take care of... Maui would like the extra space, and I can dump the rest of the mollies in the frag tank, remove the rocks and use it as a dedicated frag tank.