This a myth at best. Been drinking it for over 10 years.
If it tastes funny something is wrong as it has no taste.
Warning to others.
- Thread starter charbel101
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If it tastes funny something is wrong as it has no taste.
If I was looking for advice here I would look at people with build threads. If they document from day one with the good and bad then it is someone you can follow and respect.
Find a mentor and listen and learn. This will get you going in the right direction without alot of confusion.
I am retired now and can help anyone thats willing to listen. Just pm me.
how do you know his meter is working properllyis my point..
does your after ro and after di numbers ever both come out the same number? seems to me like he has bound phosphates and most likely its from 3 possible sources, bad husbandry, overfeeding , or its coming in on top off/water changes.. its coming from somewhere. those non calibrated tds meters are not exactly hi grade tools.
if his ro /di is not actually Zero that could be an issue. i would test the water with second /third meter.
Yea always have another way to check whatever you test for.
My rodi is usually 2-3 going into membrane and zero comming out of di.
I have 2 additional tds meters that I can calibrate.
On my system I know I can go to 2 comming out of the di and it will still be zero on my other 2 meters.
Once it hits 3ppm then I will get a reading of 1ppm on my 2 stand alone units and know its time to chamge resin.
My di holding tank is 275g's as I use the water for hydroponics also.
@charbel101
Rip clean is might be the best way to go.
If you don't want to do that, you will need to manually pull that hair out. Melvsreef has a good you tube video on how that works. You would have to work on that at least every other day. That and work on keeping nutrients and alk stable. Test often. Consider your tank like your a water keeper. Just want the water to be perfect and don't worry about the coral. If your water is perfect the coral will be fine.
Some may not make it but that is okay. Just stay the coarse on keeping water perfect and in a few months you should/will see a change.
Rip clean is might be the best way to go.
If you don't want to do that, you will need to manually pull that hair out. Melvsreef has a good you tube video on how that works. You would have to work on that at least every other day. That and work on keeping nutrients and alk stable. Test often. Consider your tank like your a water keeper. Just want the water to be perfect and don't worry about the coral. If your water is perfect the coral will be fine.
Some may not make it but that is okay. Just stay the coarse on keeping water perfect and in a few months you should/will see a change.
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My tank isn't completely set up yet, and I am coming off a break after...a less than successful attempt. However, I've been researching for over five hours a day for months, so I'm not completely clueless XD been working hard to ensure that this attempt will be a successful one.
Cool. If want to run anything by me just pm.
Best advice for anyone is to start with a plan and stick to it.
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Thanks! I am working on one n_n
Just so you know your water can be 0TDS coming out but things like chloramine could still be passing your filters if they’re old carbon blocks need to be replaced pretty often in states that use these chemicals
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For me, after RO is 0-1 and after DI is 0.
What is going to happen if is membrane was bad and the meter isn't working, is his DI will burn up quickly and a person should notice that.
I guess you missed it but he had dinos so he dosed phosphate up because it was zero, hence where the phosphate came from came from. It's appears to be a dry rock start so it will grow algae easily.
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I would say I totally agree, not because I've experienced it, but because I have read enough forums and seen enough BRS videos lol. I just see a lot of people with perfectly good tanks, but they are chasing a number or going over to fight a smaller problem, then they end up with a huge crash. I think one video in BRS explained it really well as a microscopic warzone that goes on in your tank, that you can't 100% control, but you do influence.
Anyways, keep in mind that when you are testing for phosphates or nitrates, this number is what ends up coming out AFTER the nutrients are used. So you likely do have a time when your phosphates and nitrates were spiking up but were being used by the algae as a food source, then sometime after this you test and it reads as zero. But without a food source, they wouldn't be able to take hold, so we can visually know that they get above 0. Now the issue with just removing all phosphates and nitrates from the system is that cyanobacteria then can take hold because it thrives in very low nutrient environments since the other algae then aren't around to out-compete it for space and those nutrients. This is why they tell you to at least keep your numbers above 0 slightly.
I think the biggest issue here, is that like you said, you were trying to chase that greater than 0 number, but your algae was able to consume it too fast for it to actually increase anything on your reader. Basically just fertilizing your algae more and more until you finally got above what they could consume in a day. These types of methods probably get different results in more established tanks, but that is because they have more predators/competition than you have currently.
What I would recommend, is adding something to compete with it that is hardy, and add something that will be a predator for it. I wouldn't say this because of any personal experience, but because that is what the advice that BRS typically gives to these things. You could do this in various ways, adding some refugium algae to the tank that is more appealing than what you were dealing with currently, I have seen work on other tanks (like pompom or sea lettuce is something I've been very interested in). You could add some copepods/phytoplankton. The copepods/phytoplankton BRS has a really good investigation of new tank syndrome with them specifically. The copepods will eat the algae, and the phytoplankton will compete with the algae for food. You could also add a tang if your tank is big enough, or maybe you could find an LFS that will let you take a little one and trade it in when it's bigger. There are other algae-eating fish though, but they seem to be the best. These will just consume it all day, keeping it at small enough numbers, allowing other things to finally get into high enough numbers to out-compete the algae.
Though if you go with the above method, especially if you do more than one or go aggressively with any of them, you may need to continue to dose phosphates and nitrates. I'm not really sure TBH, it will depend on your setup, how much of what you add, how much phosphates and nitrates you will consume, and how much your tank is producing. This is why I believe BRS suggests getting monitoring devices. You can see the ammonia go up, then the nitrite, then the nitrates/phosphates, and then go back down as they are used up, like in real-time. It gives you a better idea of when and how your system is doing the end of the cycle.
Anyways, keep in mind that when you are testing for phosphates or nitrates, this number is what ends up coming out AFTER the nutrients are used. So you likely do have a time when your phosphates and nitrates were spiking up but were being used by the algae as a food source, then sometime after this you test and it reads as zero. But without a food source, they wouldn't be able to take hold, so we can visually know that they get above 0. Now the issue with just removing all phosphates and nitrates from the system is that cyanobacteria then can take hold because it thrives in very low nutrient environments since the other algae then aren't around to out-compete it for space and those nutrients. This is why they tell you to at least keep your numbers above 0 slightly.
I think the biggest issue here, is that like you said, you were trying to chase that greater than 0 number, but your algae was able to consume it too fast for it to actually increase anything on your reader. Basically just fertilizing your algae more and more until you finally got above what they could consume in a day. These types of methods probably get different results in more established tanks, but that is because they have more predators/competition than you have currently.
What I would recommend, is adding something to compete with it that is hardy, and add something that will be a predator for it. I wouldn't say this because of any personal experience, but because that is what the advice that BRS typically gives to these things. You could do this in various ways, adding some refugium algae to the tank that is more appealing than what you were dealing with currently, I have seen work on other tanks (like pompom or sea lettuce is something I've been very interested in). You could add some copepods/phytoplankton. The copepods/phytoplankton BRS has a really good investigation of new tank syndrome with them specifically. The copepods will eat the algae, and the phytoplankton will compete with the algae for food. You could also add a tang if your tank is big enough, or maybe you could find an LFS that will let you take a little one and trade it in when it's bigger. There are other algae-eating fish though, but they seem to be the best. These will just consume it all day, keeping it at small enough numbers, allowing other things to finally get into high enough numbers to out-compete the algae.
Though if you go with the above method, especially if you do more than one or go aggressively with any of them, you may need to continue to dose phosphates and nitrates. I'm not really sure TBH, it will depend on your setup, how much of what you add, how much phosphates and nitrates you will consume, and how much your tank is producing. This is why I believe BRS suggests getting monitoring devices. You can see the ammonia go up, then the nitrite, then the nitrates/phosphates, and then go back down as they are used up, like in real-time. It gives you a better idea of when and how your system is doing the end of the cycle.
I think he means after the RO unit it should be higher than 0. If it reads 0 after the RO the meter is likely bad as even the lowest TDS tap water at the very least has phosphates and other chemicals to keep pipes from corroding.
Algae scrubber man. Easy peezy. Started 1 on day of this tank while shrimp was rotting for cycling. Eliminates ugly phase. No cyno dino hair algae in display. All in the nasty scrubber.
bingo.
This is the truth! Come check out my build thread. After reading through it you’ll see just one of many systems where people have battled very major issues for a long time but with patience and good advice (which they listened to) and researching they overcame their issues. I almost got out of the hobby after 8 months of fighting dinos but I got good advice. I also got live rock and chaeto from someone local to me. This forum and my friend helped me a ton. Even though it seems like people are yelling at you in this thread it’s only because they care about your reef and your success. There are a lot of great reefing minds here in this thread. It would be good to listen to them.
I can’t agree more. Even though I want to be rid of nuisance algae they’re interesting creatures. For instance check out videos on and/or google diatoms.
hes got a whole tank full of algae,, his N and P are not possibly at Zero.
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Actually, it could be, if the algae has consumed it faster than it's being added.
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