62G Starfire Reef [40x18x20]

[reefwars]

Originally Posted by JDigital

Definitely worth a try, but to do that I will need to pull out my fish as I'm sure to experience a cycle.



Wouldn't be the first tank I've seen this happen on.. my 180G @ the Office had similar issues but I have since decided to not have SPS at all in that tank.



Thanks, the Monti Cap was the first piece to start showing signs. No matter how bomb proof you think those pieces are I'm not adding anymore SPS till I start changing a few things (ie: the rock). No point killing off more frags when I don't have too. I don't want to be the guy that is known for killing Kiens unkillable SPS.

swap a few at a time and then no cycle , come fill up a bucket and take your time swapping them out , when you have a aquascape you like just bring me what ever you dont use. i got a mix of tonga, pukani and god knows what else for liverock lol :P

[JDigital]

I think I have found my new love/hate relationship.. and the love part is hopefully still to come, so as of tonight it's all hate.

ROX 0.8 Activated Carbon.... This stuff caused me to rage tonight.. It's so damn lightweight that even with the valve on my 1.5 Vertex reactor nearly completely closed the flow still caused a mess everywhere when the pump fired up. What a nightmare to clean up with how fine this stuff is.. embedded in the threads of the of reactor, sticks to your fingers, floats right to the top of the reactor, it made it's way into my display tank, sump... EVERYWHERE. After about 1hr or so I finely got it dialed in but it was more effort than I was planning to exert tonight.

Before I pull the rock out I'm going to try carbon on this tank. It's the one thing that I have always used in the past that I haven't setup on this system until tonight so will see how it works out and if there are any noticeable changes.

One coral that does seem to excel in my tank is my Acans so I picked up a few frags from the grand opening of Concept Aquatics today. So many things I wanted to buy but didn't want to risk any expensive stuff till I get this tank sorted out.

I'll get some photos soon.

[JDigital]

One thing I forgot to mention in my last post was that as I was leaving the house this morning for work I looked at the skimmer and made a mental note that I should empty it and clean the cup when I got home. I haven't touch my skimmer in weeks and it had about 1.5-2" of DARK skimmate sitting it in it too. So I felt it was due for a cleaning.


Got home tonight, walked in the door, and the damn thing was overflowing into my sump like crazy... all the skimmate was gone and back into my system. NO IDEA what happened to cause it to go haywire, as I said, I hadn't touched it in weeks with NO problems what so ever. So that sparked me to start mixing up WC water tonight (thankfully I bought a new bucket of H2Ocean along with my new acan frags today). Will do that tomorrow night when I get home from work, ya know, if the house hasn't burnt down or something.

[Kryptic4L]

airdrie air, mine does the same thing, works well forever, then goes bloody haywire for no apparent reason.

gotten in the habit of emptying mine every chance. nothing more frustrating then seeing a nice cup o skim end up back in the tank.

[JDigital]

It must be that crazy air we have out in Airdrie...

Curious what skimmer you got?

[sphelps]

Check was happens during a power cycle. If your sump level rises during shut down and everything turns back on at the same time, the short time the skimmer runs at the elevated level can sometimes be enough the fill and overflow the cup, once full it just continues to bubble over because of the lid extension. So a brief power cut could explain such skimmer issues.

[JDigital]

Originally Posted by sphelps

Check was happens during a power cycle. If your sump level rises during shut down and everything turns back on at the same time, the short time the skimmer runs at the elevated level can sometimes be enough the fill and overflow the cup, once full it just continues to bubble over because of the lid extension. So a brief power cut could explain such skimmer issues.

Definitely a possibility! I know just from switching off my power bars for water changes that the sump rises. I suppose with all the construction in my area there is a likelihood of power being cut briefly, although it NEVER happens when I'm actually home . Thanks Steve. I'm not sure my Reef Keeper Lite tracks power outages like my Apex at work though. Will have to check that out or upgrade.