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Agree 100%. I don't know what the CO2 concentration in the room was when the tank started to crash, but I would speculate it was very high due to the pair of beer fermenters pumping out about 500 gallons of pure CO2 into the same room. As soon as I made the connection, I opened all the windows and turned on the brewing exhaust fan. I am now running a airline tube from the fermenters to the outside, so they are not adding much CO2 into the room, that should help. For the dKH, I am currently dosing 45ml per day of BRS Sodium Bicarbonate mix and am at a 8.6. Should I bump that up to, maybe 60ml per day until the PH comes up a bit? Thanks for the help!

6.1 is incredibly low for sure, maybe a slow drip with a strong pH buffer? Removing CO2 is the only way to raise pH without also raising dKH, but you've got room to raise it a bit. Sounds more like the primary issue is the high CO2 concentration in the same room as the tank. This may be a bit out there but short of improving inside/outside circulation, Snake plants (S. trifasciata) and Areca Palms are incredibly efficient plants. If the CO2 levels in your room are really that high I bet those houseplants would grow like wildfire (and make a sizeable dent in the levels) with adequate care.

Hey guys, Back around December I was out of the country for three months and the people caring for my tank let it crash. There was a big storm and it kicked a circuit breaker off. Lost everything, but looking forward to starting over. Added The tank is a 150 gallon, with a old school deep sand bed refuguim, Skimz  SM202 skimmer with a biopellet reactor running into it, chiller, dosing system, wavemakers and so on. I used to run cheato mirco algae in the refugium but it died off when I added the bio pellets. After the tank crashed, I removed as much of the funk as I could but left the rock in. Did a few water changed and just let the skimmer run for a month. I added a few fish and snails and started getting some decent coralline algae. Picked up a few frags of Zoos, a Duncan, Candy Cane and a few little shrooms. My plan is to get those test frags growing well before restocking the tank. They are not growing, the Candy Cane is opening up but not growing, the Duncan started to get 5 or six buds but a few weeks ago the Duncan closed up and so did all the Zoos. Coraline algae also all died off. Few sails also died. My temp is stable, Calcium is at 435, dKH is at 8.6, and Magnesium is at 1,360. Tested the PH and its only at 6.1. I did a 50 gallon water change with 7.6 PH water and it didn't come up much. I am also not seeing much of a swing in the PH because there is almost nothing in the tank currently processing photosynthesis. I didn't think about this at the time, or when setting up my system but I have a home brewery in my unfinished area right next to my sump and skimmer. I have two five gallon beer fermenters that are producing about 250 gallons of pure CO2 each per month, right next to my skimmer air intake. The tank started to crash right around the time a started some new batches of beer. I suspect my primary problem is very low PH due to high CO2 levels. I just ran to airline into my airtight fermenters that run from a bubble lock to outside of the house. This should help keep the ambient air CO2 levels lower. I also ordered a CO2 scrubber and am going to hook it up to recycle from the skimmer cup. I don't want to draw outside air to the skimmer. Should I remove my biopellets and grow cheato until I get my PH up? Any additives I should add to the tank to get the PH up more quickly? Should I bump up the dKH? Any other steps that I should be taking to get the PH up to the 8.4 range? Thanks for any ideas or suggestions! Cheers, David

Nice looking tank!

Thank you guys!

It is!

I just won a starter package from Tampa Bay Saltwater over on Reef2Reef through one of their sponsor giveaways. Terrific news as I am planning a Caribbean lagoon biotope anyway!

If you were a winner of a prize and don't hear from the Sponsor; or didn't get an email from me, then let me know if DM and I'll look into it. ERC - Fritz boxes, notified on winners BRK - notified WAMAS officer Hilary who has the codes to send to you Reef Nutrition - you should get email from company with code and how to redeem. Reef Boxx - Puddle Aquatics - WAMAS officer Hilary notified of winners and will pass coordinate with sponsor Supreme Reef - notified of two winners Coral Mags - codes to redeem trial subs emailed by me F-Aiptasia - working on getting boxes shipped to winner. Craig

Welcome back old guy

Chris? Izzat you? Garrett.

Welcome [back]! There are a *ton* of people still here from back then. In fact... I decided to look it up. We have 106 *active members* from back then. How crazy is that?! I think that's a true testament to how awesome this club really is! Hope we serve your memory well!

Whats up fellas! I used to go by the name of Phisigs79 about 12 years ago. I actually was TOTM way back when. Anyways after all these years I’m back! Just wanted to see who is all still here. I know Chip said he was. Is Howard still in here?

WAMAS Platinum Sponsor Reef Nutrition is donating three gift cards to our July 27 Summer Meeting: $100 Gift Certificate for Reef Nutrition products (with $40 bump-up for shipping) 50 Gift Certificate for Reef Nutrition products (with $40 bump-up for shipping). (2 chances to win!) Thanks Reef Nutrition for your continued support of the WAMAS Club!

Are the fish quarantined?

You can pk up at any walmart a 13 lb bag of baking soda in the pool area for cheap......bake it...your done. Then use brs for your calcium.....i have used prestone driveway an other cal diy with no problems but try to use the brs stuff if i have the money.

Ah, yes, I'm still making my own nitrate mix with lab-grade sodium nitrate. When dosing 50ml per day of a solution, it adds up quickly. I still use Neo-Phos since I only use a few ml on occasion. It would take a lifetime to use a DIY solution at the equivalent cost.

BRS got its start many many years ago by sourcing similar grade chemicals and filter media, and then selling them bulk at a cheap rate. I haven't kept up with prices on their stuff over the years, but seems like it has crept up to closer to retail products like ESV, Brightwell, TLF, Red Sea. I've pretty much have stuck to using ESV products as my personal choice. I like results I get; and Joe at Long Island & his 20,000 reef uses ESV products as my reason to stick with it, haha.

We got in an amazing shipment of fish/ corals I this week. We can bring these to the Wamas meeting Saturday too if purchased in advance. Look forward to seeing everyone there! Fish: Foxface Powder Blue Tangs CB Yellow Tang CB Eructus Seahorse Scopas Tang Purple Queen Anthias Ignitus Anthias Bicolor Blenny Tailspot Blenny Starry Blenny PJ CArdinals Banggai Cardinals Super Black Percula Clownfish Pair DaVinci Clownfish Platinum Percula Clownfish Darwin Ocellaris Clownfish Spotted Mandarin Red Head Goby Trimma goby Diamondback Goby Six Line Wrasse Inverts: Lettuce Nudibranch Electric Flame Scallop Red Collar Snails Fire Shrimp Peacock Mantis Shrimp Corals Bicolor Frogspawn Glitter bomb Gonipora Several different types of Macro algae Holy Grail Torch Dendro Coral Duncans Grafted Digitata

The main difference through my research is food grade vs pharmaceutical grade. BRS is going to mix better because it is a higher grade. You really have to check labels to make sure there are no additives. But I believe if it says 100% soda ash and that it’s food grade it works the same just mixes a bit differently. If it’s 1/4 the price or greater then it’s a huge savings. BRS has built their empire on something this simple. Basically charging 4x the amount, but kudos to them. Because nobody else doing it. They do have the best two part mix in my opinion, but there are cheaper options. I’m just curious if anyone is or has done the DIY. I think there are much better options to buy as to 10-15 years ago. Another option would be to do a group buy. Buy 50 pound 100% food grade bags and divide. Would be dirt cheap.

I did for about ten years, especially in the "old days" when there wasn't much accessible, and I didn't have a nickel to my name. Baked my own baking soda, bought snow melt in pallets, bought epsom salts in bulk, etc. Nowadays, I use BRS in bulk. I value my time a lot, and the convenience was worth it for me. I haven't done a recent cost comparison, but I'm happy with the known quality versus risk in finding new suppliers and all.

I haven’t done the two part. However I reached out to Randy Holmes Farley, the guru on R2R about the nitrate and phosphate dosing using food grade. Way way way cheaper than the neo nitrate and neo phos. There is a lot of info on the R2R pages about the 2 part stuff as well. I personally use all 4 reef right now.

Has anyone done DIY two part? Such as buying and using food grade say vs using BRS powder. Seems that you could save a lot of money but worry about trying something I haven’t done before that’s not geared for aquarium. on Amazon for instance they sell Calcium Chloride and Soda Ash much cheaper than BRS.

WAMAS Platinum Sponsor Puddle Aquatics is donating a Reef Boxx II to the Spring meeting raffle (with free shipping ($135 value)! You can learn more about the Reef Boxx and puddle aquatics at their website: https://puddleaquatics.com/ Thank you Puddle Aquatics for your support of the Club! The Reef Boxx is a patent pending automatic backup switch that allows users to connect battery backup in many different configurations. Its what will save your fish in a power outage and is a dream come true for the DIY aquarium keeper. you simply plug in your power brick a battery source of your choosing and then the pump that you wish to back up and thats it. When the power goes out the Reef Boxx will automatically switch over to battery power and when the power comes back on it will automatically switch back. You can even charge your phone while the power is out.

New Platinum Sponsor Coral Candy Aquaculture is donating 7 corals to the raffle: Thank you Coral Candy Aquaculture for your support. -Glitterbomb Gonipora 10+heads -TCK Flametip Gonipora 20+ heads -5pc Zoa Pack Rainbow Yodas, Utter Chaos, purple monsters, sonic Flares and exosphere

Not sure if you ever got this sorted out. But is your calcium also trending down? If so, just increase your dosage of AFR. If only your alkalinity is dropping, increase it with any “alk” supplement. I also use AFR. I do not have issues with one compound being consumed more than another, but I have BRS 3-part that I could use to bring up either if my ratio were to go out of whack.