rdavidw

Greetings Angel Not Fish; your tank looks great. I am in Frederick, about a half hour from you. I grew up in Potomac. I just bought a winter vacation home in China and will be looking for someone to check in on my 150 gallon reef once or twice a month, starting around early December to around late March each year. Looking for someone to clean the glass, clean the skimmer, refill the fish feeder and maybe do a water test. I get txt notifications if there is a leak, power out, skimmer cup full and so on. Last trip to China, the person watching my house didn't know much about reefing and let me know that the power went out during a big storm - but it's back on now. The home generator came on but the fuse to the reef tank pumps tripped and did not come back on. Lights were on a different fuse that did not trip. They told me two weeks later that they didn't need to clean the skimmer because there were no bubbles. Lost everything; only have some frags and a few small fish now. I have since added the status of the fuses to my smart home monitoring and notifications. PM me if this is something you would be interested in doing, or I can reach back out to you as we get closer to December.

I am already at 8.34 PH! Crazy how fast the scrubber worked. I may get a PH controller wired to a valve on a tee after the CO2 scrubber to lock in the PH at whatever level I want. I will see where things settle after a few days and go from there. Should be about $200 to set up: Milwaukee Instruments MC122US pH Controller Normally Closed 110VAC-230VAC Motorized Ball Valve,3/8" Stainless steel

I hooked up the new CO2 scrubber on a closed loop from the skimmer lid. After running it for about two hours the PH is already up to 8.03. I was hitting about 7.01 before I hooked it up, with both readings taken near the skimmer outlet in the refugium.

Ok - good plan. I will work on keeping the workshop as CO2 free as I can and hope the reef water off gasses much of the CO2 and the PH comes down to the point where the coralline comes back. Hopefully the new CO2 scrubber helps speed up that process. Thanks again for the help.

Thanks again for your help with this DaJMasta. Yes - I have had this reef tank running for about 35 years now. Moved to a new house a few years ago and made a workshop that houses both the reef tank mechanical systems and a home brewery. The workshop is airtight with no windows to keep the reef tank and beer making smells and humidity out of the main house. I typically make a new batch of beer once every three months. I took a year off and then just made five new batches in the last two months. During the brew day, I run a big exhaust fan to outside the house and not much CO2 is made on brew day, compared to the fermenting process. Each batch of beer expels about 300 gallons of pure CO2 over the two week or so fermentation period. CO2 is about 1.5 time the weight of air so it drops to the floor, where my skimmer is. I don't regularly test my reef tank PH but did after I noticed the tank was stressed out and my other water parameters looked OK. I would speculate that about 40 gallons of pure CO2 per day (on top of regular household CO2) was being absorbed by the 150 gallon reef tank. The reef tank started going south right after I started brewing more. After I made the connection with the very high air CO2 levels, I modified my beer fermenters to vent from the air locks to the outside of the house. I also ran the exhaust fan for two days and left the workshop door open and some windows near the bar with the reef tank open. I also set up some hydroponic plants in the workshop. Moving forward, my air CO2 levels should be much lower. I installed my CO2 scrubber to recycle air from the top of the skimmer so that may help the media last a little longer also. Could my reef water be still super saturated with CO2? If so, will the scrubber help pull CO2 out of the water, or will it just help prevent more CO2 from entering the water? DaJMasta - I like the idea of only using the soda ash to replenish the bicarbonate, but my question is how much will the bicarbonate be depleted in a tank with almost no coral or coraline algae? Would a 100 gallon water change with fish only salt mix help remove the CO2 in the reef water and bring the dHK levels down? I would like to get the PH levels up fairly quickly, but it looks like the levels are already starting to rise a little and the little test corals are starting to open up a little. Maybe slow and steady is best here. Cheers! David

My PH is now running about 6.8-7.1. My CO2 scrubber is being delivered today, hopefully that will help some. I erroneously added more Bicarbonate trying to get the PH up, and now my dKH is 13.2. I just got some Soda Ash to replace my Bicarbonate dosing. Should I add any Soda Ash and get both the PH and dKH up? I just did a 50 gal water change on my 150 gal tank, the Reef Crystals mix I tested came in at 13 dKH. Should I pick up some fish only salt mix like Instant Ocean and do 100 gal water change to get the dKH down and then add Soda Ash to get the PH back up? My RO DI water is testing about 7.2 PH. I only have a few tiny frags in the 150 gallon tank and the Coraline algae died off so there is nothing up taking much of anything. I want to get the few test frags growing before restocking the tank. With the PH problems, the frags are still alive but are closed up. Thanks again for any suggestions.

Good thinking DaMasta. I have a Hanna PHep that I calibrate about once a week for brewing. I have also tested against cheap strips. I just stuck the tester in again and got 6.29. I held the prob in the refugium, right where the skimmer dumps out. I then stuck the tester in the main tank and got a 7.55. My tank is in a basement bar. The brewery is a sealed unfinished room with no windows and an airtight exterior door from the bar area to not let any of the brew day heat and smell into the main house. The beer fermenters produce about 200 to 300 gallons of pure CO2 per five gallon batch of beer and are right next to the reef tank works including the skimmer. I have just set up a vent line from the fermenters to the outside. There was likely a massive amount of CO2 in the air in that back brewery/reef works room. The skimmer is likely taking up much of the CO2 and the PH is spiking at the skimmer outlet. Good idea on the Kalkwasser, I will give that a try. I have ordered a CO2 scrubber for the skimmer and will set it up to pull air from the skimmer cup.

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!

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

Thanks DaJMasta! I do occasionally get some spots slime algae and run some GFO to knock it out. I only do a 50 gallon water change every three months. I think I will try it out, not very expensive and it will save my re-mineralization stage by isolating it to the drinking water side.

Greetings and thank you in advance for your advice. I am pondering adding a BRS resin kit - https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/triple-di-saver-kit-with-resin-and-tds-meter-bulk-reef-supply-bundle.html Are there benefits to a resin kit beyond reducing the TDS further? If I am getting around 3 TDS consistently from just my RO system would it still make sense to get a DI resin kit? I have a Watts Zero Waste RO system that has been heavily modified. I am on well water and my incoming TDS is around 148. I am running a pair of membranes in parallel and use a normally open solenoid valve to bypass the flow restrictors on the brine line. When the pressure switch hits 50 psi the pump turns off and the inlet solenoid closes and the bypass solenoid opens and drains into a floor drain, de-pressurizing the membranes. When the system powers back up the bypass closes and the brine line is pumped back into the house water further upstream. It only waste about a cup of water down the drain each time the system cuts off and its all automatic. Works great, with the bypass flush I am getting very little TDS creep. I am getting about 2 or 3 TDS at start up and it climbs to about 7-9 TDS and will then gradually fall to 1 TDS. I have a pair of 25 gallon pressure storage tanks that are plumbed together. I use the RO water for a top-up reservoir and 50 gallon water change reservoir for a 150 gallon reef tank. I also use the system for a home brewery and have a drinking water line throughout the house. I have a re-mineralization stage before the storage tanks on a 1/4" line, everything after that is on 3/8" tubing. After the storage tanks I have a polishing carbon stage and a 25 watt UV. If adding a DI kit would be a noticeable improvement for my reef tank, I am guessing that I would not want to have it on the high flow 3/8" line after the storage tanks. I am also guessing that I don't want to use the DI resin kit on my drinking and brewing water? I could make one of my two 25 gallon storage tanks just for the reef tank so it would go RO --> DI stages --> storage tank # 1 --> reef tank. The other line from the RO would go re-mineralization stage, --> storage tank #2 --> polishing stage --> UV --> brew kettle and drinking water. Thanks!

Here is another photo

Anyone know what this is? It started off almost black then turned to a cream color.

Agreed on the Aqua UV classic. Rock solid unit. I had a cheap early model UV from another company that had a twist tube that was some type of plastic. The water flow got clogged and then the heat from the UV bulb burned and melted the plastic twist tube and then the salt water cracked the bulb. Luckily the fuse blew and there was no fire. Have been running a 40 watt Aqua UV for about ten years now and replace the bulb each year. Over that decade I had to replace one transformer and one quarts sleeve (I broke it changing a bulb). That is not bad. About two years ago I decided to remove it from my system on someone's recommendation. The tank lost it's shimmery super clear look and I hooked it back up after about a month.

Here are some photos of how the tank is maturing.

The only thing that was off topic was talking about the reef tank. I am not part of a local club. I may join this Frederick MD based club at some point: Frederick's Original Ale Makers That may be a bit of a drive for you. Check out: Freestate Homebrew Club Guild I make 12 gallon batches of wine about four times a year. I have been using Eclipse Kits but am looking into a group share on a bladder press. I used to work at a winery about 30 years ago. The nice thing about the kits is the pH is spot on, which can be tricky going straight from grapes. It's also hard to get just the right amount of bees and flies caught in the press. Cheers!

Perfect! Thank you so much!

Chuck, the frags I got look amazing! Could you help me out with what is this: It's beautiful. Right now I have the frag set in between some rocks near the bottom of my tank to keep it out of the strong current. Should I move it up to get more light and what is the best way to secure it in my tank? Do you recommend some JB Water Weld or super glue? Thanks again and beautiful tank.

Here is more of my setup on Home Brew Talk: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/new-home-basement-bar.663517/#post-8573529 I have a pair of these 1/2 hp chillers: https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-1-2-HP-CHILLER-AQUARIUM-WATER-SALT-WATER-CORAL-REEF-HYDROPONICS/153194537913?hash=item23ab1b23b9:m:mD_fBU7eO2r-i9yvPBYThqA One is on my reef tank and the other is on my brewing fermenter setup. It hard to see in the photo but the chiller is on the lower shelf. There are three pumps in a glycol bath in a cooler behind the fermenters. Each pump is on a separate controller. One is set to 28F and powers on the chiller and the chiller pump. The other two each maintain a fermenter with a stainless coil in each. They are two stage controllers with heating pads under them. Works great. I can cold crash both of them down to 37F easily. I also use it for my yeast starters. The thing on the left in the photo is a stainless pot with a stir plate mounted under it and a cooper coil in it. I put the 2L starter in it and set the temp and that is it. Goes from a boil to pitch temp in about 12 min and then holds that temp. My lager beers are always the first ones to kick when entertaining but I still make lots of ales. The lagers take longer to make and its kind of a hassle to manually do the dozen or so temp step ups and downs. Surprisingly, it's been a game changer for my non-lager high gravity beers. I pitch at the cold range of the yeast to slow it down and keep the yeast from getting too sloppy and slowly ramp up the temp until the style yeast has gone as far as it can. I then pitch and re-pitch a champagne yeast. I have gotten some 12% barley wines to come out very crisp and clean with this glycol setup. I don't use stainless fermenters. Just cheap and easy Speidel 30L. I have four, two on the glycol and two off. Stainless is a little easier to clean but harder to insulate. I have five 6 gallon Better Bottles and a glass carboy I use to filter with a vacuum sealer. This is my HERMS set up: The fourth kettle on the right is a steamer for crabs and lobster bakes. Not part of the brew setup but just as important. My only burner is a single 3500 Watt induction burner. I pump my sparge water from the BK with a stainless coil in it to my HLT with no coil. I'm sure that sentence will make complete sense to everyone here on WAMAS. Cheers to thriving yeast in your fermenters and thriving bacteria in your reef tank.

I was able to edit the original post and re-upload the photos. Don't know why they were down.

Sounds like fun! Will also trade beer for cheap frags.

Nice setup YHSublime! Man, I got a soft spot in my hart (and probably my liver) for mead. Just opened a 2009 bottle. I know I guy who uses his skimmate as a fertilizer to grow weed and swears it somehow makes it magical. Weed is not my thing and I don"t think skimmate would work well for brewing. We have all seen some beautiful thriving reef tanks run on some very modest equipment, and, more often the inverse. I find homebrewing is the same way. Can't buy experience and a solid process but well designed quality equipment sure helps. I have heard good things about the Grainfather. Did you get the expanded grain bin that can do a almost 20lb grain bill? I am still doing 5 gallon beer batches and brew two or three times a month. I do 12 gallon wine batches. We entertain quite a bit. I keep 12 five gallon kegs full - six on tap (two taps are nitro), two in cold storage and four at room temp. So nice to run into another reefer here on the home brew talk site. Cheers!

Don't want to get too far off topic, but the beer and the urinal do complement the tank well. I make 5 gallon batches at a time, from water grain and hops. I also make wine. On the six taps, I typically keep a mead, an apple wine, two dark beers, a lager and a big IPA. https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/new-home-basement-bar.663517/ The two hobbies play well together. Both are part art and part science and you can get great results using mostly one or the other. I started with a salt tank back around 1990 and started making beer and wine a few years after that. I had a part time job just out of collage working in a winery.

Thanks Chuck, all good.

Sorry if off topic - replying to the basement in general comment. Not too much to look at in the tank yet but looking forward to changing that. What little I do have seems to be doing well so far. My old tank was very overgrown so this is a nice change. Thanks!