bbyatv

Blue Ribbon Koi baby! Bruce

No PM yet. Did someone stop by? I can stop in if you get a hold of me before 11:00 am eastern. Bruce

I have been watching since 5:00 am. I was hoping someone closer to Arlington would step up. PM me. Bruce

Chip. That is so cool. Thanks for sharing old school. I used to have a smaller DIY version on my 30g. Bruce

I stopped in BRK today after not having been in for some time and found the store to be completely loaded with nice stuff. Clams, corals, fish and hard goods were fully stocked. I was so impressed. As usual John greeted me as I came through the door and was glad to talk reef with me. If you have a chance to stop in, it is worth your while. If you missed his display at MACNA, you will have a good idea of what the spread looked like as he has so much stock that it looks like he is preparing to go. This is a local fish store in my back yard that many reefers would drive hours to visit. Thanks John. It is always good to see your store doing well and taking care of us reefers. Bruce

My first thought is that I would suggest you stop dosing kalk as top off. This is a very risky method of adding kalk. You can find hundreds of threads discussing all corals dead because of an overdose of kalk in a top off application. I would suggest using a dosing pump to pump fresh water into a kalk stirrer and then have it overflow into the sump. I have written an article that describes how to set this up. It is way more stable and way less risky. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5QJJLprX7aQclZsN2pyLU1zTU0/view?pli=1 As for the sediment that gets left behind at the bottom of the stirrer, I think this is normal. The contents of this leftover sediment is described in the article by Randy Holmes Farley (the king of water chemistry) in the section "What Gets Left Behind On The Bottom Of The Limewater Container?". There is also a ton of other information about the benefits of dosing kalk and how if helps your system. http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-01/rhf/index.htm Good luck, Bruce

Dave, I had not thought of that. Good idea. I will keep that in mind for the future. Thanks, Bruce

Ya, so David (Bruleyii) stopped over with a Red Sea Mg test kit that was fairly fresh. It confirmed that my new Salifert Mg test kit was accurate and that my old kit was giving false readings. I am glad I double checked before I started making changes to my water parameters. David, thanks again for stopping over with your kit. Bruce

I just bought a new Mg test kit and the results are way different than the kit I was using. Does anyone in Centreville have an Mg test kit that I could use for one test jut to verify if my new kit is bad or not. I could trade a coral for the use. Thanks, Bruce

Thanks for the feedback. And right you are. I run a very simple old school system. Bruce

Here are some tank photos at 2 years since re-build. Thanks for checking in, Bruce

Your answer might be here: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/index.htm Or in one of these articles. Reading is key. http://archive.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=102605 Good Luck, Bruce