Used kitchen/bath silicone.

See, a seemingly simple question raises more questions. Dig into everything until you find answers.

Also, are you using calibrating fluid?

 

Yes I am. The meter and solution are from Bulk Reef Supply. I believe the calibration fluid is at 35 ppm or ppt.

Should I raise salinity gravity to 1.026?

 

Parts per thousand.


I would never; and have never used anything but aquarium silicone.While this may or may not be your problem it sure sounds like it may be one of them.Also how much GFO are you running???How are you running it??Take some pics. of your system and give us more details. GFO can irritate some corals especially if it hasn't been rinsed properly.More info is needed to help you.Tank size, inhabitants,flow numbers, lighting, etc..... The best way this site can help is for you to start a tank thread.List all your info on it.Everything. That way when you have an issue its easier for people to help you.It is also a great way to keep a journal of your tank to see how it progresses.

 

I've tried listing everything many times over the past year, I've gotten some tips but none of which worked. So hopefully you may have some better insight.

Equipment list:

-125g corner flow
-Vertex omega 150 skimmer running 24/7
-2x250 watt eheim heaters
-Diy multi chip/Cree led (4x30 watt 20k multi chips, 48x3 watt Cree rb and 12x3 watt Cree UV) running 8 hours per day
-20g sump
-2x vortech mp40 running at 40-50%
-100-120lbs live rock
-ro di unit

Fish:

-3 lyretail anthias
-flasher wrasse
-yellow tang
-hippo tang
-pink spotted goby
-cleaner shrimp
-flame angel
-bangaii cardinal
-ocellaris clown
-purple firefish

I use one cup of gfo every month, it is rinsed in the reactor by running approx 3 gallons of salt water through it. I also run a cup of carbon changed out once a month. Someone told me to quit running the phosban for a while but nothing improved and algae started growing. Even with that much gfo I still get a bunch of short hair algae growing on the sand bed which forms ugly clumps of sand bound by hair algae. There is algae on the rocks but the snails seem to keep it trimmed from not getting very long. I also get some kind of a algae/sponge growth on the silicone so it's definitely not repelling mildew very well for a kitchen/bath silicone. The silicone has turned yellow though so I'm not sure what that indicates but I only glued in one side of a baffle with the wrong stuff so it's such a small amount. It also smelled like vinegar and people say the toxic kind smells like ammonia, but I could be wrong.

I've tried less flow, lots of flow, short photoperiod, longer photoperiod, less flow, more flow, lowering lights to raising lights, less fish, lots of fish, no gfo/carbon, and not running my skimmer for a while. I'm currently trying to raise my salinity to 1.026 but I'm pretty sure that won't have any drastic impact. My water is also stable, it stays at alk 8, cal 450, mag 1400-1500. PH fluctuates a bit 7.8-8.0.

 

I'm at work right now but here are some pics of off my phone. The few pieces of coral you see I've had in there since last December.

 

I would also like to mention that before this tank I had a 55 gallon bare bottom. It had the same exact issues to the tee with coral dying and the only coral that prospered was Xenia. The Xenia grew fast and overtook every other coral because nothing else would grow. In my current tank the green star polyps are the only coral that chose to actually grow significantly while everything else withers away and the rest just doesn't grow.

The old sump had the proper silicone in it and the only thing I have on my current tank from that tank is the lighting and ro unit. I can't see how my leds won't grow corals but its the only thing that I shared with my old tank that failed the same way. I couldn't figure out how to fix it then so I'm very skeptical now unless my ro unit is leaching poisons.

 

Well the main problem I see is you are overstocked.This is the biggest mistake I see made on the site and the easiest to fix.I would purchase a polypad and use it in your sump for a few weeks.If you have some contamination it should quickly absorb it. Can you dim the lights a little??

 

Aquarium Water Quality: Poly Filters Filter Media

 

I can't dim the lights, stupid on my part I know. I will be trying a different led light for a few weeks and see how that goes. I also already ordered purigen a day or two ago, do you think that this will work instead of the polypad for now? If not I will get the polypad instead. Also, can a large bioload have such a drastic impact on coal growth?

I used to use filter socks but I took them offline since they smelled a little of bleach even after drying for days. I was afraid that some residual bleach was contaminating the tank but that wasn't the problem. In your opinion should I put the socks back on to catch the bigger detrius or just leave them off?

Thanks for your help, in really hoping to get problem resolved. I try searching for other ideas and I keep running into my old posts that i started in 2010 about this issue, lol. I didn't remember battling this for that long.

 

I agree with Vinny about the stocking. My setup is very similar to yours, and it looks like you are on the right track. Your lights, I'm not too sure about. The spectrum may not be what the corals need long term.

What specific problems have you had with corals?