ATI test results

Discussion in 'Chemistry' started by CaBrowne, Jan 21, 2021.

  1. CaBrowne

    CaBrowne Plankton

  2. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Quite a bit to digest there. My thoughts:

    1. Salinity is significantly too high. What size tank? Are you using a refractometer to measure salinity in the tank and water change water? Remove a small amount of tank water every day and replace with RO/DI water until your salinity is 35ppt. If you are using a refractometer, calibrate it often with a known calibration fluid.

    2. Calcium is a little high. If dosing just decrease it a little. If not dosing check your freshly mixed salt water. You may be using a high calcium containing salt mix. More than likely the high salinity is also contributing to this.

    3. Iodine is way low. Testing for iodine is hard to do and ICP test are the only perfectly reliable method. I have almost the same low reading and I'm cautiously dosing iodine. Too much is as bad or worse than not enough.

    4. Tin level is high! Not coming from your RO/DI water. Known sources for tin include PVC pipe (any new plumbing?), plastics of other types (plastic RO/DI reservoir or mixing tank?)

    5. Nitrate is a little high but ok (that's actually where mine is right now). Phosphate is too LOW! I would not be comfortable with it being lower than 0.06.

    6. Aluminum is elevated. This is very common and not known to be really toxic. Ceramic media is a common source of aluminum.

    7. Silicon is super high in your RO/DI! The level in your tank is only about one sixth of what's in the RO/DI. Either the RO/DI source is new/recent or something is consuming silicates in your tank. Most likely things to do that are diatoms and sponges. Do you have a brown dusting on your sand bed that goes away at night only to come back the next day when the lights are on? Do you have rapidly growing sponges? This is not toxic to tank as far as I know. Check and make sure your DI resin isn't depleted. Is your post DI water showing zero TDS? (Silicone is known to not show up on a TDS meter sometimes).
     
  3. CaBrowne

    CaBrowne Plankton

    I commented below each of your posts:

    1. Salinity is significantly too high. What size tank? Are you using a refractometer to measure salinity in the tank and water change water? Remove a small amount of tank water every day and replace with RO/DI water until your salinity is 35ppt. If you are using a refractometer, calibrate it often with a known calibration fluid.

    Yes I have a refractometer, I think this got off because I had a leak and had to refill with salt water and I had salt deposits get in as well. I am not doing water changes right now because of Coolia Dinos.

    2. Calcium is a little high. If dosing just decrease it a little. If not dosing check your freshly mixed salt water. You may be using a high calcium containing salt mix. More than likely the high salinity is also contributing to this.

    I am not dosing, I use Fritz blue box salt. Any usually get around 420 when I mix fresh. How do I lower without water change?

    3. Iodine is way low. Testing for iodine is hard to do and ICP test are the only perfectly reliable method. I have almost the same low reading and I'm cautiously dosing iodine. Too much is as bad or worse than not enough.

    What Iodine do you use, and how much? I have 125 gallon with 30 gallon sump.

    4. Tin level is high! Not coming from your RO/DI water. Known sources for tin include PVC pipe (any new plumbing?), plastics of other types (plastic RO/DI reservoir or mixing tank?)

    Last new PVC was year ago...my mixing container is one of those 55 gallon food grade drums, could that be it?

    5. Nitrate is a little high but ok (that's actually where mine is right now). Phosphate is too LOW! I would not be comfortable with it being lower than 0.06.

    Due to dino fight. I had zero readings for awhile and increased feeding.

    6. Aluminum is elevated. This is very common and not known to be really toxic. Ceramic media is a common source of aluminum.

    I have media balls in my refugium.

    7. Silicon is super high in your RO/DI! The level in your tank is only about one sixth of what's in the RO/DI. Either the RO/DI source is new/recent or something is consuming silicates in your tank. Most likely things to do that are diatoms and sponges. Do you have a brown dusting on your sand bed that goes away at night only to come back the next day when the lights are on? Do you have rapidly growing sponges? This is not toxic to tank as far as I know. Check and make sure your DI resin isn't depleted. Is your post DI water showing zero TDS? (Silicone is known to not show up on a TDS meter sometimes).[/QUOTE]

    Yes I have brown dusting that does that but looks like Coolia and not Diatoms under scope. I have alot of bright yellow/green sponge..my DI resin looks fine, all still blue. I actually added the first layer as just Anion resin on a recommendation from BRS for Silicates. My TDS meter does show 0 out readings..

    IDK what to do.... I had to move this tank a year ago, and I did have Diatoms after the move. So I adjusted the DI resin like I said, but then I had the 0 phosphate 0 nitrate problem and got ostreopsis dinos. I got a UV sterilizer and worked on extra feedings. I deep cleaned my sump..the ostreopsis slowly disappeared but in came Coolia and cyanobacteria. I treated the cyano with red slime remover got new cheato and did a deep scrub and syphon of my rocks and it disappeared but still have bit of Coolia on sand bed.
     
  4. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    The calcium is probably just from the high salinity. Correct that and we'll see where it goes. It's not really a problem.

    I'm using Red Sea iodine, there are good instructions on how much to add. I just added it one time and have ordered a Red Sea iodine test kit.

    Tin could be coming from the mixing barrel. If you have another one you could fill it with RO/DI and test that on your next ATI test instead of your source RO/DI.

    I'm not a fan of over feeding to raise PO4 alone. That's probably contributing to the nitrate issue. Seachem Flourish phosphate is a great product for phosphate dosing. Dose, test, rinse, repeat.

    I would not worry about the aluminum. That's where it's coming from.

    On the coolia. Post a short video of the sand bed slide if you can. Coolia will go in to the water column but you can encourage it by turning off your lights for a day and by blowing it off with a turkey baster. What UV unit are you using and how is it plumbed? What is the flow rate through the UV unit. Check the UV to make sure there isn't any precipitation on it. With calcium that high that could happen and drastically reduce the effectiveness of the UV unit. Remind me of your tank size.

    This is a picture of my UV sleeve when my dinos made a rebound!
    [​IMG]
     
  5. CaBrowne

    CaBrowne Plankton

    Ok thanks SO much!! I am working on slowly correcting the salinity. I think my calibration fluid is bad. It's saying 35ppt after calibration. How long is the stuff good for after it's opened?

    I will also look into Iodine dosing. The only other mixing container I have is 35 gallon brute. I will try it like you suggested for the RODI test.

    Are my nitrates an issue? I just added Chaeto like 2 weeks ago, a few days before I sent this test off, and I was told for dinos, to get nitrates to 15 or so.

    I will try to post the video I have on here. As for my UV I have an aqua ultraviolet 25 watt plumbed straight to display. It's mounted on side of stand with 480 gph pump turned down to about 3/4 flow as low as I can get it in the tank without sucking up sand. It's all I could afford for uv without getting cheap Chinese one. I tried a 3 day black out and everything looked good for about a week then it all came back. How fast would precipitation occur? Only had uv hooked for about a month now. My tank is 6 foot 125 gallon with sump and separate refugium. About 150 -160 gallons total water volume.

    Thanks again Doc.



     

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  6. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Yep that's coolia and a little cyano. The flow on your UV is a little too much. 250-300 gph would be better. Dinos need long contact times to kill with UV. Good luck! These things are the absolute worst pest in the hobby! At least coolia isn't as toxic as ostreopsis.
     
  7. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Yes I have brown dusting that does that but looks like Coolia and not Diatoms under scope. I have alot of bright yellow/green sponge..my DI resin looks fine, all still blue. I actually added the first layer as just Anion resin on a recommendation from BRS for Silicates. My TDS meter does show 0 out readings..

    IDK what to do.... I had to move this tank a year ago, and I did have Diatoms after the move. So I adjusted the DI resin like I said, but then I had the 0 phosphate 0 nitrate problem and got ostreopsis dinos. I got a UV sterilizer and worked on extra feedings. I deep cleaned my sump..the ostreopsis slowly disappeared but in came Coolia and cyanobacteria. I treated the cyano with red slime remover got new cheato and did a deep scrub and syphon of my rocks and it disappeared but still have bit of Coolia on sand bed.[/QUOTE]


    I forgot to add. DI resin is not very effective in removing silicone. It requires a "silicon buster" addition to your RO/DI system. I don't think they're expensive. You could also use GFO in another canister in your RO/DI system. It also removes silicates in addition to PO4. Just don't use GFO on your tank, you already have too low PO4.

    I also forgot to add.....don't use Chemiclean when you have or recently had dinos. Cyano is good competition for dinos and not toxic. I know it's ugly but it's a lot less threat than the dinos. I found that blowing it off with a turkey baster a couple of times a day (will have to change filter socks/sponges more frequently) will calm cyano down pretty quickly.
     
  8. CaBrowne

    CaBrowne Plankton


    Thank you so much, things are starting to look better now. Corrected my salinity, my calibration solution was old I guess but the new bottle I ordered was closer to what the ICP test showed. Things have cleared up a bunch. I'm dosing for iodine, and got some brightwell for PO4 and nitrate dosing. Added two new fish and that seems to be helping too. My Chaeto is growing like crazy :). Going to order a new ICP test to see.
     
    razorbackreeFAN and huntindoc like this.

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