lduncan

wasp, what is your water change routine?

I never said I knew what the mechanisms are. But I know that they are not those presented by the manufacturer as fact. I have theories, which of course are unproven, yet based on sound long standing research and fact.

Would you use a product which has the following warnings in it's user guide? zeovit zeobak zeostart Does it not make you wonder what is REALLY going on?

Wrong. Reducing nutrients quickly will never cause problems. Wrong. The system can not work like this because even the zeolites which do absorb ammonium in sea water, have a very weak affinity for it, plus the fact that bacteria would prevent the ion exchange process from happening at all after a few days. I wonder what those "certain elements" are? Wrong. This would require around 3 days, even with high bacteria density. What? An interruption to the "chain" would mean your tank would crash, effectively going through another cycle. And it continues.

Some of the manufactures claims on how the system works are outright impossibilities. So your accepting the manufactures claims as fact? Bacteria is everywhere. Whether or not it contained bacteria was only the tip of the ice, like I have said, adding bacteria to a cycled tank is pointless. Zeovit effects come from other mechanisms, not those described by the manufacturer. The question is are these effects healthy for corals? It honestly shouldn't restore any faith in the manufacturer. But if you want to use the product I won't stop you. But misinformation is a disease which needs to be stopped. Layton

Nice. Does that xenia grow very well? I have the same sort, and I can't get it to grow at all. Layton

It doesn't. Silica (silicon dioxide) is classed as insoluble, as it should be, otherwise I'd be worried about my glass slowly dissolving . But depending on the source of the sand it may be contaminated with small amounts of silicates. You could test if you were paranoid. Layton

Typical grain size of silica sand seems to be good for efficient DSB action.

? In English what is a PF5000, and a UP6?

Think DSB.

I'd say get in line. I'd think lot of people would like to buy Redwood if the opportunity ever came up. As for breeding salt water fish. No shops in NZ bother. There are only a limited number of species which have been successfully bred in captivity. Captive propagated corals is entirely possible for most species. Layton

Hi BK, Good to see another potential reefer in chch. Just a suggestion, check out Redwood and Organism for marines, most people down here prefer them for a number of reasons. Layton

That's true. Pies, it wasn't a dig at you, from photos i've seen, all your fish look fat (in a healthy way). But in general, I think a lot of people underfeed. But every tank is different of course. Layton

Why were they not fed enough more like. Reefs are full of food. That's why they can support so much life. I have no idea why people feed as little as they do. It actually quietly annoys me. There is very little chance of killing most marine fish from overfeeding. If nutrients is what you worry about, don't. Given enough live rock and an adequate skimmer, the tank will adjust fine. Just my thoughts. Layton

Actually I find that fish start feeding quicker when the food is tossed around by the current. It appears to the fish to be live i think. They will always eat live (looking) food first.

I was talking about the story chimera linked to. The ballast would have to be pumping out a significantly more power to have a significant increase in UV output. He must have really stuffed up the ballast (like using a 400W ballast with a 250W bulb, or a 1000W ballast with a 400W bulb) to boost the UV to levels to kill or negatively affect his corals. Or the ballast was mislabelled. High pressure mercury bulbs are very similar in characteristics to metal halide bulbs.

That's not overfeeding at all.

Quite frankly I find the story hard to believe.

Salifert kits down here are the cheapest marine kits. They are less expensive than JBL and Hagen. Good quality too. Layton

Hopefully the thread will be unlocked at a later date. I don't know why the moderators don't just delete inappropriate posts. Some were just stupid. Layton

That's a pretty good summary. Running probe start bulbs on pulse start ballasts is not going to cause fire, even in a poorly design bulb. The "ignitors" built into the bulbs are temperature controlled (through a bimetal strip similar to those in heaters) and don't boost the voltage like external ones do, they shorten the spark gap for the initial arc to strike. Once the bulb is warm, it can strike the full distance of the tube.

Most likely they are pulse start, they should fire any bulb.

young percs an ocellaris clowns have a single bar, which is similar to tomato clowns

Power (wattage) is the only thing you have to worry about, colour temperature doesn't mean anything to a socket. They should also be 4.5kV pulse rated as well, for the starters. Most halide bulbs i've seen are E39 bases. But there are combo sockets which any of the two slightly different bulb bases will screw into.

A dual 250 metal halide setup would be ideal for keeping anything you would ever want. Anemones tend to need a lot of light. Layton