[saltysteve]

My tank has been up for about 6 months and i still have cloudy water, diatoms, brown and green hair algae
and god knows what else that i cant see. The thing is that my water tests really well and im growing purple all over the glass and those tiny white swirl looking barnicles. What gives? here are some pics (dont mind the mess, under construction) and my parameters :

nitrite 0
nitrate 0
amonia 0
phos 0
ph 8.16
cal 420
salt 1.027
temp 78.6
lights are on 8.5 hrs
[IMG][/IMG][IMG][/IMG][IMG][/IMG][IMG][/IMG]

[saltysteve]

oh and i feed frozen blood worms one cube - half in morning and half at night.
clean up is small: 5 large turbos and 3 hermits and a sandsifting shrimp and algae blenny.

[saltysteve]

And for water movement I have just the two exits. One has a eductor and the other doesnt. since its a cube the water bounces off the walls rather well. when i hook up two eductors its kind of turbulent and blows the sand and everything blows around to much.

[saltysteve]

also Im using RO/DI water - 0 ppm

[RyanG]

Steve, start feeding less(every other day), turn your lights off for 2 days, no need to keep them on for as long as you do. Get more water flow in your tank, add at least one more powerhead, the little giant is connected to the sump I am assume.

Then do a 25% water change.

[saltysteve]

the ps4 is connected to the sump. the only reason why i was feeding so much is because my fish seem to be upset. the brown tang keeps getting ich when i slow down the feeding

[saltysteve]

more flow - less feeding - less light?

[RyanG]

yup if you do those three things that should help out a ton

[saltysteve]

k thanks-
4 hours light?
feed everyother day? (will this stress the fish?)
how much more flow?

[Mirkle]

how many hours should the lights be on?? mine are on for about 10 hrs

[saltysteve]

well i guess thats okay if you're not having a algae problem but i think its supposed to be around 8 hours-

[kdjhawkfan]

wow, I must leave mine on way to long. (13 hours)

[Ross87]

from what I've read so far, your not suppose to feed your fish anything more than what it can eat in 2 minutes

[NATIVEVAMAN]

Steve,any kind of reef tank needs at least 20x the tank volume in flow.I know that may sound like a lot but some have flows of 40x.

[saltysteve]

20x in flow- now does that mean any kind of flow or does it have to flow through the sump? or can it be flowed with powerheads? also would adding a eductor create more flow? it says it creates 400x the flow on its package. im not sure how it could but they do make a lot more water movement inside the tank.

[NATIVEVAMAN]

Steve that would be a combination of flow from your return and powerheads combined.

[unclejed]

Hi steve, my 55 gal. took about 5-6 mos. to totally cycle and settle in. Mine looked pretty much like yours, I took out the worst rock with green hair and scrubbed and cleaned them. I had to do this 3 times. It is discouraging, no doubt but hang in there. Noe, let me ask, did the substrate and rock come from another established tank (not lfs holding tanks)? Let me know and we can go further.

[unclejed]

Hey steve, This photo is to encourage you. My 55 gal. looked much like yours for 5-6 mos. It took that long to totally cycle and settle in. Hang in there. Let me ask, is the lr and substrate from another established tank (not lfs holding tanks)? Let me know, it is important.

[saltysteve]

hey thanx for every ones help

[unclejed]

Well steve, you didn't say where your rock/substrate came from. Reason I asked is, when I flipped my old 55 to the new I used the rock from the existing tank plus 1/3 of my sub. finally got with knowledgeable lfs guy and ascertained phos may be leaching from the old rock. I bought a multi purpose reactor and am running phos-loc. Only took about 2 weeks for hair to be under control then another week or so to be eradicated.

[saltysteve]

it is marco rock that i cured pretty well. the tank was good for some time and then it just started growing stuff - maybe after i got a new pump - so i guess flow is a problem definately. substrate was caribsea out of the bag - all new stuff

[IceMan]

noone else mentioned it but 1.027 spec. grav. is a lil high, could that contribute to the cloudy look? i'm thinkin it may be killing some of your bacteria and proding that efect (shrugs)