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Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)

Hi,

John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.

I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.

With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.

I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.

If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.

I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.

I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.

Thank you
Darragh Sherwin

carbon?

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07 Jul 2006 18:05 #1 by lampeye (lampeye)
carbon? was created by lampeye (lampeye)
Hello everyone...
setting up a 240 litre marine tank with 30 kilos of live rock and a protein skimmer...ive been advised by my lfs to also use carbon (all the time)... i plan on keeping a BTA and some mushrooms. ive read up a bit on the use of carbon but im not sure whether to use it all the time or periodically (weekly or monthly).....what do the experts think?

also which brand is best/sufficent? ill either be using fluval...fritz or kent reef carbon. the kent stuff recommends only using it for 3 days while the others say 3-4 weeks, i know that it fades rapidly but whats the deal?

any experience /advice would be much appreciated (my first marine tank...cant wait)

thanks

lampeye

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09 Jul 2006 18:26 #2 by gm333 (gm333)
Replied by gm333 (gm333) on topic Re: carbon?
I only run carbon in a filter sock in my sump when cycling a tank, and after cycle i add the sock once a month for one week. If you keep the carbon in too long it can possibly cause a nitrate spike.

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10 Jul 2006 02:07 #3 by lampeye (lampeye)
Replied by lampeye (lampeye) on topic Re: carbon?
how? because it starts to act like a filter sponge?

lampeye

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10 Jul 2006 15:04 #4 by platty252 (Darren Dalton)
Good luck with your marine tank panda.

Like gm i only use it a couple of days a month.
I honestly dont think you will need to use carbon all the time.
Any of the brands you mention should be fine. Avoid carbon that is large and smooth, this is cheep rubish.
It should be small and rough.

What is a BTA?

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10 Jul 2006 17:15 #5 by gm333 (gm333)
Replied by gm333 (gm333) on topic Re: carbon?

how? because it starts to act like a filter sponge?

I assume it could over time(not too sure on this), I had a huge problem with nitrates in my 135, after removing the bioballs and once a week waterchange the nitrates are down to 12.5 from 50 ppm. I essential figured the carbon could do the same as the bioballs if not changed often.

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11 Jul 2006 01:47 #6 by lampeye (lampeye)
Replied by lampeye (lampeye) on topic Re: carbon?
bubble tipped anenome

lampeye

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17 Aug 2006 07:25 #7 by conor (conor)
Replied by conor (conor) on topic Bio Balls are EVIL!
Do not use Bio Balls. Really, Bio Balls = Very High Nitrate!

If you plan on keeping Coral or Anenomies, then you need the phosphate and nitrate to be ZERO! Or as close to it as humanely possible.

Its actually very easy. Just use LR and possibly a deep sand bed/ plenum.

I would start off with just LR and fish, then when you get used to the way things work (no sponges in Marine filters, just high turnover with pumps) you can go onto soft polyps and then SPS. Only use Coral / anenomies if your water reads low to nil nitrate/nitrite/ammonia.

Marine fish keeping is very easy, its just radically different to freshwater thinking.! :shock:

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17 Aug 2006 09:09 #8 by conor (conor)
Replied by conor (conor) on topic Re: carbon?
Oh and the use of carbon is recommended. Make sure to change it at _least_ every week (I have a compartment in my protein skimmer for this).

All that carbon will do is remove particulate matter (the skimmer does most of that) and remove heavy metals and other nasties. Use after medication to get rid of water borne pollutants.

www.algone.com/activated_carbon.htm

Over time carbon will release all that it captured back into the aquarium, this is more significant in freshwater though but still applies.

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19 Aug 2006 21:44 #9 by gm333 (gm333)
Replied by gm333 (gm333) on topic Re: carbon?
Took all my bioballs out within the first week. I actually added some rock rubble where the bioballs went, just for a little more filtration.

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20 Aug 2006 05:07 #10 by conor (conor)
Replied by conor (conor) on topic Re: carbon?
Yeah, nitrate build up is detrimental to coral. Although not nearly as bad as phosphate. Either way say hello to algae ;-0

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21 Aug 2006 21:30 #11 by gm333 (gm333)
Replied by gm333 (gm333) on topic Re: carbon?
No kidding still battling to keep mine under 20ppm. Need to build a fuge, no manufactured tanks will fit under my stand. Gathering glass as we speak.

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25 Aug 2006 15:32 #12 by conor (conor)
Replied by conor (conor) on topic Re: carbon?
I was researching the carbon question last night, and I found this to be very intelligent :

www.hallman.org/filter/gac.html

Bit heavy going - I skipped a paragraph or two :-0
:P

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25 Aug 2006 18:35 #13 by gm333 (gm333)
Replied by gm333 (gm333) on topic Re: carbon?
Very interesting!

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