dust like brown alge

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srecho

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edenvale gauteng
help needed to combat dust brown diatoms- alge
2 month ago notice small paches of brown coloring on sand and live rocks.
dit not take to much notice for a while then more and more start apering all over a tank

start brushing it off from rocks and for a while all looks good then one fish dissappear but corals do not look to happy zoas where the first to start going down and gone.
last couple of days the tank looks more like painted darkish brown
at the same time 3 dartfire fish are not seen anymore, corals are now
completly closed
they never looks so bad since the tank was startet 2012 change 150l of water twice in 2 weeks Tank is 800 l inc sump The way things are going at the moment i will lose number of corals
What surprises me that i dit not change anything out of routine
What happens ?
 
You have DI stage on your RO unit & been changing it when its been getting exhausted?
 
Sorry ignore above, you brought this up before in another thread, i didn't realise it was you posting this again.

DI stage that you don't run will mop up excess metals that make it thru the membrane, plus silicates.
Increase of silicates is quite possibly the brown issue you have - excess metals building up is quite possible why your zoas are closing.
Change as much water as you like, if the source is the problem its not going to fix anything.
 
I have replaced 2 units of 5 micron filter, could not get2 micron filter and carbon filter. Have also instal DI granulets filter after membrane
Also check old water in top up drum it was showing on TDS tester 000 then throw it away and replace it with new water ,it also show 000n TDS
Iwill also buy tomorrow silica test and see what is happening. Was reading somewhere that diatoms are absorbing silica when present in the
water.So to much silica to much diatoms? corect?
 
Can be yes , I've also seen guys reporting zinc + silicate getting thru even with 0 tds.
The di will be likely to stop it but stay on top of it, don't run to top up drum with resin that's all changed colour as then it's not absorbing anymore & can start to release.
I actually gone to a normal 10inch filter insert of di resin with mine as it holds x3 of the normal size DI pods.
 
The pet shop does not sale silica test kit, for now i bought Phosguard will let you know how it works. Will take my water to be tested to pet shop
 
at last brown alge is gone 90% you can see it on corals . They sprang back to normal self . My water parameters are alk 7.6 cal 1450 phosfate 0.1
mag 1480 nit 0 Even my Clowns are started to breed again Picaso in left front corner and standard clowns in right front corner They are breeding nonstop for over 2 years. The fry are usually gone in a space of 2- 3 days after haching. If i solve the origin of a problem i do not know only time will tell
 
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