Do You Use Carbon?

3reef members tell me if you use carbon in your tank to remove the impurities from the water.

Some people do... While others don't.

Reason im starting this poll is cause I found Im having issues with my sps after I've started using carbon and phosphate remover media.

Trying to eliminate the causes. Water testing has shown no causes to my sps struggle. In the past all sps has thrived in my tank without any media. Now that Ive introduced carbon and PFO I havent had such nice growth as before and some frags just crapping out on me.

So vote and explain why you do run carbon or why you dont.

 

Check your alkalinity. When you first introduce GFO, it's no uncommon for it to go down.

 

i dont use it because i dont want to buy it. so i use mangroves and chaeto.

 

alk is constant around 10.6. and my ca and mg check good.

I think I may be using carbon too much... As of tonight I removed carbon from my system to see what effects it has

 

The only negative thing that carbon will do to SPS is expose them to more light than they are accustomed to if there was previously a lot of gelbstoff in the water. There could temporarily be a short period of light shock.

 

I have a lot of softies, so I use carbon in the event of chemical warfare. Sorry, probably doesn't help you too much, but I have some SPS - just not a big fan of them.

 

anything else it may do??? Ive had carbon also on my tank for a few months too. I use about 1.5 cups in a media bag in my baffles.

Also My TLF po4 reactor I have it nearly full with aquaphos media.

Anything alarming?

 

This is the same thing I noticed with my tank also. I noted crystal clear water after starting to run it and I can even tell when it need a change just by the look of the water.

 

I found carbon keeps my water crystal clear. I love it!

 

I have a BRS reactor with GFO and Carbon, I only run it about 2 hours a day on a timer, it's fed from my sump by the maxijet 1200 that came with it.