Algae help

[cgthebeast]

So I have a 75g, and I can never get rid of my algae completely. And now I have a blossoming of ditaoms on my sand and cynical in my sump.
I want to completely redo my refugeium, adding mangroves and just someway better to extract nutrients.

My parms are fine, everything is in order. I'll post exact stats when I get home from work. My corals are thriving and growing, I use ro/di water and recently dropped 250$ on a new 5 stages unit from bulk reef supply and I still have these issues. I've tested for phosphates and I still have nothing showing on that.

But I really just want clean sand, I have hundreds of snails but like 1 hermit crab. (He's an unknown species that has done very well, I want to invest to more blue legs but he's killed them all, very aggressive but reef safe white hermit crab with big sorta fuzzy claws and completely blue eye stalk/ feelers, he's going in the revamped sump)

Also every time I had top off water, my skimmer goes nuts, do I have it set to high? I do 12% water changes every week in the dot

It's a 75g, with a 20g sump, it's been set up for two years so I know something is up with my water, but I'm stumped.

 

[Sniperhank]

It's been awhile since we've talked about what is going on in your system, but are you using ro/di water?
Skip mangroves, they are terrible ways of exporting nutrients due to how slow they grow.
Have you considered an ATS? I had such great success with the one I DIY'd, I spent way to much money for one on the red sea build.
As for the parameters, they aren't fine if there is algae. It is just being consumed by the algae growth, giving you a false reading. I've actually stopped worrying about what people think the nutrient levels are in their systems for nitrates simply due to never having a fair reading on the issue.

 

[cgthebeast]

It's been awhile since we've talked about what is going on in your system, but are you using ro/di water?
Skip mangroves, they are terrible ways of exporting nutrients due to how slow they grow.
Have you considered an ATS? I had such great success with the one I DIY'd, I spent way to much money for one on the red sea build.
As for the parameters, they aren't fine if there is algae. It is just being consumed by the algae growth, giving you a false reading. I've actually stopped worrying about what people think the nutrient levels are in their systems for nitrates simply due to never having a fair reading on the issue.

Yup, I even brought a brand new unit in may from brs, a five stage one with a resin. I cycled it through and ran water through it like the instructions said on how to break it in. This water didn't go in the tank.

I've actually just finished buliding my ATS, the king of diy version. I just needed a longer tube for the plumbing which I ordered so I should get that this upcoming week

Okay so skip the maggroves. Will do. I think the main issue I'm having is that sump is not really exporting nutratiants officially. I have very very low flow their and the cyanogen has bloomed everywhere, so I'm pulling out an old power head from my nano and order cheato early today off eBay, got a large poration for a good deal.

As for the nutrients, that's a good way to look at it.
During my water change this weekend, I'm gonna vacuum the top of the sand bed very carefully to remove any detritus, I can run the water back through a filter sock I have clamped in my sump. I'm hoping the only cause of this bloom was that I recently got a new tang and instead of keeping my normal feeding habits, I fed the tank extra in order to get it to eat.

 

[cgthebeast]

I don't run a phosphate reactor, is it worth it to look into buying one?

 

[Sniperhank]

Possibly, but when it comes to nutrients in the water column it is a 10:1 ratio for nitratehosphate. If a matured ATS along with several water changes to get all the old water out of the system replaced with the water you are making with 0 TDS doesn't change things, it can be looked at then.

 

[cgthebeast]

Alright sounds good. I'm preparing a 20g water change this weekend and I have been blasting my sand with a turkey vaster in order to stir up anything that might be causing it, I also bumped up my skimmer In order to catch any solids. Hopefully this will help me solve it