Warning - Contaminated Eco Complete in the market

[Al_]

Bags of contaminated Eco Complete have flooded the marketplace.

These bags contains extrememly high levels of calcium carbonate and phospates.

Carib Sea added clarifier and pH adjuster to some bags in an attempt to salvage them. These bags have a gooey, milky-white fluid in them and will cloud your water.

It is recommended you use Florite as a replacement.

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=17035

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showthread.php?t=17212

http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=6572

 

[malkore]

Actually I've heard that Carib-sea will replace the eco complete, you just need to notify them.

 

[tetrin]

hmmm...it seems i got two bags of contaminated eco-complete...8O...

anyway...i went through the forums and it seems you are not in trouble unless you have a super-soft water tank...the milky stuff was supposedly a pH buffer to neutralize part of the calcium carbonate that got mixed with the eco-complete...

rinsing the eco-complete (which i did... ...thanks a bunch, opiesilver... ) before adding it to the tank seems to be a good solution...and even without that, a couple of pwc's would clear the water up...i had somewhat cloudy water for a night...

i haven't tested my water for gh/kh/phosphates...and am too cheap to do so ...the fish and plants seem to do fine...

now, should i ask caribsea to replace my two bags of eco-complete?
even if they do replace it...it's a lot of work emptying all the substrate, putting in new substrate and...and...and...
i'll let it go...cheap and lazy... ...

 

[Medusa Head]

I believe the pH buffer is a phosphate based buffer, hence the high phosphates.

Some people over at plantedtank have reported that Carib-Sea said they will replace it. So far however, no one has gotten their replacement bags.

 

[opiesilver]

Caribsea will not be shipping out the new substrate until the 4th week of May. Their contractor which mines the stuff for them really created a disaster for the company and they are purging all of there remaining stock and replacing it with new. I will not be shipping any out until then too when I have all of mine replaced.

You would not believe how frustrated they are right now. If you do call or send an email to them please give them a few days to respond. They are literally overwhelmed right now.