Salt Recommendations

[wahwoo]

I used to use Coralife salt before I moved here. I never heard anything bad about it and my tank seemed fine. When I got here I tried a few LFS but they didnt carry it. I had no other option than to choose between Instant Ocean (which I had heard can cause bleaching) and Oceanic. I chose Oceanic.

Now I hear that Oceanic can cause problems also and that they stoped adding Stronium to their mix. Has anyone growing SPS had bad experience with Oceanic? Should I switch brands?

What salts are you reefers using in SPS tanks?

[chrisaggie]

I have always used Instant Ocean with no problems at all. They are an old standby. They are one of the oldest salt brands. Hobbyists have been using it for decades. I will use it until I see a reason not to. I do not plan to jump on any salt "fads". I'm not sure if this info will help or not, but I stick by Instant Ocean!
~Chris

[KING OF THE REEF]

go with instant ocean

[wahwoo]

Thanks for the votes - So far every one goes with instant Ocean.

What do the rest of you use?

Chris, is that a diy chiller in your gallery? Do you have plans to build one?

Dave

[chrisaggie]

No, that's a chiller I was selling (already gone). It was a chiller made by some little company, can't think of their name right now.

[wahwoo]

Whats the min reason for the your use of a chiller? Is it to save on A/C in the house all day or is it to keep a tank outside in the hot months? Or are the lights causing that much extra heat? Just curious. I thought about a chiller to keep a tank out by the pool but they aint cheap and I dont know if that idea would work for other reasons as well.

[wahwoo]

Thanks for the input. I guess I got it backwards so I'm going to stop using Oceanic. Its been two weeks and I see some brown starting on the sand to one side of the tank. My Nitrates, Phos, Ph and Alk all seem fine so it must be the salt. I did some research and many RC reefers claim the same problem with Oceanic.

I didnt see any bad input on Instant Ocean. Are there any down side to using that brand? My memory obviously skipped a beat, but I remember reading that one salt caused bleaching of SPS. What salt is that?

[chrisaggie]

I'm using the chiller to keep the tank temp down. The tank is in our living room. It's a 75 gallon with 2 250w halides. I have 4 fans in the canopy, but between the lights, pumps, and powerheads the tank temp will still get to be around 86-87 without the chiller runing. It doesn't really help that we like to keep our place at around 79-80.

[Bullredchaser]

Petsmart sell Coral Life salt.I personally dont like Instant Ocean because it doesnt mix well for me and the calcium and magnesium levels are to low for my taste.

[chrisaggie]

Ok, since IO is my salt (and I love it) I gotta stick up for it a little here (sorry Robert). When mixed at 35ppt or a specifig gravity of 1.026 (If you keep your salinity lower than this the calcium and magnesium will be lower. Why keep your tank at a lower salinity than the ocean anyway?) Instant Ocean has a calcium level around 350-400ppm and a magnesium level around 1200-1300ppm (these number are from another source, but I have tested the same thing). Is that too low for you Robert? When I mix my water for a water change I get my 15 gallons of water, throw the salt in the bucket with a pump circulating it. I then put the new water in my tank within the hour. It's crystal clear. Never had any problems.

[chrisaggie]

Here is an article which a bunch of numbers to back up my statement. http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-03/rs/feature/

[Bullredchaser]

Ive personaly left a powerhead on in a 5 galon bucket and 24 hrs later still have undissolved salt in the bottom of the bucket.It could have been a bad batch.Ive used Corallife with no regrets and it mixes really fast.I used Oceanic for a while and noticed I was getting like a light brown cyano that went away when I switched to Corallife.Maybe Ill give it a chance again since Instant Ocean is pretty inexpensive.Also I too keep my water at 35PPT as I feel the thicker density of water at that level skims better and also its what the corals are used to out in the reefs.

[Bullredchaser]

Chris in that article they claim that Instant Ocean in Table one had the worst level of larvae survival of the salts tested .Ofcourse Corallife wasnt much better.Marinemix was way ahead of the competition.Ofcourse where the heck do find that salt brand without spending a fortune.Im considering using Tropic Marine or the Pro version of it.Of course at moment Im still researching the results people are getting from it.

[chrisaggie]

Ok, I know what your talking about BullRedChaser. Some salts (including IO) do have a tendancy to get in piles on the bottom of your mixing container if not stired enough. If you get a mag 5 or somethign similar you should have no problem at all. I'm just interested, what magnesium and calcium levels were you talking abotu that were too low? I have never experienced this. All the online tests I can find do not suggest this either.
~Chris

[chrisaggie]

Originally posted by Bullredchaser
Chris in that article they claim that Instant Ocean in Table one had the worst level of larvae survival of the salts tested .Ofcourse Corallife wasnt much better.Marinemix was way ahead of the competition.Ofcourse where the heck do find that salt brand without spending a fortune.Im considering using Tropic Marine or the Pro version of it.Of course at moment Im still researching the results people are getting from it.

I guess it's a good thing 99.9% of us aren't trying to raise urchin larvae. :p

[Bullredchaser]

Originally posted by chrisaggie
I guess it's a good thing 99.9% of us aren't trying to raise urchin larvae. :p Correct but the reason they didnt make it for the 48 hrs was because of the metal toxicity which cant be good for the inverts in our tanks. Which is why I want to try a different salt brand that either one of us are using. Also I must admit that the lower calcium levels I was getting was probably because at the time I was running the tank at 31PPT.

[chrisaggie]

I use Instant Ocean. That's my plan and I'm sticking to it! :dance: A lot of these other new salts have shown to have bad side effects (even the ones in the study we are reading).

[bucaru]

My first marine tank was back around 1980. I have used IO only because it was about the only syn. salt available around here and still is the premier brand. It may not be perfect with trace elements but it is pretty darn consistent. I got no complaints!

[wahwoo]

I'm glad this thread got into some serious conversation.

Chrisaggie, what are the bad side efects of some other salts?

Dave

[chrisaggie]

Here are a few links for your reading enjoyment:

http://archive.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=169644&highlight=bioassay
http://archive.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=186595&highlight=bioassay

The Bioassay salt was a huge fad after that urchine study came out. The fad quickly ended.
~chris