OneReef

I've been running these pellets for about 3 months now and am VERY satisfied with them. I was originally dosing 20 ml of vodka daily and because of the pellets I don't have to do that and my no3 still stays at 0. Vodka never did much for my po4 either, but the pellets have sucessfully knocked that down to 0 as well! Overall, welcome to the club. This is an amazing new product! Your right it takes about 4 weeks for them to kick in, but they are set and forget.

Question about the skimmer; wouldn't it only pull extra until it gets the tank down to the skimmers minimum load and then just settle back to where it was running before?

@Spyder: As I understand it, the pellets are a constant carbon source, not a one time shot. So the skimmer will continually be pulling out more than normal before the pellets were added.

@Sedor: Yes, I am excited by what the next few weeks may bring. When I started the pellets, I was at .03 on a Hanna photometer. After 12 days, I am at .04. But I am due for a water change, and I did pull my GFO offline when I added the pellets, so a rise in Po4 is to be expected till the pellets kick in.

I too am running the pellets on my new system. I ordered Vertex NP since Ecobak was out of stock, and have a new NextReef reactor to put them in. Hopefully we can continue to post good results and can finally put N & P issues behind us in this hobby. Remember, the output of your reactor needs to be near the intake of the skimmer's pumps to exported dying bacteria from the system.

Quick update, I took out my GFO and added the pellets on 9/15. Po4 was at .03 at the time checked on Hanna Phosphate meter, as will all my checks be by. 9/26 phosphates went up to .04, i guess due to missing GFO and bacteria not built up yet. Took my refugium out of the sump and cleaned that section out on 9/28. Phosphates were at .04 at that time too. Last check was on 10/9 and I was at .03 again, with no GFO and no refugium. I am close to being up and running with pellets for 4 weeks now. I am anxious to see if I can get it down around 0.00 in the next few weeks and months. I have bumped up my SPS feeding with amino acids and Oyster Feast for when the phosphates drop more. I have noticed some nice growth lately, but making so many changes at one time, it is hard to tell what is working best, or if is a combination of all of this: added pellets, more SPS specific feeding, and went from 150w to 250w MH. Looking good so far though.

A further update: 11/7/2010. I have been running the Ecobak pellets since 9/15. This is getting close to 2 months. I tested my PO4 (phosphates) this morning with my Hanna Phosphate meter, and I was at .04. And this was after a 20g water change yesterday. Kinda surprised me that is was not lower. There are several factors for me to consider. One, I may not have enough pellets. I used less than instructed at first, as I didn't want to overdo it starting out. I may need to add more and use a larger reactor. Two, I am not sure if my tumble rate is optimal. They are moving around decently, but to shear off the biofilm from them and get some output, I am wondering if I need them tumbling more aggressively. Third, I may need to skim more agressively. I might need to skim wetter to pull more out. These are some of the factors I am looking at. I think the main factor is getting a bigger reactor with more pellets. I am using a small Phosban 150 that will not hold the amount of pellets suggested for my size tank with about 180g water volume. I am using 500ml of pellets and per Warmer Marines directions, I should be using at least 750ml. I may add more and report back, as well as skim wetter. My goal is to get down around .00 Po4 and be ULNS.

Skimm wetter? Is it not skimming as much as you expected? I am not trying to harp on this, it is just that it is my understanding that even with a carbon source you come to a point where the organics are getting so low that the skimmer will settle back to a more normal rate. If there is something that I am missing with this understanding please let me know, I find all this very fascinating

Just a thought that crossed my mind, is it possible that when you removed the GFO you increased the load that the Ecobak pellets need to handle making it take longer than expected to get to zero?

Keep in mind that the Hannah PO4 meters have an error margin of 0.03 +/- So your 0.04 could in fact be either 0.01 or 0.07. The goal is to try and keep it around 0.03 because actually our corals need PO4 in order to eat and survive, they just don't like too much of it.

As far as skimming wetter, I prefer that method too. Its not as satisfying pulling a cup full of lime green water out as opposed to a thick sludgy green, but I feel that it helps keep the neck slightly cleaner between collection cup cleanings and also might help pull out slightly more junk.