Recent content by lawndoctor

FWIW I turned and gently pushed the first layer of rocks down through the sand until they were resting on the tank bottom.

People have reported finding all sorts of things in both play sands and dedicated reef sands including nails, rocks, glass, and bullet casings. One batch of SD formed a layer of cement in one of my old tanks. The Barbie Doll head is the best one I've heard in a while. At this point, I...

A gate valve will enable you to make fine adjustments, which is particularly important when restricing the outflow on a pump.

Ugly predator of polychaetes and crustaceans.

Lab supply companies sell them. The part that actually gets squeezed by the rollers is called the "tubing link." My peristaltic pump wears out the tubing link about every six months. I get replacements from Thomas Scientific.

I have a 75 AGA with an Oceanic hood. I had Aquarium Currents make custom acrylic mounting brackets for me to mount two Sea Swirls, one at each end of the tank. The company is very helpful and will make the brackets in whatever configuration you specify.

Thanks for your response - I didn't mean to imply that you were attacking me. After several years of discussion and debate, I don't see how this incident could have been caused by anything other than contamination in the sand. If you have some other facts or a plausible explanation to support...

There have been two others in the last three years. I didn't save their posts, although now I wish I had. One was on here and the other was on RC. The three of us have taken a lot of abuse for reporting problems with South Down. In any event, I do agree that three is a low number given the...

Actually, I added the play sand through a tube with the pump turned off. The sand did not "clump." It formed a cement layer on top and stayed finely particulate below. It's still in the tank today and has never clumped. Given what I have learned recently about Carib Sea, in the future I...

All water parameters were perfect. The stuff formed a 1/4" layer of cement on everything. If you actually have a viable alternative explanation based on personal experience, please let us know.

So many people have asked this question so many times. This is the first time I have seen it answered succinctly and based on direct personal experience. Thank you for posting this information.

I've never heard of "curing" play sand. I would appreciate hearing more about this suggestion. In my case, using play sand was a costly mistake. It took weeks to chisel everything clean, do many major water changes, and replace several hundred dollars worth of live rock, filter parts, and a...

The batch of SD play sand that I had the misfortune to put in my tank was contaminated with some substance which turned to cement in my tank. Within hours after adding the play sand, a thick cement layer formed on every internal surface of the tank, filter, sump, overflow, probes, etc. It had...

SD and Carib Sea are the same thing. However, as per the warning on the SD bag, sometimes SD is contaminated because it's packaged with the same machinery used for other products like lime and gypsum. I got a contaminated batch of SD and it created a layer of cement on all my interior tank and...

It started immediately and coated everything within 2-3 hours. Just to be clear: This wasn't "clumping." This was a thin layer of cement deposited on all surfaces, including all the lines (had to be replaced), throughout the filtration system (had to use a paint scraper or wire brush), and pH...