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Thread: Gag!

  1. #11
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    Re: Gag!

    I took down one of my many tanks once and put the live rock in a container with a powerhead.

    My wife didnt know and disconnected the power. Two weeks later i went to sell the rock and the water became a gel.. it was like rock in black jello.. the whole house got fouled and i had to hire people to come steam clean my carpet and couches.

    Smelled like.:. I dunno.. undescribable with words.

  2. #12

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    Re: Gag!

    Sorry floyd for going off track! Aeros is wrong about surface area. A sand bed has vastly more surface area than any amount of live rock you could put in an aquarium. It does not need to be a deep sand bed if you do not require it to carry out nitrate removal, which you don't if you run a scrubber.
    I guess you have to ask why you use 'live' rock in the first place. If you are going to bake it in the sun for weeks it is just rock not live.
    How about creating an artificial reef look or foam rock. Let's not pretend live rock is the miracle worker some people think it is.

  3. #13

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    Re: Gag!

    Here's one. It might not be quite as bad as some of your stories, but it was pretty bad.
    I have a Coil Denitrator. And one of the issues with it is the sulfur smell, until you get the flow dialed in just right. Well, mine had been up and running for about a year, and was dialed in right, keeping nitrates at zero.
    One day, I noticed that the flow was barely dripping. This has happened before, no big deal. Something has gotten clogged in the 1/4" hose somewhere. To fix this, I take my air compressor and gently blow air through the intake tube.
    Well, this time, it must have been clogged really bad. Instead of the air pressure blowing the gunk out of the line, it blow the whole bottom of the Coil denitrator, and about 2 gallons of extremely stinky water, went all over the living room. floor. Within 5 minutes, the whole house smelled like rotten eggs.
    It took about 2 or 3 days for the smell to completely go away. And that was a long 3 days of listening to my wife telling me how much she "appreciated it." :roll:

  4. #14

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    Re: Gag!

    Quote Originally Posted by dtyharry
    Sorry floyd for going off track! Aeros is wrong about surface area. A sand bed has vastly more surface area than any amount of live rock you could put in an aquarium. It does not need to be a deep sand bed if you do not require it to carry out nitrate removal, which you don't if you run a scrubber.
    I guess you have to ask why you use 'live' rock in the first place. If you are going to bake it in the sun for weeks it is just rock not live.
    How about creating an artificial reef look or foam rock. Let's not pretend live rock is the miracle worker some people think it is.
    Sorry as well Floyd.

    As for surface area: It depends on a few factors. Grain size of sand, and porosity of LR. I'll use my system as an example of how LR has more surface area.

    I have medium grade aragonite sand. The thickness of my sand bed is irrelevant to surface area since only the surface matters here. My tank measure 4' x 2' x 2'. Given that none of my sand were covered, I would have a surface area of 8 feet square. In my system is likely half of that due to LR and coral. A single football sized piece of my Pukani LR has many times that surface area. I'm not going to test this cause I'm about 98% sure I'm correct.

    Live rock isn't "alive" it plays host to life. If you get a unwanted life that cannot be easily removed, you can "nuke" the rock. Killing everything to kill the once pest. FYI sun baking will not kill everything either, just surface life.

    As for artificial materials: we're just not that good at imitating nature yet, e.g. algae scrubber. Even the best man-made rocks pale in comparison to LR.

    As for "miracle worker": No, LR is not a miracle worker, it's a tool. It houses the bacteria that turn Urea into Nitrogen. It sits high in the water column (usually) for good nutrient exchange, houses fish/invertebrates. There are more reasons to use LR in a reef tank than I can think of right now.

  5. #15
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    Re: Gag!

    Quote Originally Posted by RkyRickstr
    Two weeks later i went to sell the rock and the water became a gel.. it was like rock in black jello.. the whole house got fouled and i had to hire people to come steam clean my carpet and couches.
    Smelled like.:. I dunno.. undescribable with words.
    Yup, that was exactly how mine looked, black gel for water, surface was solid with a few giant gel bubbles. Like you said, smell was so bad and indescribable to anything else I have smelled. Rotten egg and bad sewer smell doesn't come close to the smell of the containers.

  6. #16
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    Re: Gag!

    Dont be sorry.. lol.. start your own thread.. its free. Lol

  7. #17
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    Re: Gag!

    I think i know how to describe the smell..

    Smelled like millions of marine organisms decomposing..lol.. its what it is you can compare it.

  8. #18

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    Re: Gag!

    Quote Originally Posted by Aeros
    I have medium grade aragonite sand. The thickness of my sand bed is irrelevant to surface area since only the surface matters here. My tank measure 4' x 2' x 2'. Given that none of my sand were covered, I would have a surface area of 8 feet square. In my system is likely half of that due to LR and coral. A single football sized piece of my Pukani LR has many times that surface area. I'm not going to test this cause I'm about 98% sure I'm correct.
    This is a major error. Each grain of sand becomes colonized with bacteria of different types depending on depth, is it not silly to say thay only the grains of sand at the very top do anything?

  9. #19
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    Re: Gag!

    :bangs head against wall: you say sorry, then keep going! Man! What up?

    And Harry, are you TRYING to get kicked off the site with that avatar? I'm pretty sure there are a few kids on this site.

  10. #20

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    Galveston Texas, USA
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    Re: Gag!

    The never ending plague of dino, It has made my tank an ugly mess from the first time I added the live sand activator, the day after I first added the marine salt. The smell isnt THAT bad, but its like fighting a war against snot:


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