My 130 gallon reef has been doing great for over 13 years now. It houses LPS, SPS, some clams, softies 6 different doctor's fish and a plethora of smaller fishes. But my nitrates and phosphates always were a tiny bit on the high side. No big deal. And my corals have OK colours, not the brightest. But after al this time, I wanted to perfect it. So, I went with an macro algae reactor.

I got the pax bellum N18. I filled it up with an initial dose of cheato algae. And four weeks later it was all covered in red cyano algae. Weird thing is, I have never ever, in those 13 years seen any cyano in my tank. I actually saw it with my own eyes for the first time in the reactor. I played with high flow and a new seed of cheato, same results. Low flow, longer light period, shorter light period.

And the more I read about it online, the more I really really really want it to work. Not just for the control of organics, but more so for the other benefits.

So guys, what could I be doing wrong here?

Here's my specs:
NO3: 2
PO4: 0.03
DKH: 8.3
CA: 440
MG: 1250
PH: 7.6 (I'm trying to raise this... with the algae reactor. LOL)