Water quality advice needed.

[Hellybell80]

Hi guys,
I was wondering if I could ask a few questions and seek some advice.
I got a Fluval M60 second hand off of a guy. It had been running for a couple of years. When I got it it had plenty of rock sand already in. Plenty of micro life in both.
2 clown fish
Angel (died 2 days later prob too much stress of moving)
Yellow damsel
Another damsels (not sure what)
6 line wrass
And I added a mandarin. Two months later.
A few hermits both blue legged and red legged.
About 4 different snails.
We transferred most of the original water with it to keep a balance.
All good part from the loss of the Angel, but could have been worse.
So after a 7 weeks I got fed up with the flow in the sump at the back the baffles just weren't working (common problem I hear).
So i decided to remove the back sump. It gave me more space in the tank. Probably a bad move as I started to use a canister filter a fluval 107.
Until I work out how to sump the tank.
Well I did that 4 weeks ago.
I've had a crash so did the water changes managed my water quality. Fish were at the top of the water gasping for air. Moved them out and did a massive water change. Added a air stone got the PH back up as it had dropped to much carbon dioxide I reckon. Added seachem phosguard in my filter as my phostphate was over 3. And hair algae was starting to cover my corals and snails, was bad with algae when I got it.
Started to get diadems, loads covered everything I'd clean it and it would just return a few hours later.
Now I've got an amonia spike, over the last few days ive done day 1 30% day two 50%. Still measuring 1 but has come down from 2.
Reduced the amount of rock I have on my sand bed so it's easier to clean.
Tests today are
PH 8 dropped a little from water change.
Ammonia 1.0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 10ppm
Phostphate 0.1
Alkalinity 10.5.
Salinity 1.026

So as you can yes I've messed around a bit, fish all ok. So if I keep doing smaller water changes at 25% a day will the ammonia go?
Never had an issue with this before.
Maybe the tank has recycled because of the filter?
Sorry for the long thread just thought I'd put all the info in.
Any help is much appreciated

 

[AgentK]

Definitely sounds like you went through another cycle of your tank. Had you rinsed the sand during the move? It’s possible with the removal of the sump you had disturbed sand and released a bunch of old decaying matter. Also did the crash occur near the time you removed some rock from the sand bed? The rock was probably working well in the system to deal with the ammonia and nitrate.

Hope things get better for you!

 

[Hellybell80]

Definitely sounds like you went through another cycle of your tank. Had you rinsed the sand during the move? It’s possible with the removal of the sump you had disturbed sand and released a bunch of old decaying matter. Also did the crash occur near the time you removed some rock from the sand bed? The rock was probably working well in the system to deal with the ammonia and nitrate.

Hope things get better for you!

No it started to spike before the deep clean and removal of some rock.
I still have a hell of a lot of rock in there, I just needed to move some out so in the long run I can clean it better.
But yea I do believe it went through another cycle.
I've changed the filter media to a different set up. It's now all at the right parameters. But unfortunately I've lost my some of my xenia, some mushrooms and my zoas are unhappy.
I am refreshed carbon as I missed some of the melting away coral. The phostphate levels are still very low at 0.003. But I'm getting both green and brown algae. In fact I'm cleaning the glass every hour as it gets that bad you cant see into the tank. So I may need to measure my silicate levels.
Thanks for the reply :) its helped.

 

[AgentK]

So your po4 (phosphate) levels sound like they are quite high although your readings are low. It is likely whatever algae is growing is capturing the po4 as it grows. Personally I would let the algae grow on the glass for a day or two then clean it and do an immediate water change to pull the algae out.

I had some terrible times with algae and cyano when I was running canister filters on my tank. Make sure you are cleaning the canister regularly.

Also have you checked your water you are using to refill the tank after a water change?

 

[Hellybell80]

I'm going to run the phostphate remover again in case that is the case with the algae. It was the brown algae which was bad but I took the phostphate remover out the canister because It was a little too low levels. Obviously a false negative reading.
I use RO water.
The filters get cleaned weekly and water changes weekly as well. I find it therapeutic :)
I want to run a sump really, but the tank is too small to warrant the costs and space to do it.