The water took two days to clear when mixing.

You could have did the same steps, but the salts parameters may be different from the salinity one.

I'm not that familiar with testing new salt water but things like pH, Alk, Mg, or other trace elements could have affected things.

I wonder if I can bring up that page that I read before about someone that always tests the new water for pH and alk and always makes sure they match it or else tanks could crash....

Either or, hopefully you didnt lose too much things :(
Its always sad when a tank crashs...

well no not really , testing new water is def good but ph in freshly mixed water regardless of what it reads is only temporary and controlled by available C02 the tank or bucket pulls in. alk on the other hand can be high or low

fwiw salt can be bad ive seen salts come back for all kinds of reasons , ones no better than the brand before but everyone should test their salts new mix....even though many of us dont. were talking about products that are mass produced.


this wouldn't be instant oceans first bad batch but like stated it wouldn't be a one person instance so with that said i also highly doubt the salt change its self made your tank crash , although i wouldnt hesitate to test for what you can ( salt parameters , equipment leaks etc)

sorry to hear about your luck and good luck with it if theres anything i or concept can do let us know:)

i stand corrected :)

its ok , theres a lot of confusing info that goes around about alk and ph on the net , the two are tied hand in hand with carbon dioxide :)


one should always test their new salt though or at least the first batch that gets made from a bucket:)

I guess its a hard lesson learned. Well right now i have started my tank again. Its cycling. All my coral its in another tank and doing really well. Thank you for your replies.

I call bull****. I think the correct term your looking for is newbie mistake. Thousands of people use this salt without issue

Thousands also use instant ocean, but i remember when it wiped out many tanks due to a bad mix and high alk. Because it was good last month doesn't mean it's good forever.
Although I do agree it wouldn't be one bucket, and we'd hear a lot more about it. Maybe we will in the next while :)

I have been using io reef crystals for years but I'm having issues as well. I buy my salt the only place in town which is petsmart. The last 2 160g pails and 50g bag that I have bought there have all read .25-.5 ammonia. Checked test kit on the fresh rodi water with 0 reading. Also checked test kit on tank which reads 0. I will no longer use io reef crystals. I have also had several fellow reefers in town check theirs and they all have the same readings.

yup IO had the big issue many years ago that caused quite a stink , so it can indeed happen regardless how many use it:)