WTF IS WITH REEF CRYSTALS SALT!!
 

WARNING TO PEOPLE USING REEF CRYSTALS SALT!!
After doing my weekly water change with a new bucket of Reef Crystals Salt has completely Nuked my tank. To say the least I am ****ing ****ed. All the years of work and thousands spent have been ****ed down the drain.

For the record I have used this salt off and on for years with no problems(minus the alk spikes) .The impact was immediate on my tank after doing my water change. The water became instantly cloudy(as of now is still cloudy and smells bad) and my clown started swimming frantically around the tank. At this time it was 12am so I turned off the lights. When I checked my tank at 8am 99% of my LPS are dead or dying.

What is the Bach number?
Where did you buy it?

I've heard a lot of this lately with the Reef Crystals. I think there is a bad batch going around.

I bought it at Golds last week.
5137801706
RC1-160P 04/09 REV.A
IN01706-905

I wonder if that means its a batch from April 2009?? If so maybe something settled or went bad?

holy crap Jason!......so sorry to hear you lost everything.....also sorry I never got that frag of rainbow off ya:neutral:.....might have been able to get a frag of it back to you now.....

Wow. This is royally crappy!

Just to be clear . . . This is the Instant Ocean Reef Crystals that did this?

Yikes thanks for the warning I just bought a brand new bucket, I'll check my batch number when I get home

It looks like this person here had the same batch:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh....php?t=1961866

Edit: Based on the "RC1-160P 04/09 REV.A" identifier.

I have a bucket I bought from Golds a few weeks ago, have done a couple of water changes and no issues. I will check my info when I get home.

Is there anything that can be offered to help out? I'm in the NW and have 2 tanks going if your fish need somewhere to go, I have room.

Damn! Sorry to hear that! That totally sucks! Thanks for the heads up!

sorry to hear, that really sucks. Nothing is reliable and safe any more. There must be something in that salt that can make things go bad so quick

Keep in mind that there is an excellent chance that what happened was just co-incidental with the use of that bucket of RC salt.
If it wasn't, the store has likely sold a lot of that batch and if no one else is reporting wipe outs, then I'd be looking for some other cause, just in case.

Holy Crap!
Thanks for the heads up!

I have 10-15 gallons of Seachem mixed up if you need it or are you picking up skeletons at this point?

I'm sorry for your loss!

I have a bucket of that batch I bought from petsmart. I havent started my reef tank yet but started my qt 2 weeks ago, it is still cloudy.
Is there a way to test the salt before setting up my DT tank with it just in case? Even if there is the slight chance it is a bad batch I don't want to start out with a catastrophe. :)

Well,its a 100% loss of my LPS collection. The only thing left that is alive are my purple deaths. I took a quick pic what is left from about 30 or so colonys.

before.
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/g...es168/a002.jpg

as of this morning
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/g...s168/dead1.jpg

What it looked like before
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/g...es168/a006.jpg

and now
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/g...s168/dead2.jpg
http://s251.photobucket.com/albums/g...s168/dead3.jpg

The system in question has been running for over 4 years. I have not added any new fish since then. I have not added any coral since sept of last year. All my parameters are in check. I always keep on top of my tank maintenance. ALL my LPS was healthy untill I did my water change with this salt. There is absolutely no question that there is something wrong with this batch of salt. Just check on RC board. There are already people with the same issues as me.

If it's still cloudy 2 weeks after... then you definitly have an issue. Bad salt or poor filtration, whatever is causing it, you need to do something about it for sure.

I would dump that pail and buy a new one.

Thanks, Ill do that especially after seeing those pics! What a kick in the.....head.

I wonder if this is proved in some way.... what would Instant Ocean do?

I'd take pics of everything you lost and fight to have them replace it!

You'd think that they would have some sort of quality control in place so that this crap dosn't happen.

Truly dreadful. :( You had a stunning collection.

Perhaps someone should call the LFS and advise to pull the other buckets if any. Two tanks with the same symptoms and same batch is more than a coincidence.

That's weird as the RC thread is from January 2011.

those numbers are not the batch number.
those numbers just mean reef crystal salt 160 gallon in a 5 gallon bucket.
i have the 200 gallon boxes and the batch number is on each bag.
as i look threw all my buckets of reef crystal salt and i have no clue where the buckets keep the batch number.
i dont know if this info helps. ill try calling instance ocean and ask where to find it on the buckets.

Didnt think that was the batch # as all my empty buckets have the same #.....i just mixed up 45 gallons for a wc. glad i didnt use it yet....nervous now!

+1 when I crashed from bad Kent carbon, they hooked me up good with an rodi, aquadoser (drips system) and a few other randoms. All i had to do was report the batch number with before and after pics.

From RC:
The RC1 number was what I searched the internet for, but the other two numbers are the same on both buckets (minus the leading and end zeros in JMes' numbers).

I'd say they're the same . . . unless there is another number on the buckets somewhere that is relevant?

the same number is on my bucket at home and its almost empty.. ive had no problems..

Whoa... So sorry for your loss James I can only imagine how painful that must be. Do you still have the bucket, from the RC thread he noticed a change in the bucket plastic, perhaps this caused the problem? Either way I would be contacting Reef Crystals, I hope they give you some credit here.

I got a batch of RC a month or two ago and have just recently started using it. I've maybe done 3 WC with the new batch. Ever since making the switch things haven't been right in the tank. I've had a couple SPS colonies crap out and I've been having weird cyano and algae outbreaks that I've never seem before. Nothing else has changed except for the salt. I was wondering this weekend if there was something up with the salt, especially after the last WC and there was a weird sediment left behind the in the mixing bucket.

That's weird my last bucket left sediment as well. Like a hard white almost calcium substance. This new one is fine so far, still haven't checked the batch though.

Tagging along
 

I've got two full unopened buckets with these numbers. I think I purchased them at Ocean Aquatics a few months ago. The sticker on the lid says 11332.

As I understand it the sticker on the lid is the batch number. That is what the LFS guy showed me today when I went in and asked. Unfortunately my Son colored mine in blue pen and I can't see it lol.

whoa people...before blaming the salt it must be analysed to see if there is something that can be killing corals.

It could be other things as well. I don't know if you use tap water or if your RODI is a bit old and could be leaching some toxic stuff from the city water? You must absolutely have this salt analysed by a pro lab before you do anything.

I had my tank poisoned by copper and nickel from the kent carbon and the first thing I did was to send a sample to a professional lab and get the result. Kent paid all my dead corals so that's good and I presume that if it is proven that there was something in that salt crashing your tank, then they would give you a compensation. I am surprised that you're the only one having this problem though, and the cloudy water can be a bacteria bloom caused by a fish dying and then ammonia would surely kill your corals and irritate the fish, if not kill them.

Copper does not do this to LPS, in fact, none of my LPS were affected with copper poisoning. I have seen a duncan near death once and it was from too high nitrates.

YOu should first do proper test on your water to see if everything is good, then send a sample of the salt (fresh batch!) to be analysed, then you will know if it is the salt or not.

I have been using Reef crystal for years and never had any bad results, plus it should not be so potent as to crash everything from just a water change, since you're not replacing all the water but just a part.

Just like to add a BIG thank you to Concept Aquatics for the good deal on salt. I will be doing a major water change asap.

Sorry,I made a mistake on the batch number. I just looked at some old buckets and mattjoly85 you are correct. Can we please verify where Instant Ocean places the batch numbers? The only sticker on the bucket is on the lid which reads 12128. Correct me if I am wrong but I assume that is the batch number?
Levi,
Yes,I still have the whole 160 bucket. I only mixed up 6 gallons from it.(my tank is only 25 gal)

I just checked . . . mine doesn't have a sticker on the lid.

Either it fell off before I got it . . . or I'll find it stuck someplace strange within a three-year-old's line of sight (kids!).

Yep kids and stickers... You can make a five year old do anything with a couple of Spiderman stickers.

Jason so so sorry to hear that buddy. I know how much u love your Acans and remember we talked about me buying them and fragging them back to you after u moved. To bad it never worked out man Sorry for your $$$$$$$$ loss it's rough when u hace so much in corals and they die just so fast.

So sorry man I can only imagine... If you talk to instant ocean about this in the future to try and get some compensation; just remember you catch more flies with honey. Don't flip, stay calm tell them what happened and how devastating it is to you and I bet they will help any way they can.

@daniella3D didn't you read this whole thread? There are other cases of this exact same scenario, it IS happening to other people, not just J.

IMO, the problem is that if the batch was bad, there should be thousands of people with the same problem.
The numbers of people with the problem are statistically insignificant when dealing with the size of a batch mix.
It's too easy for someone to blame a batch of salt and then others having problems jump on the band wagon and feel the salt is the cause of their problems also.
Can you find even a hundred people who have a problem that they are blaming this batch of salt on?

Or a small amount of contaminant could have been a part of the batch too; along the line, during shipping, who knows. It's worth investigating at least. It would be a shame to ignore it and have others' tanks wrecked if there is truly an issue.