Nitrate Help

[kimgpk]

My Quetion is how do I lower my Nitrates?
Alright so here iswhat I have. I have a 46 gal bow with about 40lbs of LS and 25lbs of lr
I have 304 Fluval and standard lighting I use R/O water
Do standard water changes abut 15gal a week
Have timed fish when feed them 1 1/2 min feed them pellets everyother day ends up being a small pinch full.
~inverts~
1 peppermint shrimp
1 cleaner shrimp
2 emerald crabs
~Fish~
2 false perc clowns
1 purple fish goby
1 blue sided wrasse
1 coral beauty
~water~
Ammonia -between 0 and .25
Nitrite- Trace
Nitrate-20
Alk-normal
PH-8.2

 

[27mtaylor]

Do you have a protien skimmer?

 

[bang guy]

How much waterflow is going over the sand bed?

 

[kimgpk]

No not yet I have to get on that hangs on to the tank because I only have a canister filter. Waiting for the husband to move out the tank so I can fit one back there.
As for water flow over the sand bed there really isn't any I do have maxijet 900 but it pretty much pointed up to the surface.

 

[thomas712]

What about other pumps of any kind, can you figure your turn over rate? Your going to need at least 460 gph for that tank.

 

[kimgpk]

No that it. How do you figure out what your turn over rate is?
I am taking that this is probaly my problem?

 

[thomas712]

Your MJ 900 = 230gph, so for instance if that is all you were using then 230 divided by 46 = 5 times turnover rate. So your only half way there. I don't happen to know how many gph your canister is, but I would have at least another MJ 900 in there as well.

 

[kimgpk]

the canister says about 260 gallons per hour(pump output) 185 gallons oer hour (filter circulation). So do you think that this is my problem with my nitrate?
So do you think I should get another maxijet 900?

 

[bang guy]

Without waterflow over the sand bed there will be a very low population of sand bed critters. Without these critters there is nothing to move water from the surface to the bottom of the sand bed. Without this water movement there Nitrate reduction from the sand bed is greatly hindered.
My suggestion is to get a lot more waterflow in your system. At least twice as much and up to 4 times more than what you have now.

 

[kimgpk]

buy just getting power MJ or how do I achive this?

 

[bang guy]

More powerheads are a good option. A closed loop is more efficient and looks better but a lot more hassle.

 

[kimgpk]

By closed loop do you mean somthing like this?

 

[bang guy]

That could certainly be part of a closed loop. A closed loop is where the water flows into the same container it came from. Typically it's an external pump drawing water from one part of the tank and sending water to another part of the tank to increase waterflow.