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Might try your skimmer idea. The white foam builds in mere seconds. Let it run for 24 hours with no cup and just overflowed. I too started with Marco dry rock and dry sand. Rodi water, new filters and di resin, and fresh salt. Can’t actually figure out where all the phosphate is coming from...
Need to grab an ammonia and nitrite kit and will start dosing ammonia to get it fully cycled. Had good luck with that approach in the past. Have a bunch of marine pure balls in sump that have been in my 30aio for years to kick start.
Thank you! Yes, my parameters have been all over the place. Definitely risking it but that huge indo meat coral is pretty indestructible. My alk was super low initially. Using Red Sea blue bucket. Actually overshot with dosing and some baking soda. Up at 9.6 now. Will do a water change tonight...
Way overstocked but it works for me so far:
Blue eyed tang
Clarkii clown (paired with rainbow anemone)
Royal Gramma
Yellow Watchman goby (paired with pistol shrimp)
Six Line wrasse
Splendid Dottyback
Blue tux urchin (best thing for algae control (IMHO)
Various snails
Here is my storm set-up - two marine deep cycle 12 volt batteries and a 1000W inverter. Can run heater for a while on this set up if need be. Not sure how long it would last with just pumps, but I think well past 24 hours.