Nitrate aleart

from everything i have read, and i am sure some one will correct me if iam wrong. but my feelings are your canister filter is the problem. a good amount of LR and a good skimmer is all you really need for filtration IMO.

 

Run some Purigen? (It works awesome for clarity, heard some people who couldn't get below 40ish ended up around 5-10 w/purigen)
That may be your best bet other than giving the canister a good cleaning?
Personally I use the Hiatt cycle with the Right Now Bacteria with a Fluval FX5, have yet to see nitrates rise above 10-15, but I'm sure that will lower either when I put Purigen back in, or when I start putting macro's in...
Hey ya, got any plants?

 

Yea from what I read Bio media like bio balls and cremaic rings collect stuff and tend to make things worse. In my 12 gallon Nano, I run live rock in the first chamber, with filter floss sometimes where inlet is, Chemipure Elite in the 2n Chamber, and a GFO reactor and some Mangroves. My suggestion it to pull the Canister filter off, throw some filter floss on the inlet, and throw a bag of Chemipure Elite in there, and do water changes every week once, or even twice till you get things under control. I have a little nitrate spike right now, due to me being stupid and putting some dry rock in the back chamber about a month ago, but water changes have almost eliminated it.

 

Purigen works awesome too, just like Chemipure Elite.  These bring the clarity of the tank up so its awesome, Chemipure actually have purigen in it, but only the Chemipure Elite has that.  I would recommending getting the Elite over the regular, the regular is just like carbon. 

 

"Chemipure actually have purigen in it"
huh? hehe sorry, I'm unfamiliar with it, just looked it up though, not made by SeaChem?
And I see here though it says it only lasts 6 months then needs to be replaced.
Purigen lasts ~6 months, and then you can recharge it /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default//emoticons/biggrin.gif (heard around 6-7 times it can be 'recharged'; takes 1:1 bleach/water soak then dechlorinated water soak)
I wonder though what the differences are...
Is Chemipure polymer beads? I know that's what purigen is..
Additional:
Hmm sounds interesting, perhaps a good compliment to Purigen?

Found another site say Chemipure absorbs fertilizers? (don't have any plants myself)
I know Purigen removes nitrogenous wastes before they become nitrate that's how that works...
You're diggin the Chemipure Elite though?

 

The biological media is your problem it will always be converting ammonia (fish/coral waste) to nitrite and then eventually to nitrate. I run a 29 gallon biocube as well. I have a refugium growing cheatomorpha in the first chamber, a sapphire aquatics skimmer in the second and a sapphire nan reactor in the third. If it were me I would get rid of all your canister filters as well as bilogical media, start a refugium and do bi weekly water changes or what ever is needed to keep the nitrates down.

Here are a few questions for you that might also help figure out your problem. How are you handling evaporation? I have found salinity can rapidly fluctuate due to evaporation. Another problem with this small of tank are the fast temperature swings. Now that its getting a little warmer out you are going to need to deal wit the heat, maybe keep an eye on your temps.

Also, why are you keeping your salinity so low? I usually shoot for at least 1.025 and usually run about 1.027.

 

Purigen and Matrix are two different things, like carbon vs bio balls...
Dunno if you're asking me but I have no live rock in my entire setup. (1 lava rock, but that's in the DT)