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Micah's Hobby Re-Entry Build


Micah

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4 hours ago, obrien.david.j said:

I believe in heavy feeding.   :)

Yeah, me too actually, but the amount of feeding I'd have to do in order to make the skimmer work properly also basically ruined my water params.   Skimmers don't remove everything you add. :)

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  • 1 month later...

Alright..... Some progress yesterday.

Got her plumbed and water tested. Just flowing into the overflow box at the moment. After an initial Murphy moment, it's all running fairly smooth. Letting it run for a day or so until I'm satisfied that it's not leaking. I also need to support the plumbing here and there.

Next..... Salt.

I also already have clowns and a lawnmower in quarantine at the moment, being treated as per humblefish's recommendations.

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Thar be water in thine tank!!!

 

Added some ammonia, bunch of bacterial starters... We're cycling!

 

Gotta say, this is my first big boy water mixing station and I don't know how I did it before this..... That was a buttload of water.

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

So, HUGE thanks to everybody so far.  You've all been quite a help.  

@Gil&Fin for the 20gal quarantine tanks, @Jack-the-reefer for the 20gal coral/invert quarantine tank, @pdxmonkeyboy for the great deal on his water mixing station, and of course... HUGE shout out to @CuttleFishandCoral for all of the help he's given me both in buying my tank, getting everything I need for it and helping me plan this build.  He's been instrumental in the re-learning process and I now feel almost as if I never left. 

 

This community seems even better than when I left!  Thanks PNWMAS!  In a year or so, I'll have to host a meeting - assuming meeting people is a thing again. :)

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3d printed a screen for my overflow. Works great!

Pic of the 20 gal AIO under the stand for corals/inverts to chill for a bit.

Added a tap to get tank water into the coral/invert tank. Will create one to have it exit as well.

Got my Aquatic Life T5 Hybrid fixture (in white) set up with some bulbs thanks to@CuttleFishandCoral . Gonna do some mods to this fixture before I throw it up.

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I also realized I never posted pics of what I've done to my quarantine setup to make it easier...

I have bulkheads and valves now. They drain straight into my houses drain. I can empty a QT in 2 min, scrub it down with vinegar, rinse it, put a fan over it, and have it refilled with water in 8 hours. So far it's been easy to QT these fish. Medication and all. Let's pray I'm not missing a step. :)

For coral QT, it'll just be a 20gal separate system with water from my display. Nothing special but I will need some sort of nano light. Wishing I had kept our old AI Sol. fac42be430456b72392729dc66b712d2.jpge3960afce29a4395a80d5d1e533f1608.jpg35921b8f6917629b84f50270d10e7b0e.jpgfa0bb872698348c08a80771e7bfdc7e9.jpg

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  • 4 weeks later...

It's been too long since an update, so away we go!  

 

Since the last pics, I've finished my cycle, gotten the first fish (2x True Percs and a Lawnmower blenny) into the tank and now have some new fishies gettin' clean. I also hung the Aquatic Life T5 fixture - which involved me acting out Cathrine Zeta Jones' laser scene from entrapment - but with out the lasers.... and without Cathrine Zeta Jones....  and in my attic... and the lasers were actually insulation and roofing nails. 

 

The fish are seeming happy, though the clowns are stereo-typically awkward in one corner of the tank most of the time. 

 

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I also added a coral/invert qt system underneath the main display.  It's a separate system that I plumbed a feed from the main tank to get water from.  When I do a water change, I just stick in an MJ1200 that's pre-plumbed to a waste drain and let'er rip, over fill my DT's sump, then refill the coral QT with DT water.  It's almost too easy. 

Huge thanks to @Jack-the-reefer for the 20cube.  

 

I picked up a RedSea LED 50 from @CuttleFishandCoral to put over this. Should be plenty of light with a similar spectrum/spread to the Kessils I'm planning to run over the DT.

 

 

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12 minutes ago, Micah said:

I also added a coral/invert qt system underneath the main display. 

It's a separate system that I plumbed a feed from the main tank to get water from.  When I do a water change, I just stick in an MJ1200 that's pre-plumbed to a waste drain and let'er rip, over fill my DT's sump, then refill the coral QT with DT water.  It's almost too easy. 

So how long are you going to QT corals, and what's your criteria for a coral to Graduate?   (can't see any uglies, after X weeks - good to go?)   And is it an All-or-Nothing approach?   QT-Clock resets whenever Anything is added?    Trying to get my head around doing this better.

 

Overall, I like your thought process for water movement simplification.  On the fish QT tanks, and now the coral QT tank.   For myself, I realize - if it isn't easy, I'm not likely to do it.

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Here are the new fish in QT.  A yellow tang, sailfin tang, and a royal gramma.   I think the next batch will be some wrasses.. we'll see. 

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The clowns/lawnmower are doing great in the DT so far.  

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Also, one silver lining of doing the full blown quarantine thing is that it gives you time to do stuff... So I started designing stuff!  

I designed/made my own apex breakout box and an algae scrubber!  So far, both are working great!

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6 minutes ago, obrien.david.j said:

So how long are you going to QT corals, and what's your criteria for a coral to Graduate?   (can't see any uglies, after X weeks - good to go?)   And is it an All-or-Nothing approach?   QT-Clock resets whenever Anything is added?    Trying to get my head around doing this better.

My plan is a full 76 days for corals/inverts.  I'm doing the full humblefish method, not taking any chances as long as I can.  I fully accept that at some point, I will entirely bone myself and put my wet contaminated hands into my DT's water... But, the likelihood of spreading something more severe than ich is low.    Luckily, corals don't get a clock reset like fish do when you add a new one to QT, since you can rinse off/dip-off free-swimmers. 

Quote

Overall, I like your thought process for water movement simplification.  On the fish QT tanks, and now the coral QT tank.   For myself, I realize - if it isn't easy, I'm not likely to do it.

That's exactly the mindset behind everything I'm doing.... If I have easy options, I'll use them.  If it's a pain in the butt, I likely will put it off.  Which is why having 45 gallons of pre-mixed water heated and ready to go at all times is incredibly awesome. 

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Oh!  And I got my Apex mounted... Again, ignore the horrible wire mess... I don't want to spend the time tidying it up until everything is working exactly as planned.  I have a call today with Neptune Systems to diagnose my LINK A/B ports on my energy bar.  They arrived DOA, so, hoping for a quick RMA.

 

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Looking good Micah!  Seems like that rock already has some nice coraline growth on it.  All the plumbing work looks really nicely thought out and executed (I will call you next time I do a build 😀). BTW - it sounds like you 3D printed that algae scrubber - did you just design it around a light you wanted to use or did you have some other template to follow?  I'm just now experimenting with one that Daniel built for his tank to see if it will make a difference in my phos. levels but it's not a long term solution due to its dimensions.

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2 minutes ago, albertareef said:

Looking good Micah!  Seems like that rock already has some nice coraline growth on it.  All the plumbing work looks really nicely thought out and executed (I will call you next time I do a build 😀). BTW - it sounds like you 3D printed that algae scrubber - did you just design it around a light you wanted to use or did you have some other template to follow?  I'm just now experimenting with one that Daniel built for his tank to see if it will make a difference in my phos. levels but it's not a long term solution due to its dimensions.

The rock is actually that life-rock from caribsea.  Not real coraline - just kinda.... painted.  Glamour-rock. :)  Soon enough, it'll have the real stuff

As for the algae scrubber, yeah, I picked an adequately sized light that was relatively cheap but not horribly crappy, then I designed around it.    I definitely learned a bit from this and if I had a better table saw, I'd probably have made this with acrylic.  Mainly because printed parts aren't always super water tight.  That said, with some tweaking, I was able to make it pretty watertight.  I still sealed the corners/edges with CA glue and silicone over that.   The clear panels are glass that I had cut at a local shop for my design.  They were more expensive than I expected, like 12ish bucks per piece.  I wouldn't be super against sharing the design.   Once I see this one actually grow algae, I'll likely make a decision to make a few more for folks or just publish the files for people to tweak on their own. 

 

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22 minutes ago, Micah said:

The rock is actually that life-rock from caribsea.  Not real coraline - just kinda.... painted.  Glamour-rock. :) 

Haha - this is pretty funny.  I was wondering how you got your rock to look so well established... guess I better check the pics more closely next time!

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1 minute ago, albertareef said:

Haha - this is pretty funny.  I was wondering how you got your rock to look so well established... guess I better check the pics more closely next time!

Hehe.  Definitely not my intention to fool people.  But it sure does look nice.

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Glad to be back! We should hang sometime! You know when that's a thing again. default_smile.png
Oh yeah, don't even get me started on that.

I've been training and sparring MMA and Jits since the start of May so I'm always hanging. But [emoji2958][emoji2958], don't tell anyone. [emoji33][emoji79]

If you're ever up towards Scappoose, hit me up and I'll show you the setup.

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

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