steelhead77

You don't. They either will or they won't. More often than not, they will be hosted by a mushroom rock, frogspawn or a powerhead rather than a RBTA.

Crazing is micro cracks in the plastic that don't necessarily go all the way thru. They're more like stress cracks and can weaken the plastic. Silicone does not really bond to acrylic very well. For an acrylic to acrylic joint, you really want to use Weld-On (maybe not 16, there are other grades). For glass to glass, you use silicone. For acrylic to glass....well it really doesn't work long term.

Nitrates of 80, while undesirable, are by no means something to panic about. Four 50% water changes over next week or so, will get you down to 5. The trick is to not wait to long between WC's and let them build up again. A couple summers ago, my 180 had nitrates above 160 due to being in Asia for most off the summer. When I came back, I did five 50% changes over the course of a couple weeks and they've never risen above 5 ever since. Also, re-using a sand bed is perfectly fine as long as the sand smells like the beach and not rotten eggs. IF it smells like rotten eggs, toss it. If it smells like the beach, go ahead and re-use it. This advice was given to me by Jason, formally of Coral Reef, someone who we all respect and trust with the advice he provided while he had the shop. A spike of what you are seeing, IMO, points more to either the kits being bad or the method of testing not being consistent. It is possible for two kits to give bad readings. Good Luck

Doesn't this fit the personality of at least one former member of this forum? Just askin'.

Don't want to be a downer or nuthin', but if you have 2 Maroons in the same tank with that other Clown, more than likely the Maroons will soon dominate and the beat the little Clown to death. Maroons and Clarkii's do not play well with other Clowns. Especially in a 55. That may be what happened to the others mate. Good Luck

If all else fails, since the pinwheel is pressed on, you might be able to find some stainless drill rod or pic shaft at Graingers in Portland. You just need to accurately measure the diameter with a micrometer to get the right size and find someone to cut it to length. This would work until you could get the replacement. If you were closer, I could make you one in about 5 minutes.

Porsches cost more than Kia's, so what's your point? At least it wouldn't crash every other day. (whistle)

Now if you hooked this up on a Mac, your tank would never crash and all of your corals would be overflowing the top of the rim! Sorry, I couldn't help it.

If you get no takers on a trade, could you try hanging the fixture from the ceiling so you have more room above your tank? I think with two 400w halides, you're not going to be able to keep glass lids on the tank anyway. Another option is to make some supports out of electrical conduit or some kind of pipe that would extend up from the back of your stand and and then over your tank and hang the light from that.

20ppm won't kill fish. Most of us at one time or another have had nitrates MUCH higher than that. That said, never be afraid to do a 50% water change. A couple summers ago, I was out of the country quite a bit and they got well over 100 in my 180 gallon. I did a series of 50% changes each week for a month and each time I cut them in half. Now they are consistently around 2ppm. In a 180, that's a lot of salt, but it was worth it. None of my fish ever showed ill effects of nitrates that high or of the large water changes. Corals, however did suffer a bit from the high nitrates. Always remember; The solution to pollution is dilution. Good luck.

I agree with this. Glue, even epoxy, will eventually let go. This happened to me on a 55. Scared the you-know-what outta me when it happened. If you don't want to replace the tank, then at least put a couple stainless steel screws and nuts (10-32 should be fine) thru the acrylic strips and brace. You can cover the screw heads and nuts with silicone to seal them. Even tho they are stainless, some stainless still corrodes in salt water. Your best bet is to get them from a Marine Supply (Boat) Store.

I agree with Josh. Keep it as simple as possible. It does sound as If your over thinking this. Find yourself a used 90 gallon with corner overflows and call it good. In the long run, you'll be much better off.

I've upgrade twice: from a 72 to a 125 then to my current 180. Each time I reused all of the old sand and all of the old water adding more of each to fill the new tank. I also built the stand for my 180, so I can offer advice there as well. Each upgrade was done in a single very long day. I did not lose a single fish or coral in both upgrades. My one really good piece of advice would be to go bigger. Not 200 gallons, but 120 would be a good size. You know you want to, its not that much more money or space, it would be a more stable system and you won't be going thru this again in 9 months or so. I'd be willing to lend a hand if you need it, I live in N. Albany and work in CV. PM me if you want more info or advice.

I'm in Shenzhen, China right now. Saturday I went to the largest electronics mecca in the world, Hua Qiang Bei. One HUGE building has 7 floors of electronics stuff. There must have been literally 20,000 booths that were selling all manner of LED's and components. Looking at some of those lights from 3 feet away was like holding a camera flash an inch from my eye, I nearly got blinded. A 3 light (12W) spotlight costs about $1.50. I wish I spoke Chinese so I could convey what I want, I think I could come back with a setup that would rival any 400W MH set up for about $15.00.

Hey Rick, great pics! So you returned the 70-200 f2.8L for the 70-200 f4L? To me that seems a little backward. The 2.8L lens is supposed to be pretty much the top of the line Canon lens. Not that I'll ever be able to afford one but what didn't you like about the 2.8? It seems that on the first set of pics, you just needed to do a little pp with the WB. I would assume you're shooting raw right? What sw are you using for pp? Canon recommends using their own sw for raw processing. Even more than PS. Something about the Raw algorithms being optimized for their cameras. I'll get some of mine posted up with the same sweet camera, except I'll be using a either a much cheaper Sigma 105mm f2.8 macro or the Canon 18-135.

Hey Kim, Would you be interested in selling the Sunpod by itself? LMK, Scott

Pm sent. I can come over anytime.

I LOVE my 60D. My wife gave the OK to get any camera I wanted. I looked at the 7D, the Nikon D7000 and the 60D. The 60D was my pick. The flippy screen sealed the deal. I upgraded from an S5IS which had it also and I could not imagine owning a camera without one. The Nikon gave my hand cramps after holding it for 5 minutes. The 7D was my second choice, but I couldn't justify the extra $500.00. How do you like yours? I have to think about this lens, it's a sweet one but, $180.00 is good chunck of change. Let me see what I can work out.

I saw this on CL on was wondering if it was you. I just bought a 60D and am looking to enhance my lens collection. That a very nice lens and I'd love to have it. The price is a little steep however, but let me think on it and see if I can scrape up the $. -Scott

That is definately extra coarse stuff, my friend. I would say between 3/8" and 1" in size. That looks like the stuff I got from Garrett a few months ago.

IME, the only way to get them down is with large water changes. Small ones won't do it. Three 50% water changes will drop them from 100 to 12.5 in a week or so. From there they are much more manageable. This is what I had to do last summer in my 180. Because I was in Singapore and China most of the summer it got so that they were over 160. When I returned, I did a series of 50% changes and I got them down to under 10 where they have stayed since. BTW I have 18 fish in my tank including 4 large Tangs plus one HUGE FF Rabbitfish. Vodka, MB7, all that other stuff helps to keep them down, but to bring them down initially, the only way is with water changes.

Welcome to the forum Ryan! Glad you were finally able to get hooked up. This store is awesome! It's especially dangerous for me as it's less than 3 minutes from my house. As already stated, Ryan has a huge selection of drygoods and food. He's even carrying Rod's Food and DT's now. If you're ever down Albany way, stop in and have a look. I think you'll bee impressed.

Hey Kim, It might be worth your time to stop in at All For Fish in Albany. I was just in there today (Friday) and he just got in huge shipment of about 15-20 different kinds of Zoas (very nice size colonies 30-70 polyps each) and about 30 different kinds of mushrooms (5-15 heads), all for very, very good prices. The owner is super nice and the store is super clean and it is one of the (if not the) largest shop in the Willamette Valley. You will not be disappointed if you make the trip. Michael, He told me that he wants to become a sponsor and is waiting for you to follow up with him. It sounds like some mis-communication happened. You need to give him a call and get him hooked up.