wopadobop

SOooo, Little update for everyone. Recently changed out my MH for a radion fixture. I have to say that not having a load of huge bulky timers and my cabinet full of lights is just one of many awesome things about this change. Corals seem to open up a bit more and are growing very well. Here is a fts . Tank is now about 8 weeks along. Been battling a little bit of cyanobacteria on the sand. Think this is from having very low phosphate and its leaching from the crushed coral substrate. I'll give it a few more weeks of no changes to see if it passes. BTA Is growing very fast. Got him 4 weeks ago at about the size of a quarter and is now at least an inch and half in diameter. Pocillipora (I realize these are easy to care for) doing very well.When I got them they were very brown. Under the halides they pinked up and under the new l.e.d. fixture they just shine Little frag of red setosa I picked up at reeftech. Has already grown about 1 cm in the last 3 weeks. About 4 weeks ago my Protein skimmer broke down. So I decided since the tank was new to try something a bit different. Currently feeding 1 cube of prawn roe , 1 cube of mysis and .05 grams of spectrum pellets daily. The only filtartion on this tank is this. Seems to be working out so far.

Not trying to start a poo flinging fight or anything. But , algae scrubbers do add food to a system. Wouldnt have to change anything. just add one and keep doing what your doing. Would allow you to feed more anyway. I have had very good success with mine. doesnt take much to make one either. just my two cents.

I might be on the lucky ones but. I popped my bta in my tank. it took to a rock , hasnt moved and was instantly hosted by my tomatoe clown. Been about 2 months, still same.

comes with a 14k halide bulb. That's 60 bucks minimum right there. but it looks like the 4 t5's are only 18 inchers. 18 dollars each. That's not too bad.

Diy led kits are still pretty expensive from I can find. Maybe if you did a group buy? This fixture looks like its got the oomph to get the job done with lots of options for colors in the 4 t5's . plus plenty of moon lights. I kinda wish I could fit one in my canopy. +1 looks like a great find. Does it come with a ballast?

good thinking. Ill go with the blue acrylic.

I a have never had good luck with coraline growth. Even with no coral in a tank I monitor my calcium mag and kh and keep them at reef parameters just for good practice. Maybe need more actinic supplement. but lets hope. I do like the look of it. I have read that krylon fusion holds up very well to saltwater. Maybe ill try that. My other idea was to maybe turn it into a small algae scrubber? thoughts?

I hooked one of those california cold water shrimp once. They are mean as hell. Thing Was huge! I kinda want one. hmmm... coldwater 10 gallon for mantis shrimp... (daz)?

So I just moved all my equipment from the biocube i.e. ( the zombie tank) to my new 40 gln and was surprised to find a few aptasia starting to grow in the old tank. I still have all the rock and cleanup crew hanging out over there. I think it will be interesting to see what else pops up without fish to much down on everything. This thread is awesome I read it whenever I'm having a crummy day, always make me laugh. I hope you win. Is there a link we can follow to see the competition and show some support for you?

So the Dr. tims worked way better than I expected. day 1 ( added my tomato clown and 2 pajama cardinals) ammonia 0 ppm nitrite 0 ppm As this tank was sterile to start this is to be expected. day 2 ammonia .10 (this is the amount recommended to add the bacteria so they have something to start reproducing with) Nitrite 0 Added 4 oz of bacteria at 9:00 p.m. with lights out. day 3 ammonia 0 ppm nitrite .5 ppm Nitrates 10 ppm Not bad for day 3 day 4 Ammonia 0 ppm nitrites 0 ppm im sure there is some still there but my test kit isnt showing it. nitrates 40 ppm (kinda high as i have been feeding rather heavy to make sure bacteria has enough to live and grow on. and I am not running the skimmer at all) day 5 ammonia 0 ppm nitrite 0 ppm nitrate 20 ppm (did a small water change and used some water and a scoop of sand from other tank) Thats pretty much it. I'm sure at this point I will have to add live stock slowly as to not overly stress the biological filtration but that's kind of a given. 6 days is not a bad cycle time for dry rock. I would assume that not having any extra dead matter from live rock stops the bungy effect of the cycling. dont even have diatom bloom. Running lights 10 hours a day. Also running a phosphate media (gfo) in an upflow reactor right from day one as my last tank had a pretty bad case of phosphate leaching from the terrible lfs i got it from not using ro/di water. :( Finally got the rock work the way I want it with no dead spots and the live stock have a few calmer areas to relax in. REgrets: If I had a choice to build the overflows over again. I would run the cal flow box on the outside of the tank. I really thought I would have more room to put the box in without it interfering with anything but looking at the tank and seeing the white pvc for the bean animal is kind of ugly and really takes away from the asthetics of the tank. Any ideas to fix this? comments? bueller? buueelller?

Alright! got the rock in Hood and lights in whole system shot. All dry rock and dry sand right now. The dr. tims should be here in the next few days. I would never try this with live fish so i had them send me ammonia to start to the cycle. when the ammonia and nitrites read zero I will move my fish over from my other tank one at a time. I plan on posting all my findings and test readings here so if any of you are interested you can come give it a look see. If it works ... cool. If not at least we can all say we tried it right? right.

I have heard good things about dr tims one and only nitrifying bacteria. Supposedly it is not waste treatment plant bacteria but the ones we actually use. So to really test I started with 100% dry rock and 100% dry sand. I do have some rock from my nano tank that i will use to seed some corraline. What is the best way to get just the corraline off of these old rocks? they do have a lot of those weird string feeding inverts, I don't know any other way to describe them. So I didn't want to use them in the new system. I also have some grunge from the old tank but it is loaded with aptasia(one of the reasons for building a new system). Can I just scrape the corraline off the old rocks? Maybe not let it touch the water? I'm scared... Hold me!

Wow , this setup is so quiet I keep doing a double take every time I walk by it. Is it not working? no no it's fine. Is the pump off? no no it's on. Can't wait to cycle this sucker and finally after 3 months of working to get this baby runnin. Does anyone know if running lights is necessary for a cycle? I have heard it is actually better to run it with a regular ho bulb. At least that is what GARF recommends. (shrug) Just wondering if anyone has input on the matter. I have mh setup in the hood. Should I start the light cycle early or just go dark till the cycle is over?

double post. :(

Finally got my tank delivered. First things first .. modify to calflow overflow. installed bulkheads . Since this is going in my living room I decided to try a beananimal overflow style. It's pretty genius and I Like the self start + no noise + needs an act of god to fail. I will update with more photos of the hood. The diy fan controller and lights installed. My rock came in today while I was working on the hood frame but no one told me. So I will post pics of the rock work as soon as It's figured out. Happy reefing.

I will check out reef tech as well if I get out to Medford soon. Glad to see there are people this far south in the club. Been feeling like im on a desert island. Only there are no reefs in the water (sad).

excellent, grants pass is fairly close and i have to head over there soon anyway. I will look up frog prince. reef tech is on my list but i rarely get out to medford. thankyou soooo much for the help.

I went to the local lfs today. I was saddened and shocked by the state of this places tanks and live stock. I take my care and husbandry of fish personally and when I see someone who is just down right lazy running his own fish store it makes me want to choke them. 4 inches of thick black what I can only describe as mold covered the sand. The glass was covered in brown diatome nastiness. every single fish has ick and velvet. Not one protein skimmer to be found on any of his tanks. bioballs in the sumps(im assuming they were bioballs) that had not been cleaned in at least a year. When i asked the man what was wrong with his tanks he replied "i dunno i just cant seem to get the salinity right" . Does anyone know of a decent lfs or coral store near brookings OR? i would even be willing to make the trip to Medford if need be. HELP!

I love the way you mortised the 4x4 as support for the 2x4. Great idea! I never had any luck with the stain and poly in one. I suppose since this is pretty much solid black it would be okay. problem is you really cant add a second coat. But... you can get a can of the rub on poly. I make furniture and use this stuff on everything. It comes out like you sprayed in it a booth and all you have to do is soak a rag and go to town so if your strapped for time grab a can it works great. Is this in an area where noise will be an issue? look into a beananimal overflow . just built one and they work great.

I got the acrylic from home depot and the solvent from tap plastics. About $109 for the acrylic and $20 dollars for the solvent and applicator. It's .220 acrylic so it wouldn't work for a tank application (too thin and flimsy) but with all the support from the baffles it doesn't even bow. The paint i just had laying around the house.

little update. Noticed a few things on my rocks this weekend. aptasia? picked up a sand conche. these little guys are pretty awesome. When First placed in the tank my turbo snails were all over this guy. They have a nifty way of getting things off there back. It uses its foot which is shaped like a saw blade and flips it over its back like a scraper and pooof no more snails. They do an excellent job and cleaning the live rock where it meats the sand as well. thats pretty much it for now. Working a few extra odd jobs to get this build completed. so hopefully within the next week or so I can post some photos of the finished setup.

Stand and sump in place. still using the biocube as a display tank till funds are available for the new 40. I was very surprised at how well the width of the sump made a huge difference in the amount of baffles needed to stop micro bubbles. very happy soo far. grunge still hasnt gotten here for the refugium yet. been about 2weeks not sure whats going on so i just have the chaeto ball and a few pieces of rubble.

So i fired up my genx 40 external pump today and i think it might be a little over kill for a 80 gallon system(tank and sump). If anyone is interested in buying it for like $140 pm me. ill put an add up in the classifieds here as well. back the drawing board for plumbing i guess.

thank you , im having a blast so far.