Micah

Got back from some errands today and took a gander at the algae scrubber. The screen is coated in a slight tinge of green! Yay! It's working!!!!

Glad to be back! We should hang sometime! You know when that's a thing again.

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

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.

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.

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. 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.

The Kessils arrived! Got them mounted in the hybrid fixtire. Ignore the messy wires for now, but [language filter] these things look nice. Also added another rock structure on the right side of the tank.

Here's the algae scrubber. I'm about 60-80 bucks into it, but it seems solid. Still waiting for algae to grow, but I'm pretty low nutrient at the moment, we'll see if anything comes from it soonish.

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

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.

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.

My wife would love your rock scape... If every rock could be an arch, she'd do it. Looks good man! Digging it. I agree with@SuncrestReef , let's see that backside! "I like big sumps and I cannot lie" "Oh, my God... Beckie, look at her sump.. "

D'oh! Forgot to say I found one! Thanks everybody!!

So.... Accidentally dropped an LED light on the plumbing for one of my 20g quarantine tanks.... Need another 20g tall to replace it. Let me know what you have.

Oh no!

If anybody has one of these three modules laying around, I'd love to talk prices! Looking to expand inputs!

Baaaahahaha.. oh man. I feel for you on this one. The wounds are still fresh.

I'm looking to put a light over my coral/invert quarantine tank. Needs to be capable of sustaining SPS corals or at least keep them alive. The tank is 18x18x16, so doesn't need to be massive to accomplish that. Not looking to spend a shload, so let me know what you have.

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.

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.

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.

It may depend on your hosting. They may require you to use their own CA. If that's the case, you should probably reach out to them. If you can use any ole cert, then there are budget cert companies out there that will at least remove the "NOT SECURE" message - though it won't be as good as say Rudy's 60 dollar cert (assuming it's a verisign/other large brand).

Heck yeah! We should have a barter forum for trading skills.

It's actually an option with the hosting they have. They have to pay for the certificate, yearly renewal, but I think that's it. It's a non-significant cost, but it cost nonetheless. With more sites using SSL or TLS, it's pretty common. Might be something to look into. As it stands, your username and password are being sent in the clear. Somebody at the ISP or on your wireless network could sniff out your password. It's a good idea to never use the same password on any site anyways. I use something like LastPass to organize my passwords. All I have to know is this single password to get into that and any multi-factor authentication to use it. It makes it pretty simple, even my mom uses it.

I'm looking to set up a small invert/coral quarantine system, so I'm wanting to get a small 8-20 gal AIO setup to make my life a little easier. I don't have a lot to spend on this (justification reasons at the moment), but I can also trade 3D Design/Printing services. Let me know what you have. If I can't find an AIO, I'll likely settle for a 10-20gal and toss a HOB on it, so if you have something like that, PM me anyways - might be down. Thanks! Micah