Oregonic

3 minutes ago, Bicyclebill said:

I pull with my kamoer, but mostly due to my method of refilling and purging air after a media refill. Depends on the vintage of your geo. I modeled their design 2 years ago and had to modify the co2 recirculating loop

Its a brand new geo, the outlet is the highest point on the lid. Whats your method for purging air?  

Setting up my first calcium reactor this weekend. Picked up a Geo CR612 and will be using a Versa dosing pump to feed.  I have read of people pushing and pulling water into the reactor, pushing seems to make more sense as to ensure no air bubbles at the top.  My logic could be completely wrong tho, what are others on here doing and why? Has anyone ran into any issues one way or the other?

I was having algae issues on my sand bed in my newer tank.  I was tired of brown sand and it seemed no matter what I did it would come back the next day. I started dosing small doses of microbacter everyday, I also added a co2 scrubber since PH would barley reach 8.0 midday. It helped somewhat with the brown algae on the sand but I noticed a huge difference on how clean my glass seemed to stay. I had been cleaning my glass 1-2 times a day before and now I can go 3-5 days between cleaning. I stopped dosing microbacter after a few weeks and glass still seems to stay much cleaner, wasnt the problem I was trying to cure but worked well. 

2 hours ago, half-astronaut said:

Are you feeding them? What colors are the parents?

Im not directly feeding them. They spawned in my previous tank before I took it down. We ended up setting up a small 10 gallon tank for a yellow clown goby that that I didnt want in the new big tank because he was nipping sps. They hitch hiked in on a rock from that had been in the sump of my old tank.  I had 3 flower nems in the old tank, a pink skirt with blueish purple center, a white skirt with orange center (much like several of the babies) and a dark green skirt with bright green center. I had seen the pink one spawn several years ago but never saw any babies. I must have missed the last spawning. The little tank they are in has pretty high nutrients and fairly low light, just kind of letting nature take over the tank to see what happens. Just a few mushrooms, zoa/palys and some interesting algaes I never noticed growing in my last tank. Im assuming the nems are eating pods, the tank has tons of pods in it. 

I have a handful of little baby flower nems too. Hard to get a good picture where they are located in the tank. Seem to only be white ones and orange ones. I didnt think they would last but they have been in the tank for at least 3.5 months now. 

1 hour ago, Its_cchan said:

Sweet, thanks. How does it do @ growing the macro algae in your refugium? 

Chaeto grows like a weed. 

I run 2 cheap lights. 
 

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Feit-Electric-9-Watt-Equivalent-BR30-Medium-E26-Base-Non-Dim-Indoor-and-Greenhouse-Full-Spectrum-Plant-LED-Grow-Light-Bulb-1-Bulb-BR30-GROW-LEDG2-BX/312552638

and 

https://www.amazon.com/ACKE-Lights-Spectrum-Lights，Growing-Hydropoincs/dp/B01LX1EO3W

+1 for it being amazing stuff to anyone who has never used it. A little goes a long ways too. 

Just a few pics of the progress in the reef.  Tanks consumption has really increased  ordered a calcium reactor, I know the consumption will just continue to increase and Im already getting tired of mixing 2 part.  Picked up a Maxspect Jump skimmer, big upgrade from the Curve 5.

How could you not be the king when you look like that! Beautiful fish. 

Got a Hanna nitrate low range checker the other day. Worked great one time, the seal for the plastic filter housing must have fallen out into the garbage disposal when I washed it. If anyone has one of these checkers could you share a photo of what the seal looks like?  I have tried 2 different o rings and they seem to seal till the paper filter is placed in it then it just leaks out when trying to push past the filter. 

6 hours ago, pdxmonkeyboy said:

bummer, should have bought that reactor for $50.  I mean the geo is a great reactor, I have one.. but anyways. 

If you want some solid advice, and well, even if you don't .. buy a cheap co2 regulator, and a Kamoer fx stp pump and you are good to go.  Just run the co2 from your apex ph probe.  Soooo easy to set up and the kamoer is rock solid. 

 

 

 

That reactor didn’t have a ph probe port. This is my first calcium reactor want it to be as fool proof as possible. Went with a versa for the pump. Went cheap on co2 regulator with solenoid and a Milwaukee ph controller, my apex classic goes a little haywire from time to time not sure I want it controlling my alk. Im going to be a little nervous setting this thing up, been doing tons of reading up on how to run a calcium reactor. 

Feel free to close, bit the bullet and bought a geo reactor. 

I have had good luck swapping sediment filter when it starts to look fairly yellow, roughly every 200ish gallons of usable water. Sediment filters are cheap. Every two times I swap my sediment I also swap my carbon. Every 2 times I swap my carbon I swap my resin. Thats what has worked for me on East side Portland water. Once producing water for about 1 minute I usually have about 3-7 tds prior to resin and 0 after the resin using this method. I dont use any water till I read 0 after the resin. 

Does it feed off the recirculating pump?  Looking for a calcium reactor that can use a continuous duty dosing pump, dont want to deal with a pinch valve.

My tanks consumption is really ramping up and getting tired of mixing 2 part all the time. Also feel a calcium reactor will provide a little more stability. Total system volume is 120ish gallons. Looking for a reactor, a ph controller or pm1 module, a 5lb tank, a regulator with solenoid, and continuous duty dosing pump.  Dont mind piecing it together, likely will purchase the dosing pump and regulator new but hoping to at least pick up some of the setup used. 

Ball anemone. I had some years ago and they didnt seem to harm anything. Some people consider them a plague. 

7 hours ago, Woodstock said:

Can anyone help me drill and install a bulk head and return nozzle to two Red Sea 350 ATO chambers? 
 

I don’t have any materials but will pay a fair price for someone to get the job done for me 

I had turned my old ATO into a ATS. Its really easy, if you have a drill the diamond bits are going to cost you less to order then you will pay someone. I may have the drill bit I used laying around still, I believe it was for 1/2in bulkhead. 

Sent you a message. 

Transfered everything this weekend. Old tank is officially dry and sitting in the backyard. Everything is going ok, no casualties coral wise. A few corals are a little upset but slowly settling in. My red coris wrasse went straight into the sand and I have not seen him in a few days now. Im assuming he came out when lights were off at least once because he darted into the sand near a rock my watchman goby and pistol shrimp have claimed as their home right where they decided to make their front door. Parameters are all a little low, alk 6.6, cal 375, nitrates .5, phos .01, and no sign of ammonia what so ever. Im really happy with ph stability, my old tank had a swing between 7.75 - 8.12 every day. New tank has stayed a solid 7.95 -8.08, assuming that is due to the much larger water volume and a refugium vs an ats in the old tank. I pulled my dosing pump offline yesterday temporarily and an testing alk 2 times a day and dosing by hand so I dont get lazy and get a feel for the tank. My goal is to bring alk up .3 - .4 per day till back up to the 7.8 - 8.2 range. Want to hold it there for several days before relying on the dosing pump again. I am a firm believer in manually doing a task such as this keeps you more in touch and involved in the tank, and keeps me more aware of what is going on. Diatoms on the sand are disappearing and the slightly cloudy water gets clearer by the day.

Just transferred livestock over to new build and have some leftover 4 year old live rock from the old tank. 1 big piece that filled about 3/4 of a 5 gallon bucket and another piece that filled it the rest of the way. There is also a piece of man made branch I broke in half to make fit in the bucket. One of the pieces of rock has some remnants of branching  cyphastrea and the other some branching psamacora on it. There is also a rock flower nem in there somewhere that I couldn’t remove and noticed some rock flower nem babies as I was breaking the tank down. There is also a bunch of critters such as brittle stars. I do have aptasia and vermitid snails as a FYI. $45 OBO would also trade for a frag or two, just want it gone. It’s currently in a bucket with a pump for circulation in the garage, couldn’t fit a heater in there but its warm out. I have tomorrow off so free most the day. Located in NE PDX. 
 

Feel free to text me, Andy 503-467-1158

The tank is running and salty. Got the lights all hung, a Kessil AP9X and 2 Orphek OR3 blue plus strips. Moved over some seeded bio media out of current tank along with a few pieces of rock that had been cooking in the sump. Added some cheato thanks to @shaywood 😃. I had to mix 55 gallons of saltwater at a time so saltwater has been on sand for a 5 days but only circulating for 3 days now. Im surprised im already seeing a few diatoms on the sand, must be because of adding seeded media 🤷🏻‍♂️ 

Anyone in NE or SE Portland have some chaeto they need to trim back?

9 minutes ago, Higher Thinking said:

Good to hear!

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I was slightly nervous that I may have miscalculated 😂 

1 hour ago, Higher Thinking said:

Great work! Did you happen to test it without the check valve being installed? Depending on how deep your return output sits in your tank, your sump may overflow if (when?) that check valve fails. Personally, I don't use them because I don't trust them or have confidence in them. It only takes the slightest little buildup on that flap to prevent it from being water tight. Even a small bump from a feather duster or something will allow the water to slowly siphon back into the sump.

Overall tank setup looks super clean, though! Love that trim work around the base.

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The check valve even new slowly let water past. If I were to really submerge the returns it probably would overflow. I will probably just stick with the wide fan returns the tank came with and keep them somewhat near the surface. That 3 inch buffer was with tank filled all the way to where it was tricking down the first emergency drain and the return nozzles about inch and half maybe 2 below water line. It seems to have better flow with the nozzles just at the surface pushing across. When shut down with nozzles at surface there was about 4 - 4.5 inches of room to spare in the sump.