Joel A
Started over.
wanted to document it all in one spot, so i could get help by asking questions along the way, as well as maybe teach people a few things here and there about setting up a new system.
Background story- well my tank isn't/wasn't where i wanted it. Not enough light, inconsistent parameters, poor to moderate skimming, crappy sand bed, crappy coral colors and placement, etc. etc. You name it, it's probably wrong in my system at the moment.
So i've decided to take affirmative action, and basically strip down my system and start over again (in some ways at least).
Many of you know me from the meetings and from the forums, but i'm sure very few of you have actually seen my tank... and the chief reason for that is i'm a bit embarrassed by it. From everything that i know/learn i don't feel that it gives an accurate assessment of my time/knowledge/ money spent in the hobby... and on top of all that i have a POS camera, and even more POS photography skills.
So what's going to be happening? A lot actually.. here's some coming attractions:
New light- just ordered my new ATI sunpower fixture from Reefgeek. 6x54 watts, and a hell of a lot of light for my tank. Put me out a good bit in the pocket, but it's worth it in my opinion to take probably one of my biggest issues out of the equation. Currently i have a 2x175 MH set-up, with 14k bulbs that are 1year+ old.... and they are in poor reflectors as well.
changing out sandbed after i have the new light squared away, i'm going to be slowly siphoning out my sandbed until i have a BB tank... once the tank is BB i will then slowly add back new, better looking sand.
Modifications to my skimmer I have a reef octopus NW200 skimmer, that i am relatively happy with, but i need to make some more modifications. Currently, the skimmer is mesh modded, and recirc modded, but in the coming months i will be completing a long overdue gate valve mod, as well as probably switching out the standard octopus pump for a CoralVue Sicce 2500. Hopefully when it's all said and done i can supercharge this "poor mans skimmer" and get it to produce solid and consistent results for me.
Calcium reactor? Here's a big question mark for me at the moment. I have a "blueline aquatics" calcium reactor, (but it's identical to the Gen 1 MRC-CR1 reactor). Recently, the mag 2 recirc pump kicked the bucket on me... and i am a bit reluctant to replace it. I've got a few options here... i can replace the mag 2, switch it out for a better pump with output numbers that are relatively close, sell it and purchase a new CR all together, or sell it and purchase a serious dosing pump and go with a balling method.
This may be a topic of interest because i know a lot of people here do not use dosing pumps and two or three part solutions for seriously dominated SPS tanks, however... i have seen it done very successfully numerous times over on RC in both Europeans and American tanks. The main argument against it seems to be that after your tank is indeed dominated by SPS corals, you go through the solution so fast that it isn't worth it to try and keep up. This may be true for those of you with 300 gallon tanks, but with a 75 gallon tank, the demand for calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium can only reach so high. I'm not worried about not being able to meet the demand of the corals with it, but instead i'm a bit worried about the money factor.
here is an example of a peristaltic dosing pump i am looking into.
http://cherrycorals.com/equipment/product.php?productid=839&cat=35&page=1
the upfront cost is high (that's only capable of dosing 2 liquids at that price) but the reliability is supposed to be very good, and it is upgradeable. There are other options on the market too...
a concern i have though is the cost to keep the solutions on hand and ready...
anways, that's something i'll be looking at in the coming months, i think the plan for the time being is to just replace the mag2 pump and then look into that down the road a piece.
Some other things on the agenda include:
-replacing return pump
-teeing the return line to feed calcium reactor
-possibly replacing main display tank (with RR starfire front and side pane tank)
-Adding larger, and properly baffled sump
-Adding fully automated Top off system
-Adding the Zeovit system.
So yeah... there is a lot on the radar, and i just wanted to jump start this thread, and give all of you who might be interested a taste of what is to come.
I hope to make this thread more interesting by adding pictures and descriptions of everything i will be doing instead of just having walls upon walls of text ....
I'll update again when i re-aquascape my tank, and put up my new lights (all next week).
-Joel
Background story- well my tank isn't/wasn't where i wanted it. Not enough light, inconsistent parameters, poor to moderate skimming, crappy sand bed, crappy coral colors and placement, etc. etc. You name it, it's probably wrong in my system at the moment.
So i've decided to take affirmative action, and basically strip down my system and start over again (in some ways at least).
Many of you know me from the meetings and from the forums, but i'm sure very few of you have actually seen my tank... and the chief reason for that is i'm a bit embarrassed by it. From everything that i know/learn i don't feel that it gives an accurate assessment of my time/knowledge/ money spent in the hobby... and on top of all that i have a POS camera, and even more POS photography skills.
So what's going to be happening? A lot actually.. here's some coming attractions:
New light- just ordered my new ATI sunpower fixture from Reefgeek. 6x54 watts, and a hell of a lot of light for my tank. Put me out a good bit in the pocket, but it's worth it in my opinion to take probably one of my biggest issues out of the equation. Currently i have a 2x175 MH set-up, with 14k bulbs that are 1year+ old.... and they are in poor reflectors as well.
changing out sandbed after i have the new light squared away, i'm going to be slowly siphoning out my sandbed until i have a BB tank... once the tank is BB i will then slowly add back new, better looking sand.
Modifications to my skimmer I have a reef octopus NW200 skimmer, that i am relatively happy with, but i need to make some more modifications. Currently, the skimmer is mesh modded, and recirc modded, but in the coming months i will be completing a long overdue gate valve mod, as well as probably switching out the standard octopus pump for a CoralVue Sicce 2500. Hopefully when it's all said and done i can supercharge this "poor mans skimmer" and get it to produce solid and consistent results for me.
Calcium reactor? Here's a big question mark for me at the moment. I have a "blueline aquatics" calcium reactor, (but it's identical to the Gen 1 MRC-CR1 reactor). Recently, the mag 2 recirc pump kicked the bucket on me... and i am a bit reluctant to replace it. I've got a few options here... i can replace the mag 2, switch it out for a better pump with output numbers that are relatively close, sell it and purchase a new CR all together, or sell it and purchase a serious dosing pump and go with a balling method.
This may be a topic of interest because i know a lot of people here do not use dosing pumps and two or three part solutions for seriously dominated SPS tanks, however... i have seen it done very successfully numerous times over on RC in both Europeans and American tanks. The main argument against it seems to be that after your tank is indeed dominated by SPS corals, you go through the solution so fast that it isn't worth it to try and keep up. This may be true for those of you with 300 gallon tanks, but with a 75 gallon tank, the demand for calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium can only reach so high. I'm not worried about not being able to meet the demand of the corals with it, but instead i'm a bit worried about the money factor.
here is an example of a peristaltic dosing pump i am looking into.
http://cherrycorals.com/equipment/product.php?productid=839&cat=35&page=1
the upfront cost is high (that's only capable of dosing 2 liquids at that price) but the reliability is supposed to be very good, and it is upgradeable. There are other options on the market too...
a concern i have though is the cost to keep the solutions on hand and ready...
anways, that's something i'll be looking at in the coming months, i think the plan for the time being is to just replace the mag2 pump and then look into that down the road a piece.
Some other things on the agenda include:
-replacing return pump
-teeing the return line to feed calcium reactor
-possibly replacing main display tank (with RR starfire front and side pane tank)
-Adding larger, and properly baffled sump
-Adding fully automated Top off system
-Adding the Zeovit system.
So yeah... there is a lot on the radar, and i just wanted to jump start this thread, and give all of you who might be interested a taste of what is to come.
I hope to make this thread more interesting by adding pictures and descriptions of everything i will be doing instead of just having walls upon walls of text ....
I'll update again when i re-aquascape my tank, and put up my new lights (all next week).
-Joel
