fishcam

Wow this is a ton of feedback. Thanks everyone. Let me read over this tonight and I'll ask any followup questions!

In the next two weeks, I'll begin setting up my aga 120rr (with aga pine stand) and I'm looking for lessons learned and suggestions from folks who've been where I'm going. Let me lay out my setup, and then I'll ask general questions after that. If you've got other feedback, please post it here! Current Tank I'll be migrating a 55g+55g sump over-under style setup, and I'll be keeping most of the same equipment that I'll list below. 120rr Lights - existing current 2x150w mh with 2x96w pc (I'll be looking to upgrade to 2x250 20k's later, for simplicity and to address the added height in the 120 from the 55) Sump - since my 55 wont fit under the stand, and I dont' want a bunch of tanks everywhere, I'll probably downgrade to a standard 30g. This will house my Euro Reef RS80 with a Sedra 3500 pump, some macro algae and supporting 18w lights, and a mag 12 return pump. I've also got a 40w Current Gamma UV, and 2xTLF media reactors. (its gonna be pretty tight... so I may have to revisit this idea) Coral/Fish Care - I've got 2x Bulk Reef Supply dosers and an ACIII with temp and PH probes. Temp control is governed by 500w of heating and 4x80mm fans to cool it down. ATO for keeping the water levels up. For flow I have 4xMJ200's controlled by a wavemaster and 2xK4's, all with magnetic mounts. Finally, I've got 2x of the blue battery backup airstone fellows. I've also got some UPS I was considering hooking up to a K4, but that's for later. Plumbing - I'm going to try to do this right this time. I've got unions for easy maintenance, and flex pvc to reduce vibrations. Tank - I've got my overstocked 55... basically 3x chromis, dartfish, watchman goby, melanurus wrasse, yellow tang, blue hippo tang (hes growing up, my reason for upgrading), royal gramma, and a clown. CUC is several hermits, 3x astreas and one yellow cuke who's been with me since my 12g AP (along with the clown). Probably like 100lbs live rock and 60 lbs sand. As for corals, I've several (at least 25 types) SPS (mostly from reefhunter - cheers!), two LPS and several softies. Questions Now for the fun part: 1. The stand will be placed on carpet. I'll level it with shims. Should I put some sort of barrier between the carpet and stand? I was thinking some heavy duty trash bags, oil pan, or chair mat. What have you done? Wished you would have done? 2. I've got the darn red bugs. I figure this transition would be a good time to do the interceptor treatment. Anyone know a vet? 3. I've got 90 more lbs of sand in bags. Do I need to cure this before putting it int my tank? If so, I'll probs do it with my additional base rock later on. 4. I ordered some new bulkheads on marinedepot. Hopefully they'll come with gaskets. I read that its flange, gasket, glass, nut, and that two gaskets on either side of the glass is not a good thing. True? For now, thats it, but I'm sure there will be more. Thanks for your thoughts and help! All of the equipment here is bought used on WAMAS, and all the livestock has been bought via group buys - truly the tank that WAMAS built. -d

+1 I have two on my 55. Well worth ~15 each and 8 d cells. I used to stress out about it when I traveled and now its no worries. A generator would be a good long term solution, but like you, I'm in an apt too. When I get a house (on the far superior west coast) I'm gonna get one of those natural gas ones that clicks on automatically. OK bring on the west coast haters.

Nice timing I was wondering which canister to get! 7X gallon for me! Boret, thats a sweet sig!

i used to, hence my sn, but ive since stopped because of the trouble. ill post again with my tech, im maxing and relaxing in the pacific as we speak , but my setup took an old laptop, dedicated ip, webcam and a program called webcam xp (since i was too lazy to figure out webcams in linux)

On my 55 I run 4 mj1200's with a Red Sea Max on the variable setting, along with 2xKoralia 4's. I've been real happy with the 4x MJ+RSM, and only recently added the K4's because I'll be putting it all in a 120 soon. As for the quality of the 4's, they're OK. I feel like they should be pushing more flow, so perhaps the MJ 1200 mods might have been a better idea.

haha in-wall in-wall ... Did I tell you my CPP died too? He got stuck between my now awesome sized acro's, and i think exhausted himself trying to get out. I pulled him out and he died shortly thereafter. He'll be missed, but at least now, I can auto feed. I think I've learned a valuable lesson with picky fish: not for me! Those corner overflows... is that an oceanic tank?!

I have trouble with it too, but it seems to be working now. Its hit or miss for me - I thought my membership had expired, but everything seems OK and I've got a couple more months...

Thanks and will do. I've got a pretty thorough failure scenario worked out already, and was just curious if someone who knew the ACIII code could confirm. In my tests it seems to work (today is a hot day!) but to the end of redundancy, I wanted a second pair of eyes.

Thanks for the thought, but I like the sunrise, sunset type look. Since the blue PC's dont really help the coral much, I'm not sure I'll replace them when I replace the MH's (10k 150's).

I've got the following safety code in my ACIII, and I want to check that I'm using the max change command right. Basically in the event of a power down because of temperature, I want to wait 30 mins before attempting to power down again. Ideally this would work when the temp is 82.1, lights are off, 82, lights go on and heat up a little, to turn off again when temp gets to 82.1. Here's my whole program, which controls the lights, heaters, cooling fans, and dosing pumps. I'm open to different methods of implementation if you have any too Thanks for the help. If Time > 13:00 Then LT1 ON If Time > 23:00 Then LT1 OFF If Time > 13:30 Then LT2 ON If Time > 22:30 Then LT2 OFF If Temp > 82.0 Then LT1 OFF Max Change 030 M Then LT1 OFF If Temp > 82.0 Then LT2 OFF Max Change 030 M Then LT2 OFF If Temp > 78.0 Then COL ON If Temp < 77.5 Then COL OFF If Temp < 77.0 Then HET ON If Temp > 77.5 Then HET OFF If Time > 05:00 Then CAL ON If Time > 05:30 Then CAL OFF If Time > 06:30 Then ALK ON If Time > 06:36 Then ALK OFF If Time > 07:30 Then ALK ON If Time > 07:36 Then ALK OFF If Time > 08:30 Then ALK ON If Time > 08:36 Then ALK OFF If Time > 09:30 Then ALK ON If Time > 09:36 Then ALK OFF If Time > 10:30 Then ALK ON If Time > 10:36 Then ALK OFF

+1 I have two of the 100 (large) models, and run two aqualifters on a timer 4 times a day for ~5 mins. Air does get in... IME way more than a simple U tube style, but I guess that depends on how many bubbles you're in-tank portion is generating. Def required, I think.

I use them for alk and ca and wouldn't have it any other way. They're very reliable so far, keeping my alk and ca accurate to within the+/- 1 to 2 resolution bars of accuracy on the salifert test kits I use. It does say to calibrate them before use, and I did, but found that they were accurate enough to use the 1.6ml/min reference for all my calculations. I have them hooked up to a ACIII and dose alk 5 times a day in 1/5 does amounts, and then 1 huge does of ca. You should be pretty happy with them!

Hey if you can raise any... I want a pair!

Id also just skip the 10 and go with a 20 or 29, unless floorspace is a premium. Keep your same setup, more water vol just makes things easier to deal with, plus you can add a 2nd fish later. I came up with a list of the ultimate low cost basic reef once, but I cant seem to find it... it was essentially this (I hope it helps): 20g tank with two HOB AquaClear Filters (say, 70's or 110's if you find them used) for flow. A bag-o-sand (Petsmart had 30lbs for 15 bucks early this week) some LR, to your taste Soon you'll be adding an ACIII in no time

I suppose its possible. I paid careful attention last night when it was fully extended and didnt see an obvious problem... there is a leather near by, but even fully extended I don't think it would have touched it. Perhaps someone came to take a bite? Any other thoughts?

I've got some time yet... although target feeding probably wont help you...

Check this out: http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/219927/IMG_3559.JPG The tissue is all intact, but there are areas that are white! The piece is in a medium flow area, and my parameters are all within range with no ates/ites. There was a three week period where I didnt change the water over christmas break, but i'm back to weekly 10% changes now. Any suggestions? I'll try target feeding it tonight and maybe every other day? Any other suggestions? Thanks!

No worries, my current tank has dual hob overslows, and a siphon check. I think i talked about it above... I'll be sure to include one on th 120 as well. So, if there is a siphon check on the submerged returns, then the height of the overflow is the only thing that determines the amount of water overflown. I'll measure that and see if its more than an inch

Well I would have thought that the height of the overflows would limit the drop, since they're the barriers between the actual drain in the tank, but with everyones comments, i'll just go take a look myself and see what it is. I would suspect that a really good UPS would last about 3 mins with a pump that has reasonable turnover (~900) and 500w of heating attached to it...

Hmm, I'll have to look when I get home. I've never had a RR before, but with my 55 that has two HOB overflows, the power goes out, air is sucked into the anti-siphon hole instantly, but water continues to drain for a bit. I'll have to see exactly how high that is though. Hopefully its a non-issue, I really don't want to re-baffle the sump. thanks for the input.

I'm doing the math to see weather my 55g with 18 in baffles will overflow if I install it under my new 120rr and the power goes out. 55's measure about 48x13x20, which means I have 2 inches or 624 cubic in per inch of power out water room. Multiply that by two for a total of 1248 cubic inches of power-out water overflow room. The 120rr is about double the size (48x24x24), where each vertical inch is about 1152 cubic inches of water... so my math says my 120 fish tank can drop 1.08 inch before I run outta room... Therefore, the million dollar question for you guys that are already set up: How low does she go? Am I going to have to re-baffle ?! thanks -d

Updates man! How am I supposed to properly do an America Szied 120rr without a Texan 120 for inspiration!

They're beaut's for sure. Nice find/buy/down payment

hmm from my google searches it looks like these are 12v AC... sad times.