davidm

I would suggest you scale back, but put everything you don't need now, except maybe the LR, in storage. you wouldn't get much in return if you do sell it, and you'll want it again in ...2 yrs?

interesting. what lights do you use? If they're MH I wonder how much the electricity bill would change if you used LEDs instead - of course they're more of an upfront investment. cheers, David

I know how you feel, and I'm sorry for your losses. I too had many thoughts during this outage about giving up, and quite homestly still do. The problem with this metro area is that this happens way too often. I would say 2-3 times a year at my house, if not from wind storms during the summer then it's snow and ice pulling down those 1950s era overhead power lines in the winter. I understand your frustration. My thoughts going forward are to keep it simple - and for me that means no $100 corals, simple softies and easy SPS, and I have to accept I need to wake up every 4 hrs, and deal with the stress both for myself and my family, to do shifts with a car converter power supply to run a powerhead for circulation. We all love the hobby, but each of us have different thresholds for when enough is enough - I would suggest you give yourself time to think it through and remember what you enjoy most about your reef, and as someone else said, think of this a reboot - david

Bob, Hope you recover quickly. Let me know if I can help. Best regards, David

I'll take one of the electric blu3 milli. thanks, david

I purchased a long nosed yellow butterfly recently - came down with ich 3 wks later in the display tank. pulled just him out into Q, treated with Cu for a long time (~ 6 wks) and fed the other fish in the DT garlic. All fish in the DT beat the ich, I guess with him out they had less stress, and put the butterfly in my tank at work where he is doing fine ich-free. putting just the infected fish in Q worked for me - obviously others have had varying experiences. I have no doubt if the DT gets stressed ich will re-appear, but I probably would have said that before I purchased the butterfly - I tend to have the opinion ich is opportunistic and nearly always present. best of luck - David

Interested in one RBTA w/o rock. ever make it out to fairfax? where are you located? how soon do you need these out? thanks, David

Ditto - I have a frag of your red table if you want to come out this far for free. Also, mine is not really liking the LEDs, but it's hanging in there. David

for my DIY LEDs I found this function generator from Amazon. With a 18V DC power supply I had lying around, this function generator alternates at 1 Hz(once per second) a sine (or triangle) wave from ~7 V to ~10V DC to give some oscillations / fluctuations to my LED bank. I'm only using it for every 1 out of 3 LEDs, and it gives some nice rhythmic oscillations in LED output. Sorta like fast moving cloud cover. just thought I'd share. Amazon -- 100kHz Function Generator Sold by Wizard Of Maths LLC (Wizard of Math) $39.99

welcome to WAMAS. You might want to consider seeing other folk's tanks - most everyone would have an opinion about what they would, or wouldn't do, again when setting up a tank. where are you located? and again...Welcome! David

While I don't know about this - life can be strange. It's well accepted that we can very significantly increase our lifespan by living on the verge of starvation. It's not for me, but I know one person who is basically starving himself to live longer. sorry to go off-topic.

Am thinking of putting in a copperband and yellow longnose in the same tank - does anyone know their compatibility? they will be introduced at the same time. Already have a yellow tang. thanks, David

Welcome to WAMAS. Both my wife and I went to UW (as graduate students) and her family is from Ellensburg, so we go back to WA state often. My wife would kill me for writing this - but this is by far the better Washington! Cheers, David

ranco controllers for heaters. they are old school, can't whistle via the internet when parameters are out of whack, but automatically reset after power outages, aren't ccol enough for someone to fiddle with without a reason to do so, and do what they do - well.

I have one - in Vienna. David

As the political discussion was started by a WAMAS officer I naturally assumed it was appropriate for the WAMAS boards.

Actually that I could understand, not excuse, but understand. Many leaders today, in Italy, Israel, France and elsewhere have politicans who lied about sexual affairs. Politicans crave attention, and ultimately these are viewed and judged as only actions of one man, not the entire government. ---- But imagine if a leader lead the entire country into a WAR on false pretenses? Like WMD that are a claimed to threaten our security that actually don't exist in that country. Now THAT would set our country back for decades, undermine belief that our government is honest with us, and forcing us into debt and near economic collapse. Imagine how horrible it would be if THAT happened? Don't you agree?

Bob, congrats on the good news, and I hope you continue the speedy recovery. david

To whomever bought the hammer - would you be willing to break off and sell me 1-3 heads?

I have 3 fixtures, each with 18 RB, 9 CW and 9 NW. If you're ever in vienna VA and want to check it out let me know. david

I live in the burbs but work in DC - foggy bottom. where in DC are you? David

A quick Qu for those with LED or electronics experience - When it's time to turn the LEDs off for ~12 hrs, would it be better to shut off the 120V power supply to the driver and leave the dimmer circuit receiving 10V, or leave that 120V power supply to the driver on and drop the 10V input to the dimmer circuit to zero? Either way obviously shuts the LEDs off, but which would be 'softest' for the driver and LEDs? thanks, david

Anyone want to do a small group-buy? Orders over $130 gets free shipping - I'm in for two corals - $49 total (with 25% discount) and am in N. VA (Vienna)?

So I started using seeded biopellets early December and was very happy with the resulting decrease in algae - but now those good results have dissipated and the algae is back. I'm considering either renewing with more biopellets, or am tempted to just try dosing what I used for seeding - microbacter. I know the obvious, and almost always correct advice, is to try and find the source of the extra nutrients, but I've been trying to do that now for ~15 years without any revelation other than keeping up with water changes, Ca reactor and having a good skimmer. I was happy with the biopellets but that seems to have run its course. Anyone have any opinions on using the pellets again or dosing microbacter?

there's a lot to think about and plan, I wouldn't suggest putting it together as you go. One skimmer is almost always better than multiple ones, you might want to consider a sump for the skimmer, maybe a Ca reactor, biopellets, heater and such. Good water is also key, a tank that large may go through 3-4 gals a day in evaporation unless you cover it. Lights depend on what you plan to keep - even what type of corals, soft corals and LPS aren't as demanding, but SPS need high light and pristine water conditions. There's lots of options for lighting that you need to weigh, LEDs for cost effectiveness in energy and last a long time, but they're expensive --- MHs produce a lot of light and are cheaper to start with, but also produce a lot of heat - with these you might need a chiller, which is expensive, during the summer. Flow within the tank is also very important, you need to decide if you're going to be putting in closed loop only, in-tank pumps for circulation, or a combo of both...... I've only started with what's off the top of my head. yOu might want to visit some member's tanks to see how they've approached things. don't mean to be in any way pessimistic, putting a tank together should be a lot of fun, but it's a lot of choices and tradeoffs. hope this helps. David