Vader

What a sweet set up, is that tank 2' deep?

It's been awhile since an update, but things are moving along pretty good. I had a spell with low salinity. User error, for some reason I was reading the wrong scale. I was also getting sloppy with the water parameters but starting in July, I've stepped it up and test once a week and perform water changes once a month. I've raised my lighting and my corals are starting to get their color back and I've turn back my time on the day lights to 5 hours. The sand was getting some king of growth, so I ordered 40 Nassarius snails from Reef Cleaners and they did an ok job, but the sand wasn't as clean as I wanted. Yesterday I picked up a Orange Spotted Sleeper Goby and he is doing a great job cleaning up things. I also was able to find a male clown and the pair get along great. Last month I set up a remote deep sand bed and I have low water flow running through it. Not that I was having a problem with Nitrates, just wanted to see if I would see a change in tank condition. The tank is realy looking good and I just can't seem to stop buying corals. I keep the water at: Cal: 450 Mag: 1400 Alk: 9 dkh Sal: 1.026 pH: 8.1 - 8.2 Temp 80* Nitrate: less than 2ppm Here is my tank as of this morning These are the snails going into the tank Here are the clowns While I picking up the Sleeper Goby, I some how had these in my cooler when I got home?? Just to show how raising the lighting did for me. This was taken on 7-19-09 And this was taken yesterday, can't wait to see what it will look like in another month. One of these days I will get a real camera....maybe Santa will be good to me this year Thanks for looking

That blows about your LED lighting, sorry to hear such bad news.

Kewl thread can't wait to see this beast up and running. Love the depth on that tank.

Looks like you're off to a great start. I was just wondering about the floor, is it a slab floor or of wood construction? I'm not sure what the load limit of your floor is, but I have seen others reinforce their floors. Can't wait to see how it turns out.

Your tank has come along very well and when those corals grow out, it is really going to be awsome looking tank.

It is a differant look, but I realy like the depth. keep the updates coming

Hey Jason, I read this on-line: Using polarized Sun Glasses and a Laptop computer display, fire up the computer, get a white background (Notepad maximized),Put on the Sunglasses, Hold the blank between you and the laptop, look thru the blank at the screen, see any funny colors or patterns? If so its tempered, if its clear your good to go!

Looking very good, keep the up-dates coming.

That's a kewl little set up you have going on. Those tailspots are fun to watch. I have one in my tank.

Thanks everyone for your advise. I picked up a box of flatworm exit and dose the tank and man...they come out of the sand and rock and where ever else. I've must of had these for a while, but the stuff worked. I'm also running 2 canisters of activated carbon to deal with the toxins the dead worms are giving off. Later tonight I'll do a water change and hit it again in a couple of days.

well...I get rid of one pest to find another...oh joy After doing some reading, I come to find that they are Rust Brown Flatworm or Convolutriloba retrogemma...which I'm not even going to try to say. and there are several differant species of fish that can be employed to rid my tank of these evil little /!$#*^>!! I leaning towards buying a Dragonets, like a Red or Green Mandarin. I have 2 blennies, 1 goby, 1 Anthias, 1 clown and 1 Royal Gramma Basslet. All these guys get along fine in the tank and there is plenty of room/places to hide. Sometimes my Orange Spotted Blennie goes after the Tail Spotted Blennie, but the little guy just darts away and all is fine. The chart says to be cautious with mixxing some of these fish. Live Aquaria's compatibility cart Compatibility Chart What do some of you think?

Many have asked that question about water noise with my current set up, and there is no noise, with or with out the mesh.

double post...opps. server is running slow tonight.

Boret, wouldn't the pods flow from the refugium to the sump, then into the display tank ?

I can understand your concern with fish going down the drain line, I've been trough it, so this is what I did to keep that from happening. That mesh is the same stuff you would use for a skimmer impeller pump mod.

I'm going to throw a wrench into this, but don't you want lower flow through a refugium than your sump? It looks like you're trying to get this done by only using 1 pump. With that idea, I would pipe the drain line from tank 2 directly to the sump, but place a tee in that line, and installl a ball valve in the piping that is going to the refugium, to controll flow. Anyone??

I second the idea of keeping two seperate drain lines for the same reasons as stated by reefmontalvo. As far as teeing off from the return pump, I would measure 6 times the pipe diameter, before making any changes in flow direction. Other words, if a pipe is 1" in dia. I would have 6" of striaght pipe before installing an elbow or a tee. This would help keep your lose of head down.

great photo shot

The Birdsnest came from Dr. Mac's retail store and it wasn't listed as a true or a false, so I'm not sure. I bought it just because I like the color. The containers come from my water treatment company who come out to my buildng. I flushed them out for a month using several gallons of vinegar and they hold 15 gallons each.

good, I'm out of reef crystals.....see you at 1pm

I would like to know how long other members have their display tank lighting on for. I have my lights turning on at 7am and turning off at 7pm. Do you think that is too long or is it ok?

Thanks, I did a lot of reading before setting up the display system and I'm very happy with it's performance. I still want more flow, so around the end of this year, I'm going to add one of those VorTech's and get some wave motion going. Dr. Mac has a real nice setup and it is clean, squeaky clean. He was in the process of moving his invert display area over to another display and it looks like they are going to stock more coral at his retail store. It won't be long till I go down there again. Thanks, it's been a long road and a constant battle but it's paying off. I just have some terrible water where I live, but I think I have it down now. I buy sediment filters from HD because I go through them every 3 months. Here is what one looks likes after 3 months. I'm also been playing around with the system as far as, how often I do water changes and I keep a log of everything that I do, because I have made some mistakes and I can never remember what I did and when I did it, so the log really helps.