firecrackerbob

As has been said, they can be a pain.. my last one constantly moved, got sucked into powerheads, killed corals, and was overall really annoying... that said, there is nothing more ubiquitous in the hobby than a clown in a nem... I don't have one now, but the next house I buy and have space for I plan on setting up a Nem\clown fowlr... to me personally its the only practical way. oh, yea, the clowns do get more aggressive too.. only fish bite I have ever had in 20+ years in aquariums hobby was from a protective female clown. also as mentioned, long tentacle plate corals look pretty close and are pretty cool...

the solution I made up was to take white vinegar then add enough kalk to bring the PH of the solution up to ~10. I am currently manually adding about 10ml/day to my tank. my tank volume is about 120 total gal. I started with dosing about 5ml a day for about a week just to observe its effects and as above, noted better skimming, then scaled up to my current amounts.

it is indeed all carbon. some people dose 1, 2, or all 3 of the carbon sources you mention. I have so far only focused on vinegar, so cannot speak to the other two. I wanted to get more kalk into solution, so vinegar made the most sense to me. from my reading, if you have a calcium reactor, the other sources may make more sense.

I began dosing vinegar about 1 month ago... about 2 months ago I upgraded to a ASM G3. It pulled dark skim for about a week, then went pale and watery. Once I began adding vinegar the skim went to a dark mocha again, corals colored up, and began growing noticably better. PH has also been trending upwards since then(started at around 7.9 on average and am now up to 8.15 on avg). your results may vary!!! as for me, I have been very pleased so far. from all the reading I have done, I really dont think there is any danger to experimenting with vinegar\Kalk. if you have good flow and a decent skimmer, you really shouldnt notice any bacerial blooms... and if you do?! stop dosing. just go slow and observe your tank and its inhabitants carefully!

I'm no mantis expert, so take this FWIW, but if you start seeing livestock disappear I would say you will know the culprit... with that said, Ive known a few mantis keepers over the years, and they are pretty cool animals(the mantis' that is!). If you like them then keep them, if not capture them and offer them up here on the forum, im sure someone will want them. they do make good pets in nanos though from what I have seen... just depends on what you want to do with the tank...

Why is sending water from the storage tank to the DI a bad thing??? I have had my system plumbed this way for years...

Ive never really been impressed by many of the vendors listed so far... anyway, I went with aquasafe systems and have not had any problems. http://www.aquasafecanada.com/store/home-reverse-osmosis-systems/maximus-ii-system any yes, make sure you get a dow filmtec with high rejection rate. I would also reccomend getting a in line TDS meter as an add on. I think BRS has one for around $30.

I think there is still a lot of room for debate about the usefulness of DSBs... so, Ill play devils advocate here as a bare bottom enthusiast and say its not really that beneficial IMHO... the exception being as above with the mangroves. I have been tempted in the past to try a remote DSB with a 5gal bucket to see if there is any improvement to my tank, but haven't seen the need so far...

Calcium chloride plus sodium bicrab (or carb) WILL MOST DEFINITELY react together. if you have not seen it take a container and mix a shot of each part of two part together. this forms calcium carbonate, which is insoluble, and sodium chloride(salt). there is absolutely no silliness there...

Two TOM pumps and two timers- cheapest way to go IMHO. http://www.thatpetplace.com/pet/group/11652/product.web

If the two are dosed in a way that prevents them from reacting- such as in two seperate high flow areas you should be fine. if it is snowing(precipitating) though it is forming calcium carbonate which is just going to settle to the bottom of your tank and not add to the free calcium or carbonite in solution. If you are dosing substantial amounts then I would personally either sperate the dose location or find a way to offset the dosing by 30min or so. you could dose one to the sump and one to the display. on the other hand if its only a few mils then I wouldnt worry about it.

a recent pic of this guys tank is on page 37... really amazing!!! http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1288059&page=37

Heres a link to an older thread on RC... also, googleing "bonsai reef" yields some interesting results. I have always liked this guys initial design and have tried to keep it in mind when I do my aquascaping. If I ever get around to setting up my 120 I think I will do something similar... http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1288059

not really... I ran a APC for a while, but just recently took it off my system completely... using it to run a heater and a air pump/stone may give you some better results. I think im going to bite the bullet here and just get a generator... we were without power for almost a week this summer after the hurricane. the only think that saved me was battery air stones and a reasonably good temp in the house!

BTW- you have a nice tank there! if you dont have a sump/fuge you might want add one if its any possibility. IMHO macro algaes really help balance a tank out.

from the pic it looks pretty reddish to me- if so +1 on cyano. if its more brown than I would say dynos. I will defer to others on cyano, as thats probably the only nuisance that I havent dealt with... if its more brown(dynos) I can make some other recommendations...

hehe... yea, then you will want to go with a fixture. for a 48in tank with T5 bulbs the wattage per bulb is 54 watts. pretty much any manufacturer will work. which bulbs you want is really a matter of personal preference. do you like the more 20K(purple/blue look), 14K(blueish), 12K(blue white look)? I tired to find grim reefers thread but couldn't- maybe someone here has a link? but to make a general recommendation- I would go with 2blue plus bulbs, 1 actinic, and 1 aquablue. this gives a a nice even blue look in my opinion... but again this is personal preference.

Lighting is definitely a complicated part of the hobby and there is a lot of ways to go. LED is nice, im no expert on it though and me personally, I think the cost is pretty steep still. Metal halides are nice too, but not really necessary for a softie tank. T5s are still my "go to" lights of choice that I recommend to people. but that's just my opinion... so with T5s you have three options--hanging fixture( out in this case), retrofit systems (my personal preference for price, but a DIY project) and a standard sit on top system. The choice you will have to make is between cost and doing a DIY project. What I have over my 55 is a T5/VHO actinic combo its cheap and gives great color pop with the VHO that I prefer. these are installed into a homemade hood. these are the kits that I have: http://www.hellolights.com/48inch2x54t5retrofit.aspx http://www.hellolights.com/2lampelectronicvhoaroas220ballastkit.aspx on the other hand, if you prefer a sit on top system, probably similar to what you have you would be looking at something like this: http://www.hellolights.com/48inch-coralife-lunar-aqualight-t5-lamp-high-output-fixture-3.aspx let us know if these are the types of systems you are thinking of and we can go from there... we can also make some recommendations about bulb color... you may want to check out the grim reefers bulb thread or reef central too...

Im both lazy and cheap... its taken me a long time to put together a system that is pretty much fail safe- with the exception of major power outages... but my next house will have a generator... anyway- here is what I run: ATO : I use TOM pumps on timers with a basic float valve- at $10 bucks a pump it cant be beat. it doses my kalk water to the tank 2X a day at 15 min intervals from a 10g reservoir. this has been running 3 years now without a failure. Skimmer: non-recirculating, but then again, I dont rely on skimming for my primary nutrient export. Fuge: my fuge is about the same size as my display, cheto etc. I also run bare bottom. I don't really care what anyone says, bare bottom is the only bombproof way to run. with a small child and a major commute I only get about 1hr to fiddle with my tank a week. so I routinely leave my tank for a week at a time without any worries.

I looked into this a while back when I had a 120. The short answer that I found was that it is not needed. that said, I put in some deck beams myself for support underneath the tank in my basement. each beam had just a hair of wiggle room to allow for some settling. there was never enough deflection to compress down on the system I had set up... your results may vary though. you might want to include some more specifics about your house- age, etc. also, if you are not current on your termite you might want to have a inspection... JMHO

First let me say that there are a lot of ways to run a tank, and the key to success is to find what works best for you (and that the way others do it is not nessisarily wrong). With that said, IMHO, I would have to agree with surf/turf and disagree with rocko. I had nuisance algae problems for years until I removed my sand bed. I have been bare bottom for about a year now and my tank is getting close to being 100% problem free. I fought it for a long time because I frankly dont like the way bare bottom looks, but I would rather have a algae free tank than a tank with sand and dinos... but thats just me. so my steps where as follows: removed sand bed, installed a very large refugium with cheto, began siphoning detritus off the bare bottom daily, increased skimming, added GFO, began replacing my carbon regularly once my PH began dipping below 8, stopped dosing trace suplements(except alk, ca, and mg of course- I was dosing Fe and trace), replaced lights(mine were very old), increased water movement, increased Mg levels, began blowing off rockwork with a powerhead every other day or so, reduced photoperiod to 8hrs, do a 3day off cycle every other month or so(doing another one now actually). I also stopped feeding my tank completely ( I only have a chromis and a dottyback in ~120 total gallons) and let the fish forrage for their food. this is probably not practical for everyone, but I would cut back feeding as much as you possibly can. also as rocko mentioned, RODI is a must if you arent using it already. best of luck- ive been there too! and made it through. I almost got out bc of dinos, but im more excited than I have been in a long time about the hobby- keep at it!

Thanks guys! looking at BRS titanium- do these seem pretty good? My link

Sooo... I came home last night to find the circuit breaker tripped in the fish area. I killed all of the power strips, flipped the breaker switch, then went back and started turning on the strips one by one... then POW! one of my heaters began sparking and flashing in its tube!... Looks like the glass cracked, or a seal went then the glass cracked... needless to say, I think its time to replace my heaters- all of them are at least 5yrs old, most are older! What heaters do you guys reccomend? if I remember correctly there was big hubbub about one company recalling thiers lately...

Obviously, there are a lot of ways to run your system, but IMHO, I would add a refugium with macro algae(cheto) first before doing anything else. For me, I rely on my skimmer as my first line of defense. My fuge is my second line and chemical treatments are my final line. After that, I would agree that doing as much manual pruning is a good way to go along with siphoning out as much detritus as possible.

I would say PH, Ca, and alk should be tested relatively frequently, especially if you have SPS or LPS (daily if you have heavy demand). Mg should be tested often as well, but maybe more like weekly or every other week, depending on your system. I also check salinity about once a week. these are less important if you are running a FOWLR though. as mentioned, since I have a PH probe, I check that at least once a day, often twice. I do NOT check ammonia, phosphate, nitrates or anything else for that matter... but my system is pretty well established and when I did test, I always got 0 for those parameters. I also do not dose any trace chemicals, so there is no need to test for them in MHO.