TonyD

I agree. Those blue mushrooms make the whole tank pop!

That looks great! Tank's coloring up nicely.

I had black spots on my clowns just like your picture and it went away on its own. For now, pass it off to all your non fish friends that you have the rare LE "leopard" spot clowns.

It's so you don't have to use a damsel to start the bacteria cycle. Shrimp will decompose and start your ammonia cycle. More PETA friendly instead of subjecting a poor fish to the poor water conditions.

These blue LED bulbs burned out from my old MH light fixture. Thinking of having them replaced. Anyone know what type they are?

It should be fine. Place the tank perpendicular to the floor joists.

Reefledlights has 6 CREE royal blue led strip that is already mounted and can be prewired and connected together with other strips. I don't know how long it is, but if you string a few together you can get to 48". It's $40 per led strip. Add a driver for your power source. I would agree with fishman and build your own, but if you don't want to DIY and buy it premade, you can go with the led strip.

I have a 55 gallon rubbermaid bin.

I have some left. I'm out in Leesburg though, but I work in Sterling so that's a little closer to Tyson's. Let me know if you need it.

1. My yellow tang does that too. It is nibbling on the glass for algae to eat. 2. A few. The one I know about is the queen angelfish.

144 LEDs may be overkill. If it is, I can always scrap it for parts on another LED build. Or I can use my dimming feature on the Meanwell drivers. And at $12 per LED kit for 2 computer fans, that's inexpensive risk mitigation to keep everything cool compared to the cost of the LED kit. Using a curved heatsink is an interesting concept and I agree it would decrease the footprint, but any curved heatsink would be custom made and expensive (ie, not mass produced), unless you can bend it yourself. Of course, you could take sheet metal and bend it to a half-circle shape, then use fans the blow the heat away.

I bought the 8.46" x 22" heatsink. Heatsink USA was out of stock with this size and Reefledlights upgraded me to 10" at no charge. I wanted a wide heatsink for a wider light dispersion from the back to the front. I thought maybe a 4" wide heatsink would have concentrated too much light along the center, and not enough towards the front and back. I probably could have gone with a 18-20" long heatsink and still have gotten the same light spread, but I figure 72" long tank so I needed to cover that length. The heatsink does not get hot at all....warm, yes, but not hot. But I don't know if it's Winter and my house is cooler now. Who knows that it'll be in the summer months? I do plan on increasing the number of LEDs from 72 to 144 eventually so it's a bit of planning for future upgrades as well. 2 fans were for symmetry and a bit of overkill. Heat kills LEDs and at $6 per fan, it's a cheap investment to try and increase the lifespan of the LEDs compared to the initial cost of these kits. And with 144 LEDs in the long run, the heatsink may get hot enough that I would need 2 fans.

Getting in line for a frag of this....

Are you planning on using 1 driver? I would suggest not mixing XP-G LEDs with XR-E LEDs if you are using 1 driver. It's a constant current source and if you drive your LEDs too hard for the XP-Gs, you'll fry the XR-Es. If you drive the LEDs for the XR-Es, you'll underdrive the XP-Gs....not as bad as frying LEDs but won't be as bright as it could be. XP-Gs are rated at 1500mA max. XR-Es are rated at 1000mA max so you will probably drive it around 700mA....half of what the XP-Gs are rated for. The XP-Gs would be dimmer than its full potential. Now...if you are using 2 drivers, that' a different story.

Looks great! Question for you and the three 10"x22" fixtures over a 6'x2'x2' bowfront. Is the 2' front to back at the apex of the bow or on the sides? I will have to measure. It would make sense that it would be at the apex of the bow. I know you haven't put the optics on there yet but is there aqdequate lighting along the front and back edges? Yes. I have even spread of light. I was concerned with the spotlighting effect with LEDs but I have not seen that. It may happen with I put the optics on so we'll see. I move the middle LED kit forward from the 2 end LED kits to compensate for the bow.

Disclaimer : I'm not an artistic person. I'm more scientific so my tank looks like coral chaos. Be gentle. These pictures do not have any optics on the LEDs. I have 70 degree optics that I have not installed yet. This is my tank with 3 x 150W MH with 2 T5s. This is the full setup, mounted to the ceiling. Closeup of one of the LED kits. Tank with blue and white fully dim. Tank with blue and white at half intensity. Tank with blue and white at full intensity. Tank with white at full intensity, blue fully dim. Tank with blue at full intensity, white fully dim. Tank with just blue. I've been so impressed with LEDs that I plan on building a kit for my frag tank. If you see anything that I can improve on, please let me know. I'm thinking of adding a cable tray in the back to route all of the cables through to make it neat. Tony

Since the puffer tank is really "her" tank (although I take care of it), I'm going to opt out of adding the boxfish and potentially killing her puffer. Thanks for all of the advice.

See my DIY LED with dimmable drivers post in the DIY section. I broke down the LED kits, radio shack and Lowes/Home Depot price. I also have a 72" long tank and switched from 3 x 150W MH with 2 x 54W T5s. http://www.wamas.org/forums/topic/41514-diy-led-with-dimmable-drivers/

Actually, I just hooked it all up last night. On my last kit build, 4 of the royal blue LEDs did not work. I had to order 4 new ones and finished soldering it yesterday. I will keep my opinions to myself and just post pictures. It will be 1) white and blue fully dim, 2) white and blue mid strength, 3) white and blue full strength, 4) white full strength with blue full dim, 5) white full dim with blue full strength, 6) just blues on. Let me know if you would like to see any other combinations.

It would go in a FOWLR tank with the porcupine puffer. I got the puffer for my wife so if my boxfish nuked the tank, she'd be pissed. I've generally stayed away because of the toxins, but another thread with the sea apple said people have had it and died without nuking a tank. It seems like it's hit or miss.

Was that the only fish you had or did you have other fish and it killed everything in the tank? I have a porc puffer in the tank that took me awhile to find.

I saw a yellow cube boxfish in a lfs. I've read that if they are stressed, they will release toxins into the tank and kill everything. Anyone with experience keeping this type of fish?

Anthony, You should be able to measure the voltage coming out of your Apex with a multimeter and see that it ranges from 0V - 10V. Can you draw up how everything is wired?

Try looking under spiny boxfish

Anthony, Here is the wiring schematic diagram. If you can't read it, I can send you the file.