DeepBlue45

Thanks, good to hear. Tank should be ready for pick-up around mid-end November. I'm honestly not sure why the sock holders where added to the second chamber. It has the single hole drilled but I'm not sure what the person who originally had it built was intending to connect here. I'll most likely plumb the return from my skimmer here so I guess a set of mesh socks could serve as a bubble trap but I don't think for a sump this size it will be necessary. I may just leave them out and use this a fuge section if I want to experiment with that......not really needed for Zeovit tank though. My other idea was to possibly remove the second set of 4 sock holders in the first chamber and use the space for in-sump skimmer but the acrylic work is really good and it's built like a tank so I hate to go cutting into it. If I leave all the sock holders maybe the first set would be mesh to remove large stuff (and easier to just rinse clean), then second stage of felt socks for particulates. I don't tend to stock my tanks too heavily...or overfeed so probably not making a huge difference either way.

​Quick update on status of the tank and equipment, plus first official pics. After a lot more deliberating and speaking with several custom tank manufacturers I finally decided to give up on the Marineland 265, it's already on it's way to a new home. When I considered the total amount I'll probably end up investing to build the fish room, value of livestock I already have in my current tank, plus how long I would like this tank to be up I decided it was worth the investment to go custom. So on Wed I sent a deposit to Chris Walker at Coast to Coast Aquariums for a 325 gallon....I guess I need to update the title of this post now! The tank will be 84" x 30" x 30", all 3/4" glass with starfire front panel and single 24" external box on the rear drilled for 3 x 1.5" bulkheads for beananimal-style overflow. I'm also going with one of their steel stands. I also picked up my sump from Jeff at Pimped Out Aquariums, see pics below. It was originally built for a customer who changed his mind part way through so he gave me a good deal. The sump is 60" x 25" x 25" made from 1/2" acrylic and depending on water height should hold around 75 gallons. The first chamber was designed with two sequential stages of filter socks so will hold up to 8 x 4" mesh or felt socks which seemed like a bit of overkill but I'll see how it works practically. There is also a second chamber drilled for 1.5in bulkhead that I plan to use for return line from my skimmer, including two additional filter socks. What I really liked was that the remaining 40% of the sump is the return chamber with plenty of room for Zeovit and Media reactors. It's probably large enough that I'll be able to do water changes without having to shut off the return pump. Next post will include equipment list and hopefully some renderings of the fish room. J

Awesome, thanks everyone this was exactly what I was looking for. I'm going to start with 2 hours today. The way I did my scape I have a lot of overhangs and stuff where the LEDs just create shadows and I have some chalice's and other low light stuf under there. It's a 48" tank but shallow reef style so only 12" deep, not a lot of options for putting stuff higher/lower in the tank for light variation. I think the T5s will also help with reflected light here, and also coloring up my SPS better. Appreciate the feedback, J

Wow....lot of views, no replies. So I went ahead and turned on acclimation mode on the AI Prime's which will keep my current schedule for spectrum/intensity but reduce everything by 50% starting tomorrow and ramp back up to previous settings over 3 weeks. In parallel I'm going to start with the T5's on a timer for 2 hours for next week and then increasing to 4 and then 6 hours. Clearly I more on the conservative side as far as approach to this hobby.....but somebody tell me if I'm making this more complicated than it needs to be! J

So I don't want to sound like a KZ sales person which I'm not but I've experimented with dosing other stuff in their extensive (and confusing) product line and narrowed in on just the ones where I can see real results. I use the Pohl's Extra pretty regularly and especially when I'm acclimating frags where I've seen pretty rapid recovery of large LPS like scoly's and Acan bowerbanki that had visible polyp damage from transport. I dose Coral Vitalizer every other day as a supplemental microscopic food to the target feeding of mysis I do. Again, just a couple suggestions for further research before you test/evaluate anything else in your system. When I first started these I was checking parameters daily and recording visible reactions by livestock, effect on my skimmer etc. so I had a good picture what was going on. BRS has sample pack....called nano package or something if you want to give KZ a try without breaking the bank. J

I use Hanna checker's for everything I can but in case of nitrate I've settled on the Nyos kit that seems to work well. I can usually see a clear difference between 3 and 5 ppm for example without having to look real hard. http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/nitrate-reefer-nyos.html

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm worried about.....I've heard the stories about the 300DD seals, partly why I just went with a standard 265 non-reef ready. But honestly I'm a measure twice, cut once type of guy so if there's a good reason I'll drop the extra $ on custom tank to avoid a leak in 5 years when I have way more than that invested in livestock.

Oh man, I'm along for the ride on this one too. Working on my new 265g DT build and was about to swap the old RKE over.....maybe I'll have to expand the budget!

Did you get this worked out? I'm in MD but have multiple bits and have my own tanks plus some for other people.....happy to provide the tools and assistance if you want to come by. J

This was my first thought also.....hard to get an accurate reading of nitrate below 5ppm even with best test kits but if it's really reading zero you might be too low nutrient. I initially was thinking maybe some other chemical or something leaching in the tank but if your SPS are good then assume that's not it either. I almost always run around 5ppm nitrate even on biopellets with 0 ammonia and LPS and SPS doing great. Have you ever tried any supplementation. I've had a good response in low nutrient environment with KZ Amino Acid LPS. What about flow....if you have SPS in the tank are you blasting any of the euphyllia directly? I've seen frogspawn start to melt sections where they're getting direct flow constantly. J

I might be going backwards route here but I'm about to add some T5 (ATI coral plus) to my tank that has previously been only LED (2 x AI Prime). I've been running the LEDs around 50% of max power for 8 hour photo period and 1.5 hour ramp up/down. Spectrum almost entirely purple/blue/deep blue with a 4 hour mid-day period adding cool white/uv. Everything I've put in the tank has shown good growth and color but it's mostly zoas, shrooms and LPS (blastos, acans, 2 scolys, fungia, lithophylon and a couple euphyllia's). Then I started dipping a tow in the SPS water with a couple stylo, birdsnest and pocillopora frags which also seem to be doing well. Long story short I recently acquired some monti cap frags and two acro's that after a couple weeks still aren't showing much polyp extension, actually it looks like I'm starting to lose my forest green acro. My parameters are solid and I don't think flow is an issue but I'm probably only running between 50-150 PAR in the tank. What's the best way to add in the T5 now? Leave the LED settings alone and start the T5's on a short period of 2-3 hours? Or should I dial back the LEDs initially to avoid stressing some of the lower light stuff? Thanks for any advice, Jay

I had something like this from Petco in a freshwater tank in my daughter's room and over coarse of a year or so the paint flaked off. Assumption would be faster in saltwater environment. If you doing fish only maybe ok but personally if you'fre planning corals, especially anything other than softies I'd look for antother solution.

Great, thanks. Thought that might be the case....especially since the main colony that appeared started growing like crazy a few weeks after I started dosing KZ Sponge Power....go figure. My last tank was about 10 years ago and only FOWLR but I don't remember seeing anything like this. I'm a microbiologist by training so if I found this on land I'd be saying fungus or some strange bacteria, most likely toxic so run the other way..... Appreciate the reply! Jay

Can anyone tell me what is growing on the rock in my sump??? It started out only on this one piece of Carib Sea Life Rock that I grabbed from my LFS to get some "seeding" started. Now it's spread to other areas of the sump and there are small while pods showing up everywhere. I have yet to see anything in the display but they're throughout the sump and also in my external biopellet reactor. This tank is approx 4.5 months old and I havent had any other issues except some minor hair algae in the main tank sand bed. Parameters all stable and right where I want them. Anything to be concerned about? Should I pull that piece of rock? Thanks, Jay

Hi All, I'm fairly new to this forum but thought I would start a thread for new display system I'm assembling in a recently finished basement. After much negotiation with the wife I managed to carve out an 8x10ft dedicated fish room space where the tank and support system will be located, along with 45g frag tank, RO/DI system, storage tanks and the other associated gear. The front panel of the tank will be in-wall and visible from the main seating area.....I have several sketch-up renderings that I'll post shortly. From progress perspective I currently have a Marineland 265g (84 x 24 x 30) non-reef ready version sitting in the garage that I plan to drill for two low-profile overflows, probably 16" Synergy Reef or similar. All of my current livestock (mostly LPS with a few SPS and zoas plus a couple small reef safe fish) are crammed into a 48 x 18 x 12 shallow tank that will eventually be the frag/grow-out system mentioned above. Space is getting tight but everything is doing pretty well. I'll make another post shortly with current design specs for the DT and planned equipment list but as a preview I'm planning this to be my first full Zeovit tank. I started dosing some KZ products about 6 months ago and very happy with the results. The current system has been running biopellets since it was started so I'm a fan of ultra low nutrient approach + supplementation and I like that Zeovit has a formal system to follow with a large user community. I'd be especially interested to hear from anyone local to DC area with KZ/Zeovit experience. I just wanted to end this first post with a question around tank size and manufacturer. When I originally spec'd out the Marineland tanks I was back and forth on the non-reef 265 vs. 300 Deep Dimension that only comes reef ready with corner overflows. I love tanks with front-back depth in the 30-36" range or greater because of the aquascaping potential and there really is another dimension when viewing them. However I went with the 265 because I wanted more length than the 300DD (72") and I'm not a fan of the corner overflows. Does anyone have experience with either of these tanks, or want to comment on how much I might miss the 36" depth of the 300DD? ​I also received custom tank quotes from all the usual suspects for an 84 x 30 x 30 and they're running in the 4-6K range. From a quality perspective can anyone comment on whether it's worth the extra $ for this type of application to go custom at 3-4 times what the 265 cost me? With the tank located in a fish room I'm not really concerned about aesthetics like rimless, phantom bottoms, special silicone etc......just want a reliable, leak free tank. Any comments and followers are much appreciated! Jay