p3rmafrost

Ok, so I would need 2 4 head dosers then. Gotcha. That's helpful. I heard the reefbot was kind of sketchy, have you had good experience with them? @kngfisher

@kngfisher The doser seems to be a common theme, I think that'll go on the "for sure" list. @dmatt56 Hmm, great idea. I don't have an answer to that. I'll have to reach out to customer service and find out. I figured I had to use or lose them, but that's a good suggestion. Does anyone know how many heads the KH director needs on a doser? I dose 3 part AF currently, could I use the spare head for the KH director?

@nburg - I looked at the Reef Mat 500, it looks like it might not fit right in my tank. The way my sump is designed the ATO sits directly on top of the sock chamber, there is only about a half inch between the ATO tank and the lip that holds the socks in place. It's looking like I will need to move the ATO in order to drop a reef mat in there. I'll need to do some more research to work that one out, unless the reef mat fits under the ATO? At first glance it looks too big to fit under there.

@lowsingle - I might take you up on that. You're pretty close to me, and I'm in Reston fairly often. So to summarize so far the suggestions are: GHL Doser, ditch the Jaebo KH Director Ion Director if they start producing them Red Sea Roller Mat Chemicals and other disposable/routine items Tunze Osmolator @nburg - I wasn't aware they made a tool kit to remove the sock section. Thank you for bringing that to my attention, I was wondering how I should go about removing the section where the socks slide in.

@cpeguero - Thank you! All good thoughts. I hadn't considered the KH director, that's a good call. I'm going to look into the Klir roller. That's a new one for me, I figured I couldn't use a roller since the mount for the socks takes up so much space.

Good Morning WAMAS! Over the course of the past year I've amassed a fair amount of credit with BRS. I have nearly $700 in credit to spend. I'm looking for advice on what the community believes would be a worthwhile upgrade, or a "must have" that my tank is missing. I've outline what gear I currently have below, as well as a couple of my ideas on what to pick up. I would be very interested in hearing your opinions and feedback to help me make a well informed purchase. Thank you all in advance! Current Setup: Tank - Red Sea Reefer 250, center overflow Standard Red Sea 11 gallon sump Red Sea gravity fed 2 gallon ATO Red Sea piano black stand Circulation - 2 Tunze 6105 pumps, one in each back corner Spare Tunze 6105 in case one of the mains fail 1 Jaebo MLW30 wavemaker in the sump to circulate detritus and help keep it clean Eheim return - Don't have the model number handy Filtration - 1 Reef Octopus 150SS Classic 2 Filter socks built into sump Extra rock in sump for natural filtration 1 Two Little Fishies GFO reactor BRS CO2 scrubber Aquarium Control - GHL Profilux 4 Jaebo doser - doses Aquaforest 1+2+3+ GHL Maxi 2 head doser (not in use, intended for automatic water changes down the line) Lighting - Giesemann Aurora V4 Hybrid - 4 T5 Bulbs with a bank of 3 LEDs built in Cheap Lowes "plant grow" light in sump Testing and Cleaning - Hannah Checkers - NO3, PO4, CA, MG, ALK Magfloat scrapper Razor scraper Extras - Sicce pump in ATO attached to GHL float sensor, if the gravity fed ATO clogs, the sensor activates the pump Sicce pump for GFO reactor 4 stage RODI filter with auto shut off float valve Float sensor installed in skimmer, skimmer shuts down when full 16 space frag rack Various Aquaforest chemicals and additives Tank Stock - 1 Coral Beauty 2 Clowns 1 Watchman Goby + Tiger Pistol 1 Royal Gramma 1 Lawnmower Blenny 3 Nems (1 green, 2 rainbow) Corals - Various Acros Zoas Frogspawn Hammers Chalices Various LPS Monits GSP Mushrooms Forest Fire Digis Bird's Nest Purple Pocci Cloves 2 Goni - The short tentacle one is doing well, the long tentacle one is mad. Currently the tank is mostly doing well. I have had a couple of acros die off rather suddenly. Testing revealed that nutrients had bottomed out to nearly undetectable with the Hannah checkers. I have started to feed more and will continue to test to see if the levels come up. I'll also order and ICP test to double check things. The tank is filling out nicely and has made a lot of progress since I joined WAMAS. Thoughts on what to buy: I want to upgrade at some point to a 4 foot long tank (the 250 is 3 feet long). I want whatever I get to work in a larger tank. No sense in upgrading just to upgrade again a little ways down the road. I've considered a couple of things: Tunze Osmilator (have held off since the come up for sale here often GHL 4 head doser Chemicals - I use Aquaforest and it seems to be working well, I don't know if I could use the entirety of the credit for that, but I could certainly spend $200 or so on it DC Skimmer - mine is working fine, but I do like the added adjustability of the DC So, WAMAS, if you had $700 to spend, what would you buy?

Huh - I didn't know that was an option. It's something I would certainly consider, one problem though, the tank is full and I have no plans to drain it. If I could get it done full it might be worth a shot.

So you think skip the "upgrade" and pick up new o-rings all around and call it a day?

Good Morning WAMAS - The plumbing on my Reefer 250 is showing some age. It's starting to get salt buildup on the joints and it looks like I'll need to take it apart and reseal it, or replace it. I wanted to ask the community if anyone has had any success upgrading the plumbing on these tanks, and if so, what did you do to improve it? I know a lot of folks complain about the valve on the Red Sea tanks (which I understand), so that's something I'd like to look into replacing. Are there any off the shelf kits available? If so, can anyone point me in the right direction? I checked with Red Sea and they advised to speak with a local authorized dealer for parts. Thanks!

I recently installed a GHL Profilux 4, and a CO2 scrubber on my tank. My PH had been chronically low for a while (never above 7.25 or so). After installing the scrubber and letting it run a few weeks I have some decent data. The lowest my PH drops to now is 7.5 at 0600 (about an hour before the lights come on) and it peaks at 1800 at 8.1 (about an hour before the lights turn off). I have noticed that since I have gotten my PH a little higher, and my PO4 down with a reactor, my corals are much happier. I have decent polyp extension on my acros and they're showing some pretty good growth. My leptos that have been stagnant for over a year have encrusted and are taking off and a few other stubborn corals have shown some good signs of growth and color.

Petco in Leesburg has one for $109. Big guy, probably 4 inches long. He's there as of 15:45 on Friday the 7th.

Really hard to tell from that angle, but he looks like a nassarius snail. If so, good guy. https://aquariumbreeder.com/nassarius-snail-detailed-guide-care-diet-and-breeding/

Aquarium and terrarium builders near Norfolk does. I can PM his email.

Aww, poor little dude. Glad he made it out safely. I'm interested. You're not too far from me. I'm doing tank maintenance today, so his new house will be all cleaned up and ready for him. Shoot me a PM with a price and your address and I'll swing by whenever you're ready. My afternoon is open.

I imagine you could sell the splits, right? Do you still have them?

There are absolutely days when I go look at the tank in the morning and go "well, that looks intentional". I haven't been downstairs yet today, but I'm sure they pulled some kind of hijinks overnight.

Excellent! I'm glad to hear they're not causing any issues. Did you get them locally? I think I'm going to start looking for one.

Every. Single. Day.

That's a good lead, thank you. I'll keep an eye out and see if I can snag one of the ones you suggested. It doesn't need to be pretty, it just needs to kick up some sand and not get the tankmates too fired up.

They are now. After Dig-Dug and his buddy did so much rearranging I lifted them up, blew away the sand and set them on the glass. Honestly, at this point, I have adapted to their antics. I expect it and keep things away from the entrances and exits of their little cave system. They still outsmart me here and there. I have some unknown coral I picked up, I think it might be a chalice. It's purple with yellow bumps on it. Anyway...that's one of their favorites. They ****** it every day. I decided to glue the frag plug to a large rock and set it on the sand. I figured it would be too big for them to move/carry. They started burying it instead. I pulled it out of the sand and put it back. I found it wedged in the "door" of their cave a few hours later. On the upside it's easier to find since it's now as large as a gas station bathroom key.

Thank you for that, that was helpful. Specifically I was looking at this guy: https://www.liveaquaria.com/product/703/?pcatid=703 I wanted to go the conch route. I picked up an African Knobby Creeper (it's a snail, but kind of fills the role of a conch) and my hermits went nuts. They stalked it, murdered it, and now they fight over the shell. It's been an invert bloodbath. I have a suspicion that if I toss in another invert with a large shell my hermits with smaller shells with get all Lord of the Flies on it.

Does anyone here keep sea cucumbers? What has your experience been? I've heard they're good for turning over sand and I was considering grabbing one. I already have a goby in the tank and didn't want to risk adding another one. I've read that the sea cucumbers can 'nuke' a tank if they die, is that common? If you have pictures I'd love to see them.

They're punks. When Highlanders drops that shell it's coming out of the tank. My current setup is a Red Sea Reefer 250. The sump, in my opinion is undersized and doesn't have a lot of room for a legit refugium. My next tank (hopefully this year) will have something more appropriate that can serve as a penal colony for my pint sized miscreants.

Is the inhabitants of the tank. Fair warning, this is mostly a joke, but I wanted to rant a little bit. I enjoy my tank a lot. I spend time tinkering with it every day, checking parameters, staring at every coral, attempting to measure growth, and laboring over every detail. I get excited when I pick up a new frag or an invert to add to the system, and I'm happy when the tank is happy. The problem is, when the inhabitants are happy they have a habit of making someone else unhappy. A few details to illustrate my point: I have a pistol shrimp. He was unable to find a roommate he was happy with until I got him a rather chunky yellow watchman goby. Now those two redecorate my tank every single night. Every morning they have moved pounds of sand. They make the rocks unstable, so I have to take them out and glue them more securely, or reinforce the rock work. They have certain corals that are near the sand bed that they bury every night, so I have to rearrange the corals (which they do not love by the way) or move off the bed. There are other corals that they straight up steal and use as doors to their cave. These two are having a regular Thomas Crown Affair. I needed something to stir up my sand bed. I get a lot of sediment that settles on top (see my post about buying new powerheads). I picked up a knobby creeper conch to help with that. One of my crabs decided that was the ultimate shell. He stood on the creeper for 3 days trying to pull it out of the shell. He finally pulled it off and took his prize. I now refer to him as The Highlander (there's only one creeper shell in the tank). The other crabs want the shell so they fight for it when they get to a semi-appropriate size. Semi-appropriate being the operating term here. Whoever the current highlander in the tank is isn't quite strong enough to haul the shell, so they mostly drag it around the tank. They knock over corals and in the case of my acan, tore the flesh by dragging it over the top. This set off the dinner alarm for my coral beauty who devoured it. I'm now down an 8 or 10 polyp acan that was one of my favorites. Holler if you got one for sale! My green bubble tip anemone has been living against the back wall of my tank for well over a year. There is nothing near it, and it never harms anything. Recently, it decided to go for a walk. It came down, walked right across the largest montipora in my tank, and decided to take a break (walking is hard when you only have one foot). He stood there for a day or so and now the monti has a large bald patch. Then, it moved to the front of the tank, stung up some acros, moved back to the monti, came back to the front, and finally settled in a cave. Over night it extended, stung my porites (which was doing great) and decided it found it's new home. I had to move a bunch of corals away from it, so now they're bent out of shape. I had a cyphastrea that was about the size of a hockey puck. It was toward the back of the tank (I was hoping it would attach to a rock back there) so I didn't notice that the goby had buried half of it. I apparently didn't notice for long enough that the covered half is now dead. One of my hermits (not the Highlander) parked in the middle of a dragon soul favia to "clean it" I guess, and ripped the flesh on it. I'm sure the coral beauty will find it soon. My tuxedo urchin (now named Coco Chanel) has removed an entire zoa colony and a blue mushroom which it is using as fashion accessories. To me the absolute best part of the hobby is watching the creatures in your tank thrive. The worst part is when the creatures in your tank thrive and start doing creature stuff. When you create a stable environment that includes a food web I suppose that life, uh, finds a way.

Awesome, thanks! Time to reload on reagents!