Alan's Rimless 75 build

[AlanM]

Look what I've been up to today. Finishing the rest of the fishtank wall.

 

 

The light will go up under the upper cabinets and have a hood around them attached to the cabinets too. I havent decided about doors, but I think glass ones would look nice.

[smallreef]

Very nice!

[AlanM]

With all this white I should have painted the back white and gone with white acrylic overflows, heh.

[surf&turf]

Looks great!!

[AlanM]

Here is my new double sump layout with the d120 above the fuge. It is going to get more arcane in a couple weeks when it will become a triple sump and have a manifold added too.

 

[Cliff Puckstable]

Looks awesome, Alan. Your rocks look lonely. Coral time?

[AlanM]

Looks awesome, Alan. Your rocks look lonely. Coral time?

 

Soon. I do want to add some lps and some more zoas. I am waiting for the algae to die down a bit before too much coral added. Maybe I should come get a frag of that monti you broke up

[Cliff Puckstable]

I have a big piece for you. Oh crap forgot about the zoas on the bottom of the 55g. Ill see if I can salvage those.

[monkiboy]

i dig the towered look, and keeps premium space available to work on the different levels. eager to see how this third tier gets done!

[AlanM]

Third tier will be off to the side.  Probably hung from the floor joists above.  I plan a 10g macro algae tank with deep oolitic sand bed and a chunk of rock for algae to attach to maybe.  Might even toss a predator crab in there who seems a bit lost in my sump at the moment.   Ooh, or a mantis would be nice in there and let him and the crab duke it out.

 

So the pistol shrimp I bought with the ill fated Randalls goby seems to still be kicking.  Ever since adding the slug of 2000 amphipods and copepods this afternoon I hear him snapping away in there.  Not sure where, but apparently he's up to something in there, and ticked at the pods invading his turf, wherever that is.

[AlanM]

I found the pistol shrimp!  He was in the hole I thought he was in.  For a while I thought he and the royal gramma were sharing a burrow because the gramma has made one under some GSP I have.  I waited until lights were off and shined a flashlight around and saw his red and white striped big claw down in the hole. 

 

I don't know what he's been eating since I feed so little so I squirted some Rods food into the entrance of the hole with the powerheads off and saw him pull it in, so I guess I'll do that from time to time.

[YHSublime]

Alan,

 

My pistol and watchman goby went like this. Both paired. Put into my tank at the same time. Pistol went one way, gobby went the other way. Fast forward to yesterday (almost a year later) my goby has long passed (no idea, never found a body, never saw it after the first month) and my pistol (now quite larger than it was originally) crawls out from under a rock.

 

Could have been a cool little symbiotic relationship to watch, but honestly, if I ever do it again, it'll be in a nano.

[AlanM]

So you didnt target feed and didnt see it for a year?

[YHSublime]

So you didnt target feed and didnt see it for a year?

That's how the story goes!

[AlanM]

Two new fish from QR today!  Plus a tiger tail cucumber which I put in and who promptly disappeared, heh.  Maybe I will wake up to a clean sandbed. 

 

The royal gramma who has had the tank to himself up to this point decided to go show who was boss and would run up to them and open his mouth really big.  Never engaged, though.

 

[BowieReefer84]

Nice additions!

[YHSublime]

Very nice! I got my first clown pair from Quantum as well, they are super cool to watch establish hierarchy as well as when when you get a nem it'll be fun to watch them slide in and out. I've often wished I was a clown fish for about 5 minutes to enjoy (what I feel like would be ultimate fun) swimming about an incredibly large anemone.

[AlanM]

I have my powerheads turning on at 30% and off at 30 second intervals at the moment.  I can already tell one clown fish is dumb and the other is smart.  One sits in front of the powerhead and seems surprised every time it turns on and he gets blown across the tank.  The other one did that once and now stays away from the front.  Heh. 

 

So far their behavior is totally different from "Grammy" which is what the kids call the royal gramma.  The gramma has dug himself a hidey hole and sleeps in there when the lights go out.  The clowns seem to be hanging out near where I put them in after exploring the immediate area for a while. 

 

The royal gramma has also turned into a real eater.  It seems to like Rods food, frozen mysis, Roggers, Nutramar Ova, and also really likes the Sustainable Aquatics Dry Hatchery Diet 0.5mm pellets.  He won't touch other pellets, but seems to like those.  QR has them in a little spice shaker that I may try on my oatmeal in the morning.

[AlanM]

By the way, I tested water today and have 0 nitrates and 0.08 or less phosphate (the Red Sea Pro phosphate test is a pretty good one, but it all kind of looks the same below 0.16). 

 

It's been like this for a couple of weeks so it seems the combination of skimmer, biopellets, macro algae, deep sand bed, GFO and GAC, and a huge crop of sandbed hair algae are keeping the water nice and clean. 

 

Maybe I should go for some LPS, SPS, and a nem next week. 8)

[lnevo]

You establish quote the ammonia processing engine there. Go for it!!!

[AlanM]

Quick updates on what has been going on.

 

• Plumbing:
  
  With monkiboy's late night help I redid the plumbing from my sump and switched out a Reeflo Blowhole 1450 for a used Reeflo Blackfin 3600.  The flow is currently valved halfway down and it still doubles the exchange between the tank and the sump.  I'm pushing around 1500gph through the sump now, which is kind of a lot for the 18 inch wide baffles in the 40b sump.  I don't think I could really push much more through it as the 1/4" acrylic baffles are looking a little strained as it is.  I eliminated the powerheads that were running a GFO reactor and the skimmer feed pump by adding a manifold off the return line. 
  
  I am going to tear it down one more time to move the ball valve which throttles the outlet of the pump downstream from the manifold instead of upstream of the manifold.  That way the flow to the display tank should remain more constant when opening and closing the manifold outlets as I won't be stealing flow from that side of the valve.
  
  I am also going to add a Python drain vacuum to the end of the manifold which will let me suck up detritus and other crud from the sump and drop it right into a filter sock in the return section of the sump.  Thanks to zygote2k for suggesting it.  I am really excited about adding that. 
   
• Equipment:
  
  The d120 configured as a grow light is putting out a powerful amount of algae growth in my sump.  Piles of hair algae, cheato and other macros are growing in there.  So much so that the pH goes up quite a bit at night.  Nitrates and phosphates are basically 0 despite a lot of feeding, so I guess that's my strategy for success.  I got an acrylic box from Marco that will be a separate algae grow tank which I'll hook up off the manifold at some point.  I also got some dosers from a slub member which I will use to start dosing 2 part when I add corals.
   
• Moving things:
  
  Two clowns: The smaller of the clowns from QR died soon after adding him to the tank.  I'm not sure why because they were healthy at QR.  I ended up going to Marine Scene and getting one to replace it that was bigger than the remaining one from QR.  It did well from the start and ate immediately and settled right in.  They are buddies now wiggling all over and staying close to each other.  They are eating from the end of the baster now.  Very greedy little guys determined to get huge.
  
  Royal Gramma: He stays in his hideyhole overnight and comes out and runs all over during the day. 
  
  One spot foxface: Originally from QR, I picked this up from djplus1 who had it in his small tank for a while as an attempt to clean out bubble algae.  It is doing great, and it weirds me out every time to see him turn camoflage gray and sleep laying on the xenia every night.
  
  Scarlet cleaner shrimp: Cool looking guy from Incredible Corals.  Hangs around upside down in his cave mostly.
  
  GBTA: I got a small anemone from QR.  About the size of a quarter when purchased 3 weeks ago, now about the size of a half dollar.  It seems to have found a spot it likes.  I've fed it twice.  The second time this morning.  A huge hermit crab ran right over and tried to take the chunk of Rods food I put in the nem until I shooed it away. 
   
• Corals:
  
  Just to see what would happen, I picked up a small frag of Tyree Seasons Greeting montipora from Marine Scene.  In the two weeks since I've had it, I've seen it encrust over the edges of the frag plug and attach to the rock.  I also picked up a single head aussie splattered hammer and a big trachyphyllia from Incredible Corals.  Both are doing well and expanding a bit more each day in the week I've had them. 
  
  I've decided to not do any more soft corals (xenia, gsp, stuff like that).  I'm going to do a few LPS, probably a scoly and a frogspawn, but mostly SPS tank!  I dropped a pile of SPS requests on copps for the meeting so I should leave with a silly number of bags from there.  I'll pick up a few more frags from another club member and that will be about it.  I'll be trying to emulate chucelli's patience as he has watched his tank grow out over 5 years instead of adding new cool stuff to it. 

 

I guess that's all.  It ended up not being such a quick update.  I'll post a picture or two laters. 

Edited October 22, 2013 by AlanM

[monkiboy]

I am also going to add a Python drain vacuum to the end of the manifold which will let me suck up detritus and other crud from the sump and drop it right into a filter sock in the return section of the sump.  Thanks to zygote2k for suggesting it.  I am really excited about adding that.

on this so you will be using an actual python drain vacuum plumbed into your existing manifold or DIY'ing your own with two ball valves and some plumbing into the existing manifold? the manifold is nice and high which will work nicely to your advantage as well. with the power of that pump behind it, you'll have some great vacuum force i'd imagine and hopefully not too much splashing from the water exit of the manifold using a filter sock. then you'll have a perpendicular attachment hose to the diy or actual phython with a larger diameter pipe or similar for sucking up the detritus in the sump? following along, maybe i'll add a triple to my existing manifold for some other appendages like this.

[AlanM]

I ordered one of these from amazon:

 

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000255NVE

 

I have a 1" ball valve that is at the end of my manifold that I left for future expansion.  I'm going to put a 3/4" male hose thread with a hose attached on that ball valve and thread the python device onto it and basically drop it into a filter sock attached to the wall of my sump.  I'll put some tubing coming out the side port which develops the suction and commence to vacuuming stuff in my sump.  I may end up with lots of air into the sump, but it shouldn't be too bad. 

 

The thing I like about the python idea is that you don't have to reprime it if the end goes above the water, unlike a powerhead used for the same purpose.

 

 

on this so you will be using an actual python drain vacuum plumbed into your existing manifold or DIY'ing your own with two ball valves and some plumbing into the existing manifold? the manifold is nice and high which will work nicely to your advantage as well. with the power of that pump behind it, you'll have some great vacuum force i'd imagine and hopefully not too much splashing from the water exit of the manifold using a filter sock. then you'll have a perpendicular attachment hose to the diy or actual phython with a larger diameter pipe or similar for sucking up the detritus in the sump? following along, maybe i'll add a triple to my existing manifold for some other appendages like this.

[monkiboy]

... and basically drop it into a filter sock attached to the wall of my sump.

this is the part i don't get - how will you plumb the outlet of the actual python pump to your filter sock if there are no threads on that end and is not a slip fit for any type of plumbing (the part that engages/disengages the siphon with the twist lock)? this is why i thought DIY would be best for our application.

 

Edited October 22, 2013 by monkiboy

[AlanM]

I am not going to plumb the output.

 

I am going to attach a filter sock to it with a rubberband and just drop it into the sump. Not hard plumbed at all, just flexible hose.