47 year old tank

[madweazl]

Awesome, glad you're gaining some valuable space to work in. 

[paul b]

You can't have to much space.  If I had a really bigger space, I would build an aircraft carrier.  Supermodels really like men with aircraft carriers. 

[paul b]

I just gave away a 30' extension ladder for the move that I think is 95% certain we are doing. Now I have a bunch of tools and other things to unload as I can't bring almost any of this to the new condo. If anyone needs older car tools like timing lights, dwell meters, compression gages, ring compressors, cylinder hones, flexible dwell adjusters and long point adjusters, I will give them to you for free as I will not be using them. I was a GM Mechanic fifty years ago so I have tools for those cars as well as new cars but most of them I will keep for now.

[paul b]

I priced a 125 gallon tank but I think I will build the new stand. I don't like those Girly Man iron stands they sell to people who don't know any better. I also want to build a base rock that will span the 6' width of the tank and keep my reef structure off the gravel. Hopefully it will only touch the gravel in 6 places. I have been wanting to do that for many years but couldn't do it on a fully functioning reef. If I move everything I will first set up a tank in the new location which is 55 miles away. I plan to fill it half way with NSW from up the block. Then I will drive to this house and remove half the rock and some of the gravel and water. Drive out there and put that stuff in to get the bacteria going. Then make another trip, maybe with a friend who has another car and bring the rest of the rock, gravel and livestock. I will wash my gravel in NSW and put it in on my new Reverse UG filter.

 

I don't know if that new tank will use a sump as I have not decided on that yet.

 

I will bring my existing, water cooled LED lights but I will have to solder in another row of LEDs as the new tank is 6" wider. That is going to be a problem because I have to remove a few LEDs to solder on new pipe.

 

I will also bring my DIY, 5' Skimmer and algae trough. The algae trough is mainly for dissipating the ozone after the skimmer.

 

This is the plan anyway. If it works out like that depends on if I can keep this house a little while as I move to the new place.

 

This may be in February and that room the tank will be in is not heated and I will have to add heat at the same time I install the tank .

 

 

 

 

Oh and my male flasher wrasse jumped out this morning. I will give up on those because I lost 3 of them so far from jumping. As they get into spawning mode, they are so excited, that they jump for joy. :D

[paul b]

If this goes as planned, (not likely) After I empty out my existing tank I will scrape off all the mulm growing on the sides and back to add to my new tank and under my UG filter. I can't wait to see what is growing under there and I will also be bringing whatever that stuff is. I will try to eliminate the larger bristle worms, the 2 foot ones with the antlers and Godzilla larvae. I will have to break off all my montipora and try to get most of the rest of the corals and sponges out. I am sure I will lose some, or maybe even all my corals as the lights may not be functioning correctly for a while as I build stuff. It all depends on if I can keep this house for a few days after I own that house. If I have to move out of here before that place is finished, I don't think the tank can stay running as I will have no place to transfer the livestock and rocks.

[Bruleyii]

You could always plan to take all of your corals with you at the same time you bring your light and just have it light up one side of the tank and have your corals on that side. I did that when I upgraded from a 37g to a 90g.

[paul b]

The problem is that it will be in the winter and when I install that tank there, I don't think there will be heat in that part of the house. I also need to rinse out my gravel in the ice cold ocean, then put it in my tank, heat it up, go back to my original house and bring the rest of the stuff. Rinse that gravel in the ocean, heat it up and put everything back in while I chop the fish out of the ice.

[Bruleyii]

Just pop them in the microwave for a few seconds. lol

[paul b]

These little striped cardinals are spawning. I have 3 of them and it seems 2 of them are female and are pregnant to the joy of the one male.

 

 

 

 

But cardinals are very easy to spawn and they will spawn even if you lay them down on the asphalt of interstate 80 on a hot summer day and a Mack truck runs them over twice. Not a really big Mack truck like a tractor trailer but a smaller dump truck that is only maybe half full of ball bearings or old VCR tape players.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[paul b]

So a few days ago I took 2 other couples and my wife out to dinner on my boat.

 

 

 

 

On the way to the boat I noticed that the air conditioner started blowing warm air so I looked at the temperature gauge and the car was overheating. Great, just what I want with a car full of people and other people meeting us at the marina in five minutes.

 

 

 

 

 

Luckily I was right near a gas station so I quickly went in there and shut the car off.

 

 

 

 

I open the hood and antifreeze is flying all over the place.

 

 

 

 

Now I have to wait five minutes for it to cool down and dissipate the smoke. I get a rag and open the radiator cap. Of course by now I need antifreeze so I buy a gallon from the station. I put it in and wait a few minutes for it to cool down further. I start it up and it seems fine so then I drive the ten minutes to my boat to meet the rest of the group.

 

 

 

 

I figure I will fix it tomorrow and I have the rest of the antifreeze with me in case I get stuck again.

 

 

 

 

We get on my boat and go to dinner at City Island in the Bronx and it was excellent.

 

 

 

 

We made it home in my car with no problem and I checked the oil which was a quart and a half low. I figure between that and the antifreeze probably being low, It will be fine now.

 

 

 

 

"Yeah Right"

 

 

 

 

The next day we drove about half an hour to my friends boat for a dinner cruise and on the way home, the thing overheats. Great. I cool it down, put in antifreeze and get it home.

 

 

 

 

Today I checked it out and what do you know, the fan isn't working.

 

 

 

 

These silly cars with the engine in sideways are always a pain to work on and to change the fan, you have to be Houdini and take half the car apart. This car is a PT Cruiser and is about 4" off the ground. It's like working on a toy. Of course I disconnected the fan wires first and connected them to the battery to make sure the thing was broken and I checked the 3 relays that control it.

 

 

 

 

I take out the fan and only cut myself 4 or 5 times because I think as they assemble these cars, they purposely sharpen all the ends of any exposed metal to see how much blood they can make you lose as you work on the car.

 

 

 

 

I go to the auto supply and buy a new fan. (These things come with the entire shroud and fan motor in one assembly because God Forbid you can only change the defective motor and keep the fan and shroud)

 

 

 

 

I get the thing home and compare it to my fan. Of course the wiring connecter is wrong so I have to go back the auto supply (who is a friend of mine) and after 45 minutes of looking it up, I get the correct part.

 

 

 

 

 

I stick the thing in and this time only cut myself 3 or 4 times and I don't need a tourniquet.

 

 

 

 

The fan is behind the radiator and air conditioner condenser.

 

 

 

 

I put back the grill, hoses, wires, brackets etc and start the thing up. Success.

 

 

 

 

(I was a GM Mechanic Many Many years ago when cars had cranks to start them)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I know what your thinking. It's a PT Cruiser, a Nerd car and not exactly a "Chick Magnet". You would be correct if a Snowflake was driving it, But I drive it and I am a real Man and not a snowflake. I love this car but I also have one of these.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[paul b]

OOOOHHHHhhhh NNNoooooo, My blackworm tank crashed.

 

 

 

 

 

I don't remember when I set up my blackworm tank but It doesn't support blackworms any more. It must have a blackworm version of the Flu or chicken pox for worms.

 

 

 

 

 

Whenever I put in worms, they croak and turn into Jello.

 

I am currently bleaching it and I will have to cycle it again.

 

Normally I can add 4 or 5 portions of worms, but no more.

 

 

 

Tonight, after it bleaches for 10 hours, I will fill it with new water from my goldfish pond along with some scurvy stuff from the bottom and some garden soil. That should move along the cycle from 20 days to 20 minutes. I will let you know how that goes.

 

I won't run my tank without live worms

 

 

 

[paul b]

Today I emptied out my goldfish pond and took all the fish back to the LFS where I got them from. I always empty it in the winter because it is a small pond and I only really built the thing to put in a fountain that I made from copper sheets and I had no place to put it.

 

I also put worms in my worm keeper to see how that works.

 

 

 

 

Then I want to my boat and had to fix the white light in the back. In my boat (and all boats) you need this silly light that sits on a pole about 6' high. (some boats can have short lights) The light reflector broke in a million pieces (apparently someone did the hustle or macarana on it during one of our not so quiet boat parties).

 

I went to get a new reflector and of course you can't get that. You have to buy the entire thing which costs almost as much as the boat. So I bought a one foot one and cut it apart and used the parts on my 6' light pole. It only cost me $36.00 for the $2.00 part that I needed. I often wonder how people live that don't know how to do things. Very few days go by that something doesn't break and I have to fix it. Either my car, boat or house something always breaks. Do people hire someone to fix all of these things or do they just leave them broken.

 

My wife has a cousin that doesn't know how to do anything so everything in his house is broken which drives me nuts. 99% of it is a no brainer things.

 

 

 

 

Here is my fountain. I took a video but I took it sideways. Is there any way to turn a video sideways? Anyone know how to do that?

 

The copper scoops all move up and down and there is a wheel near the water that spins.

 

 

 

 

[paul b]

I found it.

[paul b]

I still love looking at my tank after all those years mostly because, well first of all there are no Supermodels here right now and I went to church and breakfast with my beautiful wife this morning so I looked at her for a couple of hours.  Now I am looking at my tank.  I love the way it is now because it is filled with the combination of fish that I find the most intriguing.
My copperband is a little larger than I would like but it is what it is.  My Bangai Cardinal is way past his supposed lifespan and I have been saying for many months that he should pass away soon from old age, but he is still hanging in there.  This week he stopped eating (again) but he has done that 3 or 4 times in the last 6 months so I am not sure what he is thinking but I am sure he "misses" the "Misses" who died last year, also past her life span.
I love the bluestripe pipefish.  They go off ontheir own to hunt but always find each other and spend time curling around each other, a perfect pair.
My Fire clowns are like an old married couple.  Fighting then mating.  This has been going on for decades and they never tire of each other.

My other two pipefish, a dragon face and a Janss pipefish are always on the move.  The dragon face slowly inching his way along the rocks intently starring at every grain of gravel looking for a pod and the Janss who is like a Javelin cutting through the water searching for new born brine shrimp that escaped from the feeder.  At that feeder is normally the two mandarins who stay there long after they ate the last brine shrimp in the hope there is one left.   Eventually they get the hint and go out looking for more productive haunts but they always circle back for a quick look at the feeder.

The other cool IMO fish are a possum wrasse that rarely comes out along with a tiny red perchlet.  Those two fish really colored up on their diet of worms, new born brine shrimp and clams.  They are so much brighter than they were when I got them.

Of course there are quite a few wrasses, bleenies, anthias and gobies that I also find facinating but I forget their exact names so I rarely mention them.

I love this type of tank as I always find something that comes out of hiding that I forgot I had.  I forget a lot.  Why did I start this?  OK I remember.
I do not like tangs and angels except for a hippo tang that I have always had up to a couple of years ago.  They are one of the most beautiful fish but not as interesting as some of the fish I mentioned and much more common.  You see tangs in every tank and if you dive, you see thousands of them as they are one of the most common fish in the sea.  I just got tired of them.

Who could resist this face!

[paul b]

I was just thinking of old times.
I remember once I was stationed in Colorado and in Colorado they have a lot of space. I rented, or borrowed a nice Manly motorcycle and headed out in the mountains to see if I could pick up any girls. After all I thought who I was with my hair and all.

So I see these two girls in a convertible so I head out in the plains after them with all my "coolness".

They finally stopped for a light and I very smoothly pulled up beside them to put my moves on them. I came to a stop, put my foot down, and my bell bottom pants got stuck on the starter pedal and I fell down right in the street next to these girls.

I stayed on the pavement until they left. That was fifty years ago. I am sure those two girls just stopped laughing last Tuesday. :confused:

[Origami]

I was just thinking of old times.

I remember once I was stationed in Colorado and in Colorado they have a lot of space. I rented, or borrowed a nice Manly motorcycle and headed out in the mountains to see if I could pick up any girls. After all I thought who I was with my hair and all.

So I see these two girls in a convertible so I head out in the plains after them with all my "coolness".

They finally stopped for a light and I very smoothly pulled up beside them to put my moves on them. I came to a stop, put my foot down, and my bell bottom pants got stuck on the starter pedal and I fell down right in the street next to these girls.

I stayed on the pavement until they left. That was fifty years ago. I am sure those two girls just stopped laughing last Tuesday. :confused:

Gave me a hearty laugh there, Paul. Thanks!

 

 

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[paul b]

Hello there Tom.  It seems that only you and some times me read this thread. 

 

This little Cardinal is so pregnant she doesn't know which way to go.

I just took a picture of this guy because he rarely poses.  Unlike Supermodels

[Origami]

Hello there Tom.  It seems that only you and some times me read this thread. 

Hey, Paul. I don't think so. This shows over 21,000 reads to date. Pretty popular, I'd say! Love the stories. How's the new place coming along? Have you started setting up the new tank yet? It'll be starting to get cold soon.

 

 

 

[paul b]

Tom 20,987 of those posts were from me.     The last few are from you and one or two are from a homeless guy that hangs out on my porch begging for a frag 

 

We are heading out to see the new place now.  I have a few questions for the builder before we sign the contract because it is a Condo and in Condo's they have thousands of rules of silly things you are not allowed to do such as walking around after Labor Day wearing White unless it is "Winter White" (ask your wife to explain) You can't wear socks with shorts unless they are those very short little Sissy socks.  You can't have two or more fish in your tank where their colors clash with the wall paper.  To change the water in your tank, you are not allowed to throw the used water into the drain.  Instead, you have to bring it back to the place in the ocean where you collected it, then filter and Ozone it before dumping it in.

You can only wash your car on the second Tuesday of every month and you have to test the pH of the wash water.

 

Stupid things like that.  But besides all that I am going today to make sure I can have a sewer and water in my workshop.  I also need an elevator for my wife.  I don't want them to do those things for me,but I need to make sure I am allowed to do them and i would like to have them at least have the water and drain connections in place so I don't have to demolish the place as soon as I move in.  I also want an empty conduit from the panel, which is above the workshop so I can add at least four circuits for my workshop and fish, unless of course I keep electric eels. 

[yauger]

Paul there are a lot of lurkers out there who enjoy this thread very much so! keep it up, love the stories and the supporting photos of the world most amazingly old reef!

[Origami]

Tom 20,987 of those posts were from me.     The last few are from you and one or two are from a homeless guy that hangs out on my porch begging for a frag 

 

We are heading out to see the new place now.  I have a few questions for the builder before we sign the contract because it is a Condo and in Condo's they have thousands of rules of silly things you are not allowed to do such as walking around after Labor Day wearing White unless it is "Winter White" (ask your wife to explain) You can't wear socks with shorts unless they are those very short little Sissy socks.  You can't have two or more fish in your tank where their colors clash with the wall paper.  To change the water in your tank, you are not allowed to throw the used water into the drain.  Instead, you have to bring it back to the place in the ocean where you collected it, then filter and Ozone it before dumping it in.

You can only wash your car on the second Tuesday of every month and you have to test the pH of the wash water.

 

Stupid things like that.  But besides all that I am going today to make sure I can have a sewer and water in my workshop.  I also need an elevator for my wife.  I don't want them to do those things for me,but I need to make sure I am allowed to do them and i would like to have them at least have the water and drain connections in place so I don't have to demolish the place as soon as I move in.  I also want an empty conduit from the panel, which is above the workshop so I can add at least four circuits for my workshop and fish, unless of course I keep electric eels. 

 

Give the guy a frag. He's been there long enough.

 

Good thinking on the conduit as a channel for future wiring. I have two full panels downstairs. (We live in a ranch with a full basement.)  But all of wiring for the main level leaves the panels and heads straight for the attic where it hits junction boxes before descending into the walls where the receptacles are. This makes it easy to reconfigure the wiring without a whole lot of effort. At either end of the house, I have runs (about 8" x 3-1/2") that go from the attic to the basement and allow me to run whatever I need up and down. I can run low-voltage stuff or, as I do  now, I run a PVC line to carry fresh air from near the top of the house (outside) down to my skimmer. (I put a screen on the end of the line right after I found stink bugs that had gotten sucked into my skimmer.) I do have to cap the openings at the top and block the bottom with fire-retardant material to meet building code, but it's really handy to have the vertical runs.

[paul b]

Yauger, Thank you for telling me.  The Supermodel who types all this stuff for me gets paid by the word so it is getting expensive.  It's a good thing she doesn't speak English, or any other language I can tell.  But who cares!  

[paul b]

Tom, thanks, but you do remember I am an electrician don't you!  

I want a nuclear reactor in my workshop. 

[Origami]

Tom, thanks, but you do remember I am an electrician don't you!  

I want a nuclear reactor in my workshop. 

Absolutely, I do. :zap:

 

But those supermodels can be distracting.

[BowieReefer84]

Paul there are a lot of lurkers out there

shhhhh