Shadyraro's Cade 900 S2

shadyraro · Mar 24, 2024

wickedxreef said:
Looking really good and glad to hear the smart tester is working as expected. Looking forward to additional updates on how it progresses.

Makes me think I should remove the shelf as well. My cabinet is getting extremely tight quick. How’re you liking the pax? How often do you find yourself having to maintain it and what benefits have you seen from it?

Thanks, so far so good on the smart tester!
Yeah the cabinets are pretty tight and I think removing the shelf was a good idea, it's more open now and I can easily access the ATO valve at the back which was a bit tricky previously.
The pax is great, it grows chaeto no problem and as long as you harvest it it does a great job.
With maintenance I remove it usually every 10-12 days to harvest, the whole process takes less than 20 mins.
It's great for nutrient export and I find it keeps my nitrates and phosphates at a good levels.
My phosphates have already dropped from 0.50 down to 0.21 in a week since it's been back online and they usually end up hovering around 0.10 when it’s been running a while.
Nitrates sit around 5 so all in all the pax does a great job.

shadyraro · Apr 21, 2024

Update:

The tank has been cruising along nicely even tho my nitrates bottomed out, I think it was from the pax needing a harvest and also the ReefMat.
I’ve since done a harvest and we’ll see how it goes, but as nothing seemed upset in the tank I’m not too worried about it.
I did a Triton ICP and the test results were pretty good, the only red flag was molybdenum which was high. After researching it I found it can be found in some additives and can cause cyano, I don’t have cyano so I’m not sure if it was a test error but anyway I’ll just monitor the tank for now.
My fish are all doing good and yesterday I added a Naso (lipstick) tang, he settled right in and made friends straight away with my mimic and blue tang. He’s a great looking fish and I hope he likes his new home.
The corals are all going good apart from one of my hammers losing a head, it never looked comfortable since I put it in the tank a few months ago so I’m just monitoring it.
I also added an ultra Goni and that’s settled in nicely.
The smart tester is doing a good job, it’s currently testing twice a day and the KH keeper also tests twice a day. There’s no major variances in the tests and everything is staying stable so I’m just letting the tank do its thing.
One thing I found interesting with the ICP result was I also tested the water at the same time I filled the vials, and my po4 Hanna and salifert tests were 0.25 while the ICP tested 0.10.
Anyway, I’m not one to chase numbers and the tank is doing great so all good.

shadyraro · Apr 21, 2024

Edit:
So after writing in @Randy Holmes-Farley forum about my high molybdenum result, he informed me that the stainless hose clamps that came with my Cade more than likely contains molybdenum. After a quick google search he was indeed correct.
That would explain the high reading as I use 4 clamps that came with the tank, so luckily I ordered some plastic clamps a while ago and I’ll be replacing them soon.

DarkReefer · Apr 23, 2024

Didn't see you'd posted an update in my notifications, but your tank is looking lush! Well done! Envious! haha
I did think twice about those stainless clamps too but went and installed them anyway as I didn't have the plastic on hand, guess I should probably look into those a bit more as well!

That FTS looks great though, awesome job!

shadyraro · Apr 23, 2024

DarkReefer said:
Didn't see you'd posted an update in my notifications, but your tank is looking lush! Well done! Envious! haha
I did think twice about those stainless clamps too but went and installed them anyway as I didn't have the plastic on hand, guess I should probably look into those a bit more as well!

That FTS looks great though, awesome job!

Hey thanks!

My LFS had the plastic ratchet clamps so I just grabbed a handful of different sizes.
I’ve changed the pump clamps but haven’t done the 2 clamps in the RO reservoir yet as I’m waiting for the water to drain out lol.
The whole return pipe has to come out so it’s a bit of a mission, but when I do another ICP it’ll be interesting to see what the result is.

SaltwaterandLime · Apr 28, 2024

Just brought home a cade 600, I'm going to try to install the reefmat 250 like you have here. I have a reefmat 500 on my larger tank and have been really happy with it

shadyraro · Apr 28, 2024

SaltwaterandLime said:
Just brought home a cade 600, I'm going to try to install the reefmat 250 like you have here. I have a reefmat 500 on my larger tank and have been really happy with it

Nice, you're going to love the 600 they're an awesome setup!
The 250 is a perfect fit for this sump, it has a small footprint but does a great job.

shadyraro · Thursday at 8:32 PM

Update:

Well the hammer that lost a head recently bailed and died, and a torch I had also did the same.
I'm not sure why they bailed but when I checked my notes I noticed that a few corals I’ve lost lately were all from the same shop. This particular shop is not my LFS, but they had reasonably priced corals and I now think most of their systems were just full of BJD and other diseases.
All other corals that I didn't buy from that shop are doing fine, it might be a coincidence but I won’t be going there again!

On a side note I picked up a holy grail hammer from my LFS, I’ve been after one for a while and it’s settled in great and I’m keeping a close eye on it. My Naso tang is also doing good and has settled in nicely even tho he's a fussy eater preferring to eat only nori over any other type of herbivore food. Hopefully he eventually takes a liking to all the other foods on offer.

My Reef Factory smart tester was doing good until last week when it started throwing errors "can't add reagent 2" and "can't clean dropper of reagent 2". After reading up on the errors I attempted to try and fix the issues, but I ended up getting too frustrated so I reached out to RF support.
They were great and suggested I try a few different things, but in the end it was apparent I had a bad batch of reagents. They sent me a new set of reagents for free which arrived today and we are now back in business.
For an expensive piece of kit less than a month old you'd expect little to no issues, but as I have a lot of RF gear in my tank that all work fine I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.

Happy reefing!

DarkReefer · Friday at 3:48 AM

Sorry to hear of the losses, don't suppose you can share which LFS was the ones you've had issues with (even by pm), so I can be sure to be wary if I go there.
I know one of the 2-3 I goto seem to have Aiptasia in their tanks and on their corals which is a bit annoying and something I try and keep an eye on but still finding I've got some in my tank.

That pic is really popping, looks awesome.
Glad the Naso tang is settling in well despite it's pickiness and it's good to hear RF were quick to assist and without any additional costs etc to you and that it seems to have resolved your issues. I noticed there's some new testing things coming out soon from various brands that seem to test almost, if not everything that we would usually test. Do you think you'll be picking up something like that or does the RF do this already for you?

shadyraro · Friday at 7:09 AM

DarkReefer said:
Sorry to hear of the losses, don't suppose you can share which LFS was the ones you've had issues with (even by pm), so I can be sure to be wary if I go there.
I know one of the 2-3 I goto seem to have Aiptasia in their tanks and on their corals which is a bit annoying and something I try and keep an eye on but still finding I've got some in my tank.

That pic is really popping, looks awesome.
Glad the Naso tang is settling in well despite it's pickiness and it's good to hear RF were quick to assist and without any additional costs etc to you and that it seems to have resolved your issues. I noticed there's some new testing things coming out soon from various brands that seem to test almost, if not everything that we would usually test. Do you think you'll be picking up something like that or does the RF do this already for you?

Thanks! I’m pretty happy with how the tanks looking atm, but I might need to rearrange a few corals as my 2 gobies keep building sand castles which ends up covering corals lol.

I’m pretty happy with the RF equipment even tho I know some of the gear is a bit pricey, but the accuracy and ease of use app/ push notifications is fantastic and I can’t really fault them. Their support is prompt and they didn’t hesitate to send me new reagents, so little things like that make it worth it.
They’re fairly new to the industry and there’s a lot of mixed reviews out there, but my experience with them so far has been great.

I’ve seen a few different reviews on some master test kits and they all look good, but most of them are usually one big unit and you’ll need to have plenty of room for it to fit.
With RF you can put any of the test equipment anywhere so for my kind of setup it works better.