I’ve been in the hobby for about 6 months or so but fell in love with it very very hard. I started with a 115 gallon Aquadream system that came fully plumbed so this has been my first foray into having to actually do anything beyond putting a kit together and it has been a ton of fun. The tank is up and running so this will be a retrospective look into what I’ve done with it thus far.
Equipment list:
-Aqueon reef ready 210 gallon and stand (modified the stand by opening a side door and reinforcing with 2x4 to ease my anxiety prior to filling)
-Aqueon 60 gallon breeder that I converted to a three compartment sump
-RedSea Reefmat 1200 (modified connections to have the two drains connected to the roller mat)
-Red Sea return pumps
-2x 4K icecap gyre pumps
-4x Nero 5 (along the back of the tank)
-4x Hydra32 (want to add T5 upgrade but need to wait a bit)
-Aquamaxx skimmer
-Apex controller and trident (will get the DOS eventually)
-icecap algae scrubber (not connected yet)
-coralife turbotwist UV (not connected yet)
-CO2 scrubber (not connected yet)
Biggest mod was getting a whole house generator prior to getting this tank since I lost a lot of Coral during a power outage 3 months ago. I also think the outage stressed out my fish and led to an ich outbreak so also lost a lot of fish. Currently quarantining my remaining fish in hypo (dusky wrasse, two clowns, fox face, six line wrasse, royal gramma, purple dottyback, firefish, 4 chromis) and have started transferring coral and getting new pieces into this tank. Started with 140lb of live rock from different sources to try to get going with lots of biodiversity. Added another 80 lb or so of dry rock. Cycled almost instantaneously due to all the live rock and behaving super stably. Currently wet for 1 month.
Equipment list:
-Aqueon reef ready 210 gallon and stand (modified the stand by opening a side door and reinforcing with 2x4 to ease my anxiety prior to filling)
-Aqueon 60 gallon breeder that I converted to a three compartment sump
-RedSea Reefmat 1200 (modified connections to have the two drains connected to the roller mat)
-Red Sea return pumps
-2x 4K icecap gyre pumps
-4x Nero 5 (along the back of the tank)
-4x Hydra32 (want to add T5 upgrade but need to wait a bit)
-Aquamaxx skimmer
-Apex controller and trident (will get the DOS eventually)
-icecap algae scrubber (not connected yet)
-coralife turbotwist UV (not connected yet)
-CO2 scrubber (not connected yet)
Biggest mod was getting a whole house generator prior to getting this tank since I lost a lot of Coral during a power outage 3 months ago. I also think the outage stressed out my fish and led to an ich outbreak so also lost a lot of fish. Currently quarantining my remaining fish in hypo (dusky wrasse, two clowns, fox face, six line wrasse, royal gramma, purple dottyback, firefish, 4 chromis) and have started transferring coral and getting new pieces into this tank. Started with 140lb of live rock from different sources to try to get going with lots of biodiversity. Added another 80 lb or so of dry rock. Cycled almost instantaneously due to all the live rock and behaving super stably. Currently wet for 1 month.