100g Rimless - restarting the process after storage
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TriggerThis
Well-Known Member
Oh wow. With all those nice sps frags and scolys and wellsos. When they grow out it's gonna be insane. You have one of every color.
You need to get rocks piled higher up on the right side so you have more sps frag space! Looks like your almost out already lol
You need to get rocks piled higher up on the right side so you have more sps frag space! Looks like your almost out already lol
OP
OP
Thanks I cant wait until they grow out and dont look like little sticks everywhere. lol
Im hoping to fill the space with corals while still maintaining the "open space" for my fish...not that I have many fish yet. I still have the same 6 fish from the start of the process, one of the 6 (a flame angel) has been moved to the sump until I can find someone who wants him because he was nipping at my corals. I still want to get 1 or 2 bluespots and I really want a few wrasses but just havent pulled the trigger on them yet.
I do plan on doing some growth shots over time to show it as the tank matures. I sort of forgot to do this with the corals I had from the start because I have re-arranged a lot of their locations to helps spread out color. Before I have basically a green side and a colored side, so I moved them.
Anyway, Here is a before and after shot up to this point. Thanks for looking.
ethridge78
Valuable Member
tank looks awesome what camera are you using
OP
OP
I havent posted an update in a while, because I have had a bit of a setback on my system. Just before I went out of town on business, I did my standard water change, water tests, and maintenance. Everything looked great, when I left. Then a day after I left, my wife called me and said some of my corals werent looking so good and she sent me the following pictures:
From my APEX, I couldnt seen anything out of normal. Unfortunately for my tank, I still had another week that I had to be out of town. So when I returned, I found even more dead-loss then indicated in these pictures. I checked all my levels and the only level which was a tad lower then normal was my alk. it was 9dKh, when it was normally 10-ish. I did a 50% water change, started up my carbon reactor, changed my filter sock, checked my levels which were back to my pre-problem levels. Over the next few days, my corals still continued to STN and RTN. I changed my lighting schedule to see if a little less light would help the corals, but I am not sure if that really did anything at all. Its now been about 3 weeks and I think I have stopped the dying corals (knock on wood). I have lost most of my high-end corals, all of my chalices, my 3 scully's receded and still arent very happy, and the only corals in my tank that didnt seem to be affected at all are my zoa's (maybe because zoa's arent my favorites).
There are so many nice tanks on here and it seems that I must be doing something wrong when I see tanks less than a year old that have 10x the growth then my tank does. Then when things go bad, it really drives me crazy because I must not know the magic trick yet. I have not been able to identify what caused it and at this point, I probably never will. So with this setback, I have decided to focus on a minor system upgrade which I planned to do quite a while ago. After the many hours digging around under the tank stand and becoming frustrated because I dont have much room under there anymore, I am going to relocate my current sump to my basement. With this change, I will upgrade from the sump that came with the system to a 48"x16"x16" custom sump I am having built. I still need to purchase a return pump and buy all the piping but I will try to document that process better than I have in the past. Also, I plan on building a remote DIY algae turf scrubber to use instead of having micro algae in my sump. I am hoping to use the space that I did have as a refugium as a mini frag system.
From my APEX, I couldnt seen anything out of normal. Unfortunately for my tank, I still had another week that I had to be out of town. So when I returned, I found even more dead-loss then indicated in these pictures. I checked all my levels and the only level which was a tad lower then normal was my alk. it was 9dKh, when it was normally 10-ish. I did a 50% water change, started up my carbon reactor, changed my filter sock, checked my levels which were back to my pre-problem levels. Over the next few days, my corals still continued to STN and RTN. I changed my lighting schedule to see if a little less light would help the corals, but I am not sure if that really did anything at all. Its now been about 3 weeks and I think I have stopped the dying corals (knock on wood). I have lost most of my high-end corals, all of my chalices, my 3 scully's receded and still arent very happy, and the only corals in my tank that didnt seem to be affected at all are my zoa's (maybe because zoa's arent my favorites).
There are so many nice tanks on here and it seems that I must be doing something wrong when I see tanks less than a year old that have 10x the growth then my tank does. Then when things go bad, it really drives me crazy because I must not know the magic trick yet. I have not been able to identify what caused it and at this point, I probably never will. So with this setback, I have decided to focus on a minor system upgrade which I planned to do quite a while ago. After the many hours digging around under the tank stand and becoming frustrated because I dont have much room under there anymore, I am going to relocate my current sump to my basement. With this change, I will upgrade from the sump that came with the system to a 48"x16"x16" custom sump I am having built. I still need to purchase a return pump and buy all the piping but I will try to document that process better than I have in the past. Also, I plan on building a remote DIY algae turf scrubber to use instead of having micro algae in my sump. I am hoping to use the space that I did have as a refugium as a mini frag system.
OP
OP
Well I'm still fighting tank stability issues. I thought i tracked down the problem with a refractometer being out of calibration but that unfortunately didn't solve the problem. The strangest part for me is that every time i do a water change, the problem seems more prevalent. Even though I use RO/DI water, Im starting to wonder if the water in my area is the problem. Some days i feel like throwing in the towel. I dont remember reefing being this hard for the first 8 years but the last 4 have not been easy. Anyway, I will continue to see if I can figure out what is going wrong, because I would rather spend my time enjoying my tank, not swearing at it. lol
Anyway, as I mentioned, I had a custom sump built so I can move all my equipment to the basement since I am running out of space under the tank.
Here is my sump:
I have 10' head height on my the system, but I wanted to run an internal pump for the short term, which I am going to try a Mag 18 since I have one already. if that doesn't give me the flow I want, I may switch out to a external pump. I am still waiting on some plumbing parts to convert from the pvc-u to standard pvc sizes, but once I get those pieces, i can continue the process. Once in the basement, I am going to hook my calcium reactor back up instead of the Kalk reactor to see if that does anything for my tank.
Anyway, as I mentioned, I had a custom sump built so I can move all my equipment to the basement since I am running out of space under the tank.
Here is my sump:
I have 10' head height on my the system, but I wanted to run an internal pump for the short term, which I am going to try a Mag 18 since I have one already. if that doesn't give me the flow I want, I may switch out to a external pump. I am still waiting on some plumbing parts to convert from the pvc-u to standard pvc sizes, but once I get those pieces, i can continue the process. Once in the basement, I am going to hook my calcium reactor back up instead of the Kalk reactor to see if that does anything for my tank.
reggaedrummin
Active Member
That's a beautiful sump! I hope you get your tank settled down. I have been struggling with water quality for some time now myself so I feel your pain. At the moment, I have tinkered with everything so much that I'm in a much needed cooling off period. I don't know now if my lights are too bright our not bright enough. It all started with an alk drop, then ph spike, and I've run the gamut trying to stabilize. Params are stable but I moved my lights ironically right about the same time I detected the alk issue. I'm waiting 3 or 4 weeks to see how things go cause if I keep tweaking it, I'll never figure it out without a complete loss...
Sobo's Reef
Valuable Member
Where did you have your sump built at? I'm looking into getting a custom sump for my 150 while I redo everything.
OP
OP
Thank you.
I think that is what I am going to do this last go around, take a little break. I hope you can figure out the issue with your tank so that you too can start enjoying it. This morning, I checked my levels and they still seem to be in line (alk 9.5, ca 460, phosphates .07, mag 1350, ph 8.03). For the past month, my pH has been pretty constant 8.1-8.2, However, 2 nights ago it dropped to a 7.8. I was notified by my APEX that i was in alarm, so I went investigated the problem, but I have no Idea what made it drop. The next morning, I re-calibrated my 2 ph probes and now they read in the 7.8-8.03 range. I dont know if I need to buy new probes already, but I cant imagine that both would go out at the same time. Again, if you look at just the numbers, I would think my tank should be thriving, however, its not. I have some SPS corals that seem to be bullet but others just cant seem to hold on. Also my LPS dont expand like they use to, they are all sunken in and dont look happy. I really hope I can solve this mystery, I have a cup full of frag plugs that remind me how much I have lost over the past year, this keeps me from buying any new corals because I just cant get them to thrive.
I actually purchased my sump through Acrylic Bird Cages,Aquarium Filters,Tye Dye Clothes,How to Videos on Filter Manufacturing The website is not great at all but apparently the owner has built the sump systems for the Columbus & Cincinnati Zoos. He has been in the acrylic business for 25+ years. You can buy his pre-made or DIY versions of his sumps but i wanted to do something a little different. I contacted him and asked if he would do a custom sump which I designed, we spoke on the phone a few times, I sent him a few drawings, he quoted me a price, and then you can see the results. He did a awesome job and this sump (48x16x16) was under $300. He can ship as well but I decided to make the 3 hour drive to pick it up and make a day trip out of it to visit the Great Lakes at the same time.
LarrySmith75
New Member
Very nice sump!! I just built one very similar but without that bubble wall baffle which is a great idea. I think I may add one of those this weekend. I have too many micro bubbles in the display.
Sobo's Reef
Valuable Member
Awesome, I will definitely check this out! Hope everything works out for you and your tank! Gorgeous pics too
Sobo's Reef
Valuable Member
Can you post a website to those guys, the link won't work on my phone bc it doesn't support flash player or something.
OP
OP
unfortunately their site only works on a computer. IT is definitely not his skill set. The looped music he uses is a little annoying as well.
OP
OP
Here is a link to my tank status if anyone was interested http://www.reeftronics.net/Ca/chk4tix/apex-status
ethridge78
Valuable Member
Sorry to hear the problems you are having hopefully it will get better soon.
OP
OP
well a lot has changed since the last update. Biggest change is that I moved 1000 miles away from OH to TX. I originally tried to sell my system, but apparently there wasn't much interest during this time of year. The only thing I did sell was the custom sump that I just had built because I had no way to use it in my new home. Since I couldn't find a buyer, I decided to try and move my tank. This was a pretty large task to try and move my LR and Livestock 1000 miles and try to keep everything alive. We wouldnt be closing on the house we were moving into until the day after we arrived, so I tried coming up with a plan to keep the fish/corals a live as long as possible. I figured I would have a little die-off in the process (and I did) but over all it wasn't too terrible.
For the move, I purchased a large cooler, some 8x4 plastic tray's, a power inverter for heaters and air pump. Other than that, I had everything I needed. i thought i took more pictures than i actually did but here is what i did.
I started by filling up the cooler with freshly mixed water:
Then after a few days, I built little floating "boats" out of the trays to place all of the coral frags I had in the tank. (forgot to take photos of this process) Once I created these, I removed all of the live rock and place it in the cooler. I put a Plexiglas divider in the cooler in the tank to keep the two "sides" of the tank separated. The purpose of this was to help me in the recreation of my rock work once I to the final destination. I placed 2 6in bubblers on the bottom of the cooler and ran the tubing out the opening in the top if the cooler. Once in-place, i moved all the LR into the cooler, then transferred the fish, and lastly placed the boats in the cooler and added the corals.
I placed a heater, temp gauge, and circulation pump into the cooler and kept it lite with a 120W led fixture i had.
This was all done about 3 days before the movers showed up to make sure i had time to prep the tank for the move.
The cooler was placed in the minivan with the family and we drove the 16 hours strait through. unfortunately even though we got to the destination fairly quick, there was a lot of water leaked out. I didnt plan for the cooler to have a poor seal, so by time we arrived, we had lost 1/3rd of the water.
On top of that with all the moving of house stuff, cleaning the tank, and running the new waterline it took another 5 days of cooler living for my livestock. however, i didnt lose any fish in the process,
The water was a little cloudy in these pictures, but I figured the livestock had been in the cooler for long enough and I rushed the final tank setup a little quicker then I typically would.
I am currently running a bare bottom tank because I didnt even attempt to keep the sand alive at all. I figured that would have been more trouble then it was worth. Depending on how things go, I think I might add sand back in a month or so.
On a side note, the water quality is a ton better then where I just came from. Before, tap water was running 450-ish TDS with +30 phosphates out of the tap before RO reduction. Now the current water quality is 85-ish TDS with .02 phosphates before RO correction. I can't wait to see how this water quality difference affects the growth of my corals.
For the move, I purchased a large cooler, some 8x4 plastic tray's, a power inverter for heaters and air pump. Other than that, I had everything I needed. i thought i took more pictures than i actually did but here is what i did.
I started by filling up the cooler with freshly mixed water:
Then after a few days, I built little floating "boats" out of the trays to place all of the coral frags I had in the tank. (forgot to take photos of this process) Once I created these, I removed all of the live rock and place it in the cooler. I put a Plexiglas divider in the cooler in the tank to keep the two "sides" of the tank separated. The purpose of this was to help me in the recreation of my rock work once I to the final destination. I placed 2 6in bubblers on the bottom of the cooler and ran the tubing out the opening in the top if the cooler. Once in-place, i moved all the LR into the cooler, then transferred the fish, and lastly placed the boats in the cooler and added the corals.
I placed a heater, temp gauge, and circulation pump into the cooler and kept it lite with a 120W led fixture i had.
This was all done about 3 days before the movers showed up to make sure i had time to prep the tank for the move.
The cooler was placed in the minivan with the family and we drove the 16 hours strait through. unfortunately even though we got to the destination fairly quick, there was a lot of water leaked out. I didnt plan for the cooler to have a poor seal, so by time we arrived, we had lost 1/3rd of the water.
On top of that with all the moving of house stuff, cleaning the tank, and running the new waterline it took another 5 days of cooler living for my livestock. however, i didnt lose any fish in the process,
The water was a little cloudy in these pictures, but I figured the livestock had been in the cooler for long enough and I rushed the final tank setup a little quicker then I typically would.
I am currently running a bare bottom tank because I didnt even attempt to keep the sand alive at all. I figured that would have been more trouble then it was worth. Depending on how things go, I think I might add sand back in a month or so.
On a side note, the water quality is a ton better then where I just came from. Before, tap water was running 450-ish TDS with +30 phosphates out of the tap before RO reduction. Now the current water quality is 85-ish TDS with .02 phosphates before RO correction. I can't wait to see how this water quality difference affects the growth of my corals.
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