220G Mixed reef

Dolphins18

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Hello,

I enjoy this hobby very much and purchased a used 220 gallon a few months ago. It has been an ongoing process preparing the house, stand and the tank itself. I redid all the plumbing as well as bulk heads.

The tank is an older 220 gallon, 72"x24"x29". Thick glass, over 1/2" but under 3/4".
Sump is an old school Oceanic 50 gallon, I modified it a bit, allowing the skimmer to fit in the return section, with 2 2600 gph jebao returns (i've used these products for years, I keep backups). This allowed the middle section of the sump to be used as decent sized fuge, and the supply trickles over filter material, chemi pure blue, and then smaller pieces of live rock.
Skimmer is a Aquamaxx Cone Sq-3, fits perfectly between both return pumps.
I am running a 2 little fishes reactor 550 stuffed full of Seachem Denitrate with around 25-30 gph flow. (Not conventional but one of the best methods I have discovered in 20+ years) Also have a 150 reactor I will use for either algae or GFO.
Brain will be a Apex system with ORP, PH, Salinity, and temp probes. I have a trident as well as the Apex Doser as well that is not set up yet as I do not need to waste the reagents yet.
ATO: Apex ATK
240 lbs sand.
200 lbs rock currently, have another 100 in my 75 which will be consolidated, though I wont add all the rock.
Flow consists of 4 Jebao wavemakers, one of which is the sine one that goes along the back. Will replace with vortechs and icecaps as these go, but no need to spend all that at the start.
Lighting: 4x Ai Hydras, 2 black box leds (these will go right at the ends of the tank vertically) - ERASE THE BLACK BOX ONE CAUGHT FIRE. Going with 1 hydra 64 and 4 32s
Stocking list will include the fish from my 75 gallon:
Large 10-12" Volitan Lion. (maybe. hes huge)
Chainlink Moray eel 14"
Yellow Eye kole tang
Assorted Damsels x3

Current inhabitants in 220:
2x ignitus anthias (had 3 one never took)
Foxface
Scopas tang
Flameback Angel (first time i've ever owned one, these are very cool dwarfs)
Lamarcks Angel
Diamond Goby
Damsel.
Blue Hippo
Purple Tang

Coral - Coming Soon! :)

1619824763261.png


1619824841967.png

1619824867707.png

I set the trident up outside of the stand as I was finding difficulty with space inside.
I think ill run an airline outdoors from the skimmer. I am having trouble keeping my PH above 7.9. Hoping this will be enough.
Also need to upgrade the chiller, 79.6 is a little warm. Close but no cigar on the 1/10 hp.

Fuge is STUFFED full of algae. All sorts, ulva, chaeto, hair, I love it. (so do the tangs) Nitrates are completely non existent anymore however and ill probably be having some fun with dinos for a little while. Eel will take care of the 0 nitrate issue fairly quickly :). I only want 2-5, I do not like running 0.








This big fella will be happy to have a larger home, dang damsel bit his other horn off... ruthless little creatures. They even become predators to the predators!

1616463031844.png





:) :)

1616462911414.png
 
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Dolphins18

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Attached are some photos of the filtration, I had to cut the bottom of the stand out and set the sump on the floor to accommodate the skimmer.
1616543674532.png



1616543801084.png

1616543849249.png
 
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Dolphins18

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This little dude is spending the night with the returns off, had to do a little silicone fix. He’s a tough little fella he’ll be fine
 

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Dolphins18

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Also did this over the weekend, lot of organizing to do while I calibrate.
 

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revhtree

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Also did this over the weekend, lot of organizing to do while I calibrate.

Oh nice! How did the organizing go? I never organize even when I plan to! HA!
 
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Oh nice! How did the organizing go? I never organize even when I plan to! HA!
It went very good! (though took a lot longer than expected ;)) Sorry for the super late response, I've had a busy few weeks!
I wanted to provide an update on the tank. Things are going quite well apart from the electrical nuisances we all deal with :)
Earlier today I smell a terrible electrical burning smell coming from underneath the stand. I had one of the black box chinese leds lighting my fuge and it caught on fire, luckily I was home or it would have burned right thru one of the 3/4" supply lines, and probably the whole stand. I wont be using these anymore and have ordered a sealed fuge light. Very thankful there was no major damage.
Anyway, added a hydra 64 to the middle and will be adding 3 additional 32s when I break down my other tank. Looking to start adding and moving some coral in soon, I added a few nems but am not planning on putting too many in this tank. I've had more than enough over the years.

Heres some fishies in the mean time!

April 30, 2021 - YouTube

Disregard the salt on the glass, I got water all over the place earlier :rolleyes:


Also a little tip, if you guys feed sheets of nori, put it in between your mag floats, works a lot better than the suction cups!

As big as the lion has gotten I am a little worried about adding him to this tank. He is fine with the small fish in his tank now as he eats frozen, but I do not want him eating my fish. I had one years ago that was half the size of this beast and he ate a smaller poisonous fish (irresponsible on my part)
 
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Long time no updates! Bottom filling out thanks to @AquaSD and reeffarm.com!
Got some sticks up top, killed one on accident (oops)

Anyone with eels in their tank - tunze coral gum will be your best friend. Strongest epoxy I’ve ever seen (also doesn’t affect the skimmer at all)

Will take better pics tomorrow, am out for a beer now!

PS: feel so spoiled with AI’s auto acclimate settings considering I haven’t kept sps since halide/t5 days!

D88BD2BE-0C08-4F43-A261-D2550FB7B3A3.jpeg 97C6EA05-9099-4D48-82CF-49DFCCA7B0D2.jpeg 587A6734-4666-48E4-93C3-E9B271A5D0F9.jpeg
 
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Upgraded the skimmer found a used SRO 5000 ext. This thing is a BEAST - installing this weekend. Looking forward to a little extra space underneath the stand. Installing this on the other side of the wall.
1626881023083.png

The poor white lab in the background was put down yesterday - she had issues that began in her hips and was then in her spine. She was a great dog and companion for the last 14 years.

Anyway heres a current shot of the tank - still a work in progress.
All moved in and have the nems set up in tanks in an indoor/outdoor area, I do not want many in this tank.
1626881153302.png
 
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Set up the skimmer on the other side of the wall. This is in an indoor/outdoor room so I am hoping I can do away with the need for co2 scrubbing as that stuff adds up over time!
1627842503914.png


Waiting on a new AI hydra for that top 40g tank
 
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Some photos. Been a while since update. Things are doing really good.
 

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Lavabrine ninja

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Hello,

I enjoy this hobby very much and purchased a used 220 gallon a few months ago. It has been an ongoing process preparing the house, stand and the tank itself. I redid all the plumbing as well as bulk heads.

The tank is an older 220 gallon, 72"x24"x29". Thick glass, over 1/2" but under 3/4".
Sump is an old school Oceanic 50 gallon, I modified it a bit, allowing the skimmer to fit in the return section, with 2 2600 gph jebao returns (i've used these products for years, I keep backups). This allowed the middle section of the sump to be used as decent sized fuge, and the supply trickles over filter material, chemi pure blue, and then smaller pieces of live rock.
Skimmer is a Aquamaxx Cone Sq-3, fits perfectly between both return pumps.
I am running a 2 little fishes reactor 550 stuffed full of Seachem Denitrate with around 25-30 gph flow. (Not conventional but one of the best methods I have discovered in 20+ years) Also have a 150 reactor I will use for either algae or GFO.
Brain will be a Apex system with ORP, PH, Salinity, and temp probes. I have a trident as well as the Apex Doser as well that is not set up yet as I do not need to waste the reagents yet.
ATO: Apex ATK
240 lbs sand.
200 lbs rock currently, have another 100 in my 75 which will be consolidated, though I wont add all the rock.
Flow consists of 4 Jebao wavemakers, one of which is the sine one that goes along the back. Will replace with vortechs and icecaps as these go, but no need to spend all that at the start.
Lighting: 4x Ai Hydras, 2 black box leds (these will go right at the ends of the tank vertically) - ERASE THE BLACK BOX ONE CAUGHT FIRE. Going with 1 hydra 64 and 4 32s
Stocking list will include the fish from my 75 gallon:
Large 10-12" Volitan Lion. (maybe. hes huge)
Chainlink Moray eel 14"
Yellow Eye kole tang
Assorted Damsels x3

Current inhabitants in 220:
2x ignitus anthias (had 3 one never took)
Foxface
Scopas tang
Flameback Angel (first time i've ever owned one, these are very cool dwarfs)
Lamarcks Angel
Diamond Goby
Damsel.
Blue Hippo
Purple Tang

Coral - Coming Soon! :)

1619824763261.png


1619824841967.png

1619824867707.png

I set the trident up outside of the stand as I was finding difficulty with space inside.
I think ill run an airline outdoors from the skimmer. I am having trouble keeping my PH above 7.9. Hoping this will be enough.
Also need to upgrade the chiller, 79.6 is a little warm. Close but no cigar on the 1/10 hp.

Fuge is STUFFED full of algae. All sorts, ulva, chaeto, hair, I love it. (so do the tangs) Nitrates are completely non existent anymore however and ill probably be having some fun with dinos for a little while. Eel will take care of the 0 nitrate issue fairly quickly :). I only want 2-5, I do not like running 0.








This big fella will be happy to have a larger home, dang damsel bit his other horn off... ruthless little creatures. They even become predators to the predators!

1616463031844.png





:) :)

1616462911414.png
What can u tell me about the chainlink eel? I want to get ome for my reef tank but I do have small fish
 

A worm with high fashion and practical utility: Have you ever kept feather dusters in your reef aquarium?

  • I currently have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 64 36.8%
  • Not currently, but I have had feather dusters in my tank in the past.

    Votes: 59 33.9%
  • I have not had feather dusters, but I hope to in the future.

    Votes: 25 14.4%
  • I have no plans to have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 26 14.9%
  • Other.

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