270g FOWLR and Fish Room Build (image heavy)

[TheWB]

Thanks for the info. I did not rough up the screen that is on there now, but I figured I would need to do that on my other screens.

Roughing up the screen on both sides will help a lot. You may also consider getting a second submersible light and placing it on the other side. That should speed your growth, depending on how much you want.

 

[JumboShrimp]

To @TheWB 's point, when I made one (DIY), it did very little until I roughed the screen up-- and not just with sandpaper, but more like gouging up the surface with a wood file. Best wishes.

 

[Oberst Hajj]

Roughing up the screen on both sides will help a lot. You may also consider getting a second submersible light and placing it on the other side. That should speed your growth, depending on how much you want.

To @TheWB 's point, when I made one (DIY), it did very little until I roughed the screen up-- and not just with sandpaper, but more like gouging up the surface with a wood file. Best wishes.

Thanks guys, I'll rough it up quite a bit and see how it does.

 

[Oberst Hajj]

I'm trying to get some video of the different fish I have. Let me know what you guys thinks of this first one...

Desjardini Sailfin Tang

 

[Jeffcb]

I'm trying to get some video of the different fish I have. Let me know what you guys thinks of this first one...

Desjardini Sailfin Tang

Nice video. Cool fish!

 

[Oberst Hajj]

Here is my Blond Naso Tang, Billy...

 

[JumboShrimp]

Loving it!

 

[Oberst Hajj]

This weekend I got a little bit of laser time for the fish room. Here's a quick video of what I did. Can anyone guess as to what these will be used for?

 

[Oberst Hajj]

Meet "Guy", our Powder Brown Tang.

 

[Oberst Hajj]

So the laser work was to make some saltwater proof labels to go on the sump and around the fishroom so that my wife or the tank sitter can more easily identify where an issue is and I can talk them through fixing it over the phone. I will also be writing up some procedures that will live in a binder in the fishroom for my trips that take me out of cell phone coverage. I am going to have pictures in the procedures that also shows the number/letter assigned to each section/part. Hopefully that will make it easy for the person to read what needs to be done and show them exactly where it needs to be done at.

I also cut some water level markers for just a quick glance check to make sure everything is running as it should be.

 

[New&no clue]

So the laser work was to make some saltwater proof labels to go on the sump and around the fishroom so that my wife or the tank sitter can more easily identify where an issue is and I can talk them through fixing it over the phone. I will also be writing up some procedures that will live in a binder in the fishroom for my trips that take me out of cell phone coverage. I am going to have pictures in the procedures that also shows the number/letter assigned to each section/part. Hopefully that will make it easy for the person to read what needs to be done and show them exactly where it needs to be done at.

I also cut some water level markers for just a quick glance check to make sure everything is running as it should be.

So smart, I should implement that. A typical conversation with my husband

Husband: You're tank is beeping
Me: What is Beeping?
Husband: I don't know a box
Me; Which box?
Husband: One of the white ones...
Me:...

 

[Janci]

So the laser work was to make some saltwater proof labels to go on the sump and around the fishroom so that my wife or the tank sitter can more easily identify where an issue is and I can talk them through fixing it over the phone. I will also be writing up some procedures that will live in a binder in the fishroom for my trips that take me out of cell phone coverage. I am going to have pictures in the procedures that also shows the number/letter assigned to each section/part. Hopefully that will make it easy for the person to read what needs to be done and show them exactly where it needs to be done at.

I also cut some water level markers for just a quick glance check to make sure everything is running as it should be.

Cool idea.
And more sleak than my permanent marker...

 

[Oberst Hajj]

So smart, I should implement that. A typical conversation with my husband

Husband: You're tank is beeping
Me: What is Beeping?
Husband: I don't know a box
Me; Which box?
Husband: One of the white ones...
Me:...

That sounds like my wife and I talking! lol

Cool idea.
And more sleak than my permanent marker...

Since I have access to the laser and already had the acrylic laying around, I figured I might as well use it.

 

[Oberst Hajj]

I finally finished up the canopy build a couple of weeks ago. I'm not really happy with how it turned out and I'm thinking of ways to rebuild it already. Here is the full tank shot with the canopy on...

And here is the reason I'm going to be rebuilding it...

The front of it has started to warp pretty badly As you can see, not only does it look bad it also lets the light escape which is a double No Bueno.

So, it is off to the drawing board again for the canopy.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I love your set-up, including the crystal clear water.

 

[Oberst Hajj]

I love your set-up, including the crystal clear water.

Thanks, but the water only looks crystal clear. I'm actually getting a lot of micro bubbles from somewhere

 

[Oberst Hajj]

Well, the in sump algae scrubber seems to be working... at least it is growing algae.

I don't know if it is helping to reduce my Nitrates and Phosphate though. I setup the scrubber on Jan 23 and 50g + water changes on Jan 29th and Feb 5th, but then I skipped three weeks and did not do a change until Feb 26th. My Nitrates are at their third highest level (27.3ppm) since I setup the tank and the Phosphates are at their highest (0.41ppm). But who knows, without the scrubber those numbers might have been higher.

Also on the nutrient front, I used my laser to make a filter sock holder that replaces the refugium section lid. This allows me to run my syphon hose right back into the sump. Now I can take as long as needed to clean the sand bed while the system is operating normally.

As you can see it collects a lot of sand and gunk, even with the little filter screen on the tube body. When I'm done, I can simply set the lid and filter sock on to a 5g bucket and let it dry out for cleaning later.

So that this post is not all work and no play, I snapped this cell phone pic of Krusty out Clown Trigger Fish. He is one of the newer/younger fish that we have and he tends to put him self to bed much earlier than everyone else. He has even been known to take a Sunday afternoon nap in his special spot! lol

 

[Oberst Hajj]

Sometime last year we started having issues with our garage door openers. Sometimes it would open from the car remote, sometimes it would not. Sometimes the keypad would open it, sometimes it would not. Then this last fall I noticed that the garage door opener for the 3rd bay was also acting this way (we don't really use that bay as I park my truck out in the shop). That got me to thinking that it was not an issue with the actual garage door opener and that maybe something was interfering with the signals. If I stood directly below the openers, they worked like a champ from the remotes. The internet lead me down many possibilities for where the interference could be coming from, but nothing fixed my issue.

Finally one source said to turn off all the breakers in the house and test the openers as the breakers were turned back on one by one. As you can imagine that would be a huge pain to do, but I it was the last thing I could try. Then it dawned on me that nothing had changed in our house except for the new tank and fishroom and those were right there in the garage! So, I turned off the two newly installed breakers for the fishroom and the openers worked perfectly! I then proceeded to unplug everything from the outlets on those two breakers and test as I added things back. After a little trial and error, I found that just having the EB832s plugged in to the outlets (no Apex head unit connected to it) would cause interference with the openers.

Does the EB832 have any type of transmitter in it? I don't think it does, but how else could it interfere with the openers?

 

[Oberst Hajj]

The interference issue turned out to be relatively easy to fix, a cardboard box and some tin foil for the win!

It does not look very good but it works. I may end up making a better one later one, but for now the Wife is off my back about her garage door not opening!

 

[JumboShrimp]

Take your invention to "Shark Tank" and tell Mr. Wonderful I said 'Hi!'