45 Gallon Shallow Reef Build

[Patx]

They all jump "someday"... need mesh or etc...

 

[CBonito]

They all jump "someday"... need mesh or etc...

I have a jumpguard, but I freaking hate it. It ruins the entire appeal of my tank. So I never want to use it. My tank is actually really peaceful, so I think I can get by without it. Famous last words, but to change the subject, Stolichnaya and Peach Redbull is pretty good.

 

[CBonito]

These corals are rocking some neat color for being so close to the bottom. I love the pink/purple.
I think I may lower everything a bit when the straton pro arrives because I know that's a pretty powerful dude.

I cant wait to see what happens when I get everything under some more uniform light!

That's a millepora on the top and a tenuis below it. They look great! All 3 of my millepora colonies are growing. I will set up with the same PAR with the ATI Straton, but the corals will be more blanketed now and we're gonna see some crazy stuff happen! In a good way I hope. LOL Millepora have a way of really doing wild stuff when they get high PAR. I plan to get a hold of my dude and acquire a few more as I want a variety of them for contrast.

I'm doing the dino battle right now, but it's not too bad because really the Diamond Goby is doing it for me. You can see it's kind of dying so who knows. I have things real blue and they will remain so, thank you. lol
My tank is still maturing, so it is what it is. Let it ride!

 

[magallonbuckinbulls]

Hello All...

My name is Carmine. I'm new here.

I've been playing with this stuff on and off for over 25 years. My last tank was about 5 years ago though. I had a bad crash on the wrong day and ended up taking it all down. I think they call it rage quitting. hehe

But I have been thinking a lot about it lately and I know a lot of my past failures were my own fault...so there's that.
There were lots of areas that needed improvement and I know that by just doing it all right from scratch with all good equipment, I won't have the problems I've had in the past.

So today, I bought one of these tanks from Advanced Acrylics and most of the equipment I will be using along with it.
It's 36"x24"x12"h. Like 45 gallons I guess which is nice and manageable.

I love the rimless open top design and the fact the overflow doesn't take up any tank real estate.. It makes it so easy to deal with and it's so clean. It's 3/4" acrylic so I know there will never be any turrible episodes. Yeah, I'm aware I may be hit in the head with the occasional jumper. I can live with that. It happens regardless... Anyway, it's got 2 half inch returns and a 1 inch drain. I'm putting some ductors on the return outputs to increase the flow a bit.

I don't know anything about Advanced Acrylics, I've been out of the game for 5 years and I don't know anything in general about what's going on in the hobby. But when I saw this tank I knew it was the one, so I am just trusting and hoping I am happy with it. We'll see what happens. I think it's going to be awesome.

Anyway, I also bought the following stuff today...
Lighting is two Kessel A360x Tuna Blues with the solid brackets, extensions (so I can go as high or low as I want) and the controller.
Remember, this is going to be about 11 inches of real water depth so this is a pretty good amount of light to start with and can be increased in potency with different lenses. Lots of room to play here. These cover 24x24 each, so 2 of them on this tank ought to be pretty good. If the tank was deeper I would have gone with the a500, but I think that light would be too much of a bomber for this. We'll see. I love them because they are small and minimalistic and they are the closest thing to a legit point light source that I've seen...similar
to metal halide.
Sump is a Reef Octopus Octo Reef 36A Sump. It's got a 6 gallon top-off compartment (one of my previous screwups I am not revisiting) so I can just add RO to the reservoir with ATO and let it eat. This is a pretty decent sized sump that is well thought out and I love the way they look too. I ain't playing around this time man...

Skimmer is a Reef Octopus Elite 150 Internal. Yeah, it's a bit big but I like to feed often and again and the tank will end up heavily stocked...everyone says they won't, but they do and I'm tellin ya, it will end up stocked. lol But again, I'm not playing around this time.

Return Pump is a Reef Octopus Varios 4. I think this will do nicely and it's cool that I can turn it up or down as needed. Notice all this stuff is controller compatible...mmmm....yep! This is just for the return so it's probably overkill, but that's cool. Overkill is fine. I bought a check valve to stop the tank from siphoning back through the returns when the pump is paused.

All of the plumbing is red and gray PVC, so it will look cool. I purchased all the proper unions so everything will come apart/ go back together easily for maintenance.

I also bought a brand new 4 stage 75gpd RO which should be more than adequate for this system. It was the right thing to do.

I plan to Keep SPS, Clams, some LPS and zooanthids. I'll have a few fish in there too. Not sure what. But this kind of tank is a great way to create little territories for everyone with lots of hiding spaces. I will definitely have a pair of clowns too.

I am still debating what I am going to do for a controller or what my means of calcium/alk management will be. It's not a huge tank really so I could probably dose 2 part. I am unsure if a kalk reactor or calcium reactor would be practical or smart. But I'm open if anyone has a take on that. I have an older reef keeper that I can use to control stuff, but not sure if there's anything newer and better. Probably. I want to get the tank up and running, get it cycled and then one by one I will get everything dialed in and ultimately automated.

*OH!!! I don't yet have a stand. I really don't want to have all this new stuff and then hack together a 2x4 stand. But I want something that's quality. Anyone know where I could get one for the above measurements? If you had the cash burning a hole what would you do? What's cool out there for a tank like this? I like something modern.*

What kind of water flow/wave maker getup will successfully attach through 3/4" acrylic? I know this will be an issue as time goes on. It always is. I dont want to do closed loops.

I will keep updating as things come in and go together...

Feel free to critique and/or share ideas.

I'm pretty excited to be back in the game.

sweet tank

 

[CBonito]

sweet tank

Thanks Man! Late this week, I'll be rocking the new ATI Straton Pro light, and I'll be scoring several new colonies. Stay tuned!

 

[CBonito]

DUH DUH DUH!!!

There she is kids, the mighty Straton Pro 102. The smallest in the Straton Caste System.
Looks like it's broken into 2 "panels", and when you get the larger two models you basically get a larger chassis with additional modules in it.

So first impression, this thing is like solid man and it looks like something that immature people like myself shouldn't play with, but too bad! We are now! Seriously, this is like some grownup stuff here. Couple notches above the rest. Very nice. That's all powdercoated CNC machined aluminum. Very cool and for a panel style light, still very minimalist. Lenses are nice, reflectors I believe look to be machined into the aluminum? Just a guess.
Meanwell power supply and some strange box that I think maybe is the driver? Probably. All good!

Second impression is that the packing smells like armpits...hey I dunno?

There is zero plastic here, so this can be easily cleaned with a damp microfiber and easily be kept looking good and wont look like doodie in 6 months like a plastic light. I can see how they keep cool because there is a lot of mass to dissipate the LED heat into. It is not something to worry about. It just eliminates a fan, that apparently you dont need and they're using LEDs rated at twice the power they are using so this is built to hopefully "hang" around for a while.

Good Job ATI. See, this is why I buy cars from Germany too. There is an emphasis on not making things so cheap.
Good quality. No plastic! No complaints there.

I'm not sure I'm such a fan of the fixed cable to the fixture, but I understand their design and how it probably needed to be this way, so whatever. If you have a big 'ol tank, you'll be overjoyed at the length of the cables as they are adequate for most.

And then it comes with hanging cables which is kind of like just saying "yup, get your butt to home depot and f-bomb your way through it sucker!" I guess in Europe, hanging lights from cables is like the only way or something, so I won't hate...I'll only make fun. It's all harmless. And I mean, this beautiful hi-tech fixture...no kind of brackets to go along? Come on man!

Manual comes in English, so that's kinda nice.

Ever get something and you have to find your little micro-square of micro-print with a magnifying glass in a manual that has 30 languages? I saw in a few cases, people complaining about everything being in German...not the case here.

So this thing is going to light my 3x2 foot SPS tank. That's what I think anyway. But first I'm going to light up the ceiling and make disco lights, look at all the pretty colors and all the other crap immature people do when they get something really nice...so I can familiarize and get the app working.


I have a feeling it will be worth it.

...and then I'll get some pics in action.

Man! That thing is nice huh? You could knock an intruder clean out with it.

Bwaaaahhh!!! ROCK!!!! Holy crap man...this thing will kill you!

 

[Reign1]

Nice !!
Pics when it it on the tank !!

 

[08TRDOFFROAD]

Nice !!
Pics when it it on the tank !!

I second this motion!

 

[CBonito]

HAHA!!! Victory!!!

Alright, she's setup to talk to my desktop like my apex, and all I need is power and to pull those kessil wires out of my brackets. But I'll do that after I know my life has been changed forever with happiness....let me get this bad boy lit.

In case anyone gives a rip about my horrible mounting problems. Kessil arms work perfectly.
You just need a small spacer on top so the arm doesnt hit the light chassis and you can bolt it onto the arms right through 2 slots in the fixture that are through solid aluminum. I could use this thing as a shelf if I wanted now. Pretty solid. I have to figure out how to remove those hanging wire things from the fixture since I no longer need them, but for now, let me get ignition here, select the mode I like best which I think is the "deep water" or "shallow lagoon" Not sure yet, we'll fire this thing up and see if it's all that...or if I'm going to start breaking stuff.

 

[CBonito]

Ok, so she's working.

I'm getting 279 PAR right now how I have things set close to the bottom and the top guys are getting like 370-400ish PAR at the top. I am using NO white at all, a lot of royal blue and blue and some cyan.

There is a little disco duck action on the sand near the edges, but nothing to make me cry. The light is indeed very uniform. That acro colony on the top left is about the limit where you're going to get good light up near the top. I could move it down a bit or over to the right and the PAR will increase significantly, but even when I look at it from top down, it's getting a lot more light now and it's growing quite a bit from multiple branches. Thing is, I can create PAR levels that are ridiculous. I just don't want to overdo it at this point. This is a really cool light. Very different from the kessils but very good indeed. It's staying. I am going to redo my rockwork and place all corals a bit lower, then bomb them. But let them get used to this for now. Changing lights is a culture shock for corals, but they look good right now, so I'll leave it and we'll see where we are in a few days. I expect the corals will color up quite a bit better now that they're getting a uniform spread. My frags down low in the front seem to have better polyp extension than they did which is cool. They were only getting 120 PAR before. Now they're getting quite a bit.

I created a basic light schedule and we'll see what happens. I will ramp the par up every few days until I am over 400ish PAR 17 inches or so down from the light.

I am going to acquire some more colonies this weekend and I need a new cleanup crew and want some anthias too...so there's that.

It's a winner!

 

[CBonito]

Just bought 6 new acro colonies of some really nice rainbow tennies and more millepora because you can't have enough....

 

[CBonito]

I know, I know..."but they don't look blue!!!"

Here...lol I get to see this during ramp up and sundown.

I have to adjust my rock work, kill some algae and get ready to add new colonies.
Cool thing is all of my acros come from the same dude, and his systems are solid and his corals are too.

Oh and here's how I hung my ATI Straton Pro on Kessil brackets, using ATI's cable hanging kit. lol
Pretty awesome, eh?

 

[Ernie Mccracken]

Daaaang I have high hopes for this one. I hope that light is the ultimate.

 

[CBonito]

Daaaang I have high hopes for this one. I hope that light is the ultimate.

Well, I hope so too! It's one of those things that's priced ridiculously which is why many won't touch it.
But so far I want to say I like it a lot. The GUI is pretty decent and makes it very easy to set the light up and none of it is really hard to understand. The wifi is totally solid as well. No drops in connectivity or anything like that.
It stays logged into your access point and you just hit it on your browser. No apps to load or anything like that. It's all in the light.

Basically this thing has 7 light channels, and you can mix all of those light channels to create one color which you can then store and use in one "segment" of your light schedule. So you can make all these colors yourself and store them, and then over the course of the photoperiod, you can change each color/intensity you create of the light from deep blue, to like aqua and then white for example which it will automatically blend and transition in between....then back as you get to sunset. Really cool. The par it produces is enough to make me not want to *** around and find out, so I am relegated to slow increases over the next couple weeks.

For every light preset there are three modes for acclimation, corals already acclimated and then corals acclimated to high light, so you can choose levels within each preset to start with. The light even tells you what it thinks the PAR will be based on what they know from their initial testing and it's pretty accurate against my PAR Meter.

It looks like this thing that wouldn't do a heck of a lot but there is a lot of thought into it. I mean, it's just a light, but there's a lot of controllability and info. It even tells you how much power it's using.

If it performs to a high standard I'll definitely be happy because at this point, I don't feel like I paid a ton of money for just another piece of junk. It doesn't detract from the fact that I still spent a lot of money on it, but I don't feel bad about it so far is what I mean. I think it's going to do good but like anything in this hobby, whether something is good or not only reveals itself in time.

 

[SomeHappyFish]

Vid of everyone this morning. Except maybe my Flame Hawk who is being a shady fool in the right rock pile somewhere.

So everyone that arrived yesterday made it through the night.

So what kind of beneficial critters do people with wrasses and flame hawks use?

I love the look of the branches ! Hermits would look good in that type of setup !

How many fish do you currently have ?

 

[CBonito]

I love the look of the branches ! Hermits would look good in that type of setup !

How many fish do you currently have ?

A Midas Blenny, A Melanurus Wrasse, 3 Chromis, a Flame Hawk and a Diamond Goby. I plan to add either anthias or fairies and maybe an algae eating fish I have yet to decide on. That's a few weeks out from now.

I have 50 hermits coming tomorrow with 150 mixed snails...and 6 new acropora colonies.
So not only am I adding a cleanup crew and new corals, I am adding new strains of bacteria to my tank out of a well working system which is also a great thing and more consumption of nutrient.

 

[SomeHappyFish]

Its a cool fish list ! Anthias are nice but require often feeding if you can manage it. Lawnmoyer blenny are funny and good from what I have heard !

Not going to lie but 50 hermit and 150 snails seems a bit too much. I have seen bigger build with way less hermit and snails... Should build your way up with them but it might be fine depending how much you feed

Get a Clean Up Crew (CUC) for your reef | Melev's Reef

melevsreef.com

 

[CBonito]

Ok so, I changed my rockwork on the left side of the tank and got some frags placed where I think I want them.

The idea of two islands the same height kind of turned me off, and the rock on the left was too high anyway. I want everything to be in the spread of the light and not so high in the tank where it ruins the space. I want swimming room overhead because I envision more schooling fish swimming back and forth. Some kind of pink fish. I dunno. But I want the corals to take up some vertical space and not have the crap where things are poking out of the water.

Anyway, I am now also prepared to pick up my new acro colonies. I'm really excited about the new ones. I don't even know where I'm going to put them. LOL! I need one of those giant things of putty and a big thing of glue man...but these should really fill in some space and I hope to see a little more color contrast. I am also going to really enjoy seeing colors intensify as I slowly give them more light. I have PLENTY of that. Man I ain't lyin!

Gonna redo the rock on the right side of the tank tomorrow to facilitate the new arrivals. I want things lower so there is space over the corals and so they are bathed in light. I mean, this is what I wanted to do anyway. I wanted like a reef crest kind of deal where there is a lot of back and forth water movement, shallow water and bright light. That's where all the crazy wild colonies come from that everyone buys, then kills. LOL

And some more of my dookie photography. I dunno man. Some people just weren't meant to do certain things,
ya know? I know...yup.

 

[CBonito]

What the ATI Straton App looks like...and it's PAR guestimations on the top left which are actually pretty accurate.
Just going to slowly ramp things up until the corals say "hey, we're good...".

 

[CBonito]

Ordered a 27 watt UV sterilizer today because these freaking dinos won't go away. I'm making them SOBs go away...Should have just got one to begin with, but want/need...whatever...it's all good. I'm not being derailed by anything.