50g Shallow Mixed Reef

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50g tank 48Lx20Dx12H

Equipment:

Trigger Ruby 36 bought used
Bubble Magus Curve 7 (reused from old tank)
DCT 6000
2x mp10 quietdrives (reused from old tank)
2x G3 xr30 non-pro (reused from old tank)
2x 150-watt Fluval heaters (reused from old tank)
Apex classic (reused from old tank)

temp probe
ph probe
2x eb8
wxm
breakout box​

2x 1.1ml/minute brs dosers
Marshydro led grow light
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Livestock from old tank:
Fish:

4" marine betta
3" melanarus wrasse
3" sailfin tang (will be rehoming)
3" female ocellaris clown
2 1/2" male ocellaris misbar clown​

Corals:

sunset monti
mystic sunset monti
jedi mind trick
spongodes
season's greetings cap
bonsai tree
pink/orange lobo
orange/green lobo
6 types of multi head acans
30+ head frogspawn
6" galaxia
8" pink photosynthetic gorgonian sp.
various zoanthids, palys, discosoma, rhodactics, polyps, lps frags.​

Inverts:

2" purple urchin sp
4 1/2" derasa (died after move)
5-6 snails turban and trochas​

New livestock:

2" Yellow eye kole tang
3x 3/4" yellow tail damsels
5 turbo snails
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The old tank was a 37 column tank with a plumbed in 20 gallon refugium, 20g frag tank, and 20g sump. The combination of the all the tanks was a nightmare to keep clean and the tank had gone through a couple mini crashes where I lost livestock, so I decided to do a reset. The old tank was setup in a bedroom converted office. The display was adjacent to a closet that housed the frag, and sump tanks. Plumbed through the wall.

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What I started with, bought used from a local hobbiest. The tank is in decent shape, a few scratches but nothing too bad. It has an overflow box installed with a 2" bulkhead that is glued to a street elbow. I am sure this combination was super noisy.

 

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I cut the bulkhead with a hacksaw to remove it. I knew there was a decent chance that I would reuse this bulkhead so I tried not to mangle it. I wanted to create a silent overflow so I took an old used inky box and glued a piece of acrylic onto the open side to make a closed box. I drilled the bottom for 2 1" bulkheads and the side for the 2" bulkhead to clamp it to the tank. This allows me a herbie style overflow. I did reuse the original bulkhead with a new gasket. I cleaned up the hacksaw cut on the band saw. Plumbing is red sch40 with gray sch80 fittings. Drains are 1" return is 3/4". Unfortunately I did a lot of work with out progress pictures.

 

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I glued all the pvc and filled the tank up with tap water for testing. Everything looked good so I drained it and then decided to paint the bottom and repaint the back of the tank since I was planning to run bare bottom. The tank is setup in an unfinished basement. I wanted to finish the basement first, but didn't really have the time or money right now. I will work around the tank the best I can when the time comes.

 

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It took a few days to get the tank up to temperature. Moved the livestock and liverock from the old tank on 2/25. Things were kinda thrown in at the time, but I actually liked how it ended up. The rocks were held together with fiberglass rods and epoxy in the old tank and I was able to basically break the structure into two shorter columns/piles. You can see I just through some egg crate on top to keep the fish in and at the time was using a single radion with an rms mount. I was in a hurry to get stuff out of the old tank and get the reset started. Very glad I did.

 

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I was planning to run an open stand but a few nights after setup, the red light flooding the basement was too much so I decided to face the stand with melamine. While I was at it, I would build a canopy. I wasn't sure how I was going to mount the lights with an open top, and I am super paranoid about fish jumping (I have lost about 10 fish to carpet surfing in the past) so this would solve both concerns. I drew up a cut plan to take to home depot. I had them make all the major panel cuts for me. The results would have been better if I had cut the melamine myself but it is heavy and I didn't want to mess with it. I also figured the tank is in an unfinished basement and this was a utilitarian project, although it turned out looking pretty good. Pocket Screws!!!!

 

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The hood opens from the mid top. the sides stay in place. The lights sit in a sled made from 2 aluminum angles. This arrangement allows me to easily move them in and out and side to side. Height adjustment would require some modification if needed.

 

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Some top down pictures.

Radion xr30 g3 all channels @ 100%

 

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Added some rock and moved some stuff around. The sailfin has been nipping at my acans pretty bad so he may need to go soon.

I want to grow mostly sps on the center structure. That will add some height that I think will balance things out well.

 

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My sump has gotten very funky since startup only 2 weeks ago. Lots of green film/slime/diatoms/cyano. I don't know for sure what to call it. The sump was very clean just a few days ago. Not a huge deal but could be tedious to do maintenance. The fuge section can grow all it wants but it's troublesome to have it on the protein skimmer and return pump. Maybe I should swap the fuge and the protein skimmer?

I am going to run the fuge light less, but I'm going to do it with a pH if/then condition. My tanks have always run high pH. The normal swing is 8.3 to 8.6. 8.3 at night right before the fuge light comes on and raises all night long. The peak of pH is when the fuge light goes off. So I set the light on from 11am to 11pm but off when pH reached 8.5. this should knock an hour+ off the light cycle.

 

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Things have settled in nicely. I added some frags this week. All pictures taken under radions (all channels @ 100%) with a pixel phone.

 

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I've been chasing alkalinity and pH, but I think I have it under control. Ph has always been high on my tanks, rarely dropping below 8.3 and often hitting 8.6. When I mounted my new frags, I used some epoxy which made my skimmer go crazy, and I couldn't get it settled down for about a week. In the week my pH shot way up and my alk dropped to around 4 at the same time. I couldn't get my 2part doses to buffer the alk, although they did raise the pH even more, I almost hit 9 at one point. Magnesium was around 1250. I have dosed it back up to 1350. Calcium has always been around 440. I threw in a bag of carbon and the skimmer is running again. The pH dropped and the alk is back up to 7.5. I dose 26ml of brs 2 part daily. I have a very large ball of chaeto, so I think there was too much oxygen in the water which prevented the alkalinity to buffer. With the skimmer running, it provides enough gas exchange to raise the co2 levels which allows the alkalinity to raise? That sounds backwards, usually you need the skimmer to lower co2 levels.

 

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