Aquavim 150 Gallon Corner Tank

alabella1

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Well, after a little over a year I have outgrown my RSM250. I changed out the T5 lights for a Steve's LED hood retrofit. I upgraded to a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer and added 2x ecotech MP40s. I have a wifi inkbird to control my heater and chiller.

On to bigger and better things!

My LFS happened to have my dream tank on the floor for sale. The price was absolutely too good to pass up. $2650 delivered.

Came with:

Tank, Cabinet, Generic Led Light
Sump (eshopps reef sump 200)
Return Pump (Vectra M2)
Skimmer (eshopps s-200)
Phos Reactor 150

I will be bringing over my JBJ Arctica Chiller and my 2x MP40s.

I bought 100lbs of new tropic eden sand and I'm buying some live rock from a buddy. I'll be bringing over all rocks, coral and fish once the cycle is complete. I also bought this 100lb rubbermaid bin since all I have are 20 and 30 gal buckets. Sticking with Reef Crystals for my salt. I ordered 2x 300watt eheim heaters. I also snagged a Neptune Sky off ebay.

Only parts I'm missing that I plan to scoop up is a Tunze ATO, maybe do a fuge or algae scrubber and a larger UV filter.

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alabella1

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Thanks!! I'll keep posting updates as it all comes together. Quite possibly the best part is I'm using up all the room in the corner that was wasted by the RSM250. It's nearly the exact same footprint and distance from the wall but I've almost tripled my volume!
 
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alabella1

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Taking my first crack at a real aquascape with acrylic rods and mortar. It was a learning experience for sure but I learned a lot and I'm pretty happy with the results. Can wait to get these into the tank!
 

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alabella1

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Tank is 100% up and running. Dumped in Dr. Tim's one and only and my first 2 tbsp of ammonia last night. Wish me luck for a successful cycle!
 

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Bobthebrewer

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Well, after a little over a year I have outgrown my RSM250. I changed out the T5 lights for a Steve's LED hood retrofit. I upgraded to a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer and added 2x ecotech MP40s. I have a wifi inkbird to control my heater and chiller.

On to bigger and better things!

My LFS happened to have my dream tank on the floor for sale. The price was absolutely too good to pass up. $2650 delivered.

Came with:

Tank, Cabinet, Generic Led Light
Sump (eshopps reef sump 200)
Return Pump (Vectra M2)
Skimmer (eshopps s-200)
Phos Reactor 150

I will be bringing over my JBJ Arctica Chiller and my 2x MP40s.

I bought 100lbs of new tropic eden sand and I'm buying some live rock from a buddy. I'll be bringing over all rocks, coral and fish once the cycle is complete. I also bought this 100lb rubbermaid bin since all I have are 20 and 30 gal buckets. Sticking with Reef Crystals for my salt. I ordered 2x 300watt eheim heaters. I also snagged a Neptune Sky off ebay.

Only parts I'm missing that I plan to scoop up is a Tunze ATO, maybe do a fuge or algae scrubber and a larger UV filter.

IMG_5549.jpg IMG_5550.jpg IMG_5552.jpg IMG_5553.jpg 67598430264__C929F062-20A8-4DE9-A472-DCAA2D9EB355.jpg IMG_5785.jpg IMG_5875.jpg IMG_5878.jpg IMG_5880.jpg IMG_5919.jpg
Nice hopefully one day I can find a good deal on a corner tank or a pentagon tank.
 
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alabella1

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Nice hopefully one day I can find a good deal on a corner tank or a pentagon tank.
I know of two people selling on facebook marketplace. One is in Sauguerties, NY and the other is in New Hampshire. I was about to grab the NH one - 120gal aqua vim but last minute happened to see this one for sale at my LFS.
 
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alabella1

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Nice, I dig the quarter and half cylinder tanks. I always wanted a quarter style, but never had the wall to use it.

Looks like a trade in to the LFS?
I had a Red Sea Max 250 and was wasting so much space in that corner. This tank is 3x the water volume and does not come out as far from the wall as the Red Sea.
 
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alabella1

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Things are coming along. Cycled with Dr. Tim's one and only and ammonia. Been adding ammonia every other day or so and testing the levels. Did my first water change after a week. Tons of nitrates 20-30+, nitrites sitting around .25 and ammonia around .1 so it's getting closer every day.
 
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alabella1

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Wow. First off apologies for my neglect of this thread. So much has gone on since my last post. Once my cycle was complete I started slowly adding fish.

I started with my lunate tail crescent wrasse, firefish. I later followed with the pajama cardinal and tomini tang. The last of my 6 survivors were the golden nugget wrasse and the yellow coris wrasse who upon being added to the DT started acting crazy, swimming upside down, letting himself get sucked up against the MP40s. I put him back in QT and he was dead by morning. The firefish just didn't seem to adjust so he also ended up dying.

So the grand total of deaths from this disease outbreak was like 15 or 16. I had 4 survivors.

Restocking time. I snagged a Purple Tang and a Whitetail Bristletooth that 2 guys were looking to rehome. Brought the two of em home and right into QT. I then grabbed a fully QT'd pair of Gold stripe maroon clowns. After that I added a fully QT'd orchid dottyback and an indigo dottyback.

Somewhere around this time the lunate crescent committed suicide by overflow and I ended up finding him dead in a filter sock.

Next was a Sailfin Tang that someone was looking to rehome. He went into my second QT tank.

Once the three tangs completed QT protocol I added them to the DT.

Next wave of fully QT'd fish arrived. I added them to my cleaned QT tanks for observation. I added a dracula goby/curly que pistol shrimp to the DT so they could bond. One QT tank got the male and female blue throat triggers. The other got the cleaner wrasse, small Naso blonde tang, magnificent foxface and royal gramma. After a couple weeks of observation I added the triggers. The male died after a couple days. He was always in hiding and just never quite adjusted. The female is thriving.

After a bit more observation, the gramma and cleaner were moved to the DT. The foxface and naso were still being very shy and hiding and were colored like they were stressed. The naso did not make it out of QT. The foxface began looking ok so I moved him to the DT.

A guy was getting rid of a falco hawkfish so I snagged him and put into QT. I also grabbed a Quoyi Parrotfish and an Oreni Tilefish who went into the other QT. Not sure when exactly, but the dracula goby found his way into the overflow and I found him dead in a filter sock. I put some mesh into the overflow to stop the fish from sneaking into there but somehow he still got in.

Snagged a Gem Tang for a steal of a deal - fully QT'd. Put him in observation for a bit.

Around this time I ended up losing the Parrot in QT. He went a little nutty. Then i noticed he was heavy breathing and just overall acting weird. I tried my best to nurse him back but he passed.

The time came to move the Gem Tang to the DT and at first it was okay, but then he was being ruthlessly bullied by the purple tang.

This whole time I have been lights out per BRS recommendations. While monitoring the tang I turned up the lights and noticed my sailfin looking REALLY dusty and spots. I was like oh no, not again. Well... it appears this time it's ich and not velvet thankfully. But it was time to start getting everyone outta there. While moving everyone out I noticed the trigger was pretty infected as was the tomini. They are all in QT and doing well so far. While removing everyone though I found the royal gramma's body under the rocks.

I also noticed the whitetail was acting kinda nuts. Mouth agape, not eating, breathing heavy. He apparently got some sort of mouth injury in the DT and despite feeding with a tube and isolating him, he still passed away.

Chalk this up to bad timing, but I had already ordered a few more fish that were headed to QT... which now are much more crowded. The tailspot blenny, small lamarck's angel arrived from LiveAquaria and went right into QT. The Parrotfish replacements included a Choati Wrasse and a pair of Zebra Swallowtail Angels.

After only a few days I lost the Lamarck's who was just too stressed out I guess.

So you're up to date now. All fish are split into 2 QT tanks. They have been in copper about a week now. The DT is fallow. Since it's fallow anyway, I went to work on my Aquascape and various equipment updates.

The good news is Dr. Reef is being awesome and working with me to replace the male trigger, dracula goby, and blonde naso. Not rushing that order though until my QT and fallow period are over.
 
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alabella1

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Ok... so on to gear updates. I found many amazing deals from people shutting down or taking a break from the hobby. I started with an Apex EL, 2x EB832, Cor20, FMM and flow monitors, some random modules - he also had a AI Fuge light, Red Sea 300 skimmer, pumps, wavemakers, heaters galore, some random plumbing, a bigger rodi, 2 small tanks (which became my QTs), a few 45gal brutes, a brute full of rock, Radion XR15 and XR30 G5s with mounts and diffusers, 2x MP40s, 2x MP10s, 2x hob UVs, BRS dual reactor, 5 gal ato, a TON of BRS dosing mixes and containers, and various foods, medications, testing kits. Another guy cashing out I got a Clear Water CW-100 scrubber, Trident, Dos and Apex gold 2016 wifi. I later snagged a 15 gal ATO and Tunze Osmolator. I grabbed the apex par meter, 2x auto feeders and 2 more DOS for a total of 3.

I swapped my Vectra M2 for the Cor20. I sold the M2 and the Red Sea skimmer to my co-worker/friend/reef sherpa.

I just cannot stop shopping and cannot let a good deal pass... so I grabbed a Deltec 1500i skimmer for a steal and a Deltec VF4000 fleece roller for an even bigger steal.

The new Apex stuff dropped so of course I snagged the new A3 Pro and some extra sensors. I really need to stop buying **** and start selling ****!!

Looking for a new sump to accomodate the fleece roller. Snagged a used Bashsea 3615 in orange and gray, but UPS misplaced the package and are searching for it as we speak. Really great price too which sucks as these are hard to come by.

I ended up upgrading my 2x 400w heaters to 2x 800w which will sub on and off every 12 hours. Also snagged 2x Ranco controllers.

Got sick of smelly brown buckets from the reef crystals, so I went back to the Purple Bucket IO. I got a sick deal at Petsmart last month and ordered like 10 buckets for $22 a piece!!

Last I've been trying to decide on making my own control board or trying the adaptive reef boards.

My stuff is kinda all over the place and much has not even been hooked up as of yet.

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alabella1

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So... time for some pictures. Aquascaping... I ended up combining two of the pieces that were already in the DT and created one bigger piece. Today I took ALL the rocks I picked up from that guy and instead of doing mortar like last time, I opted for @Glue Masters super glue and Marcorocks Rock powder. This stuff worked amazingly well and I was able to create some cool caves, overhangs, branches, shelves.

Oh... one thing I forgot to add. All coral still remains in the RSM250 and I've been picking some stuff up here and there. The tank is ready to burst. I may try to bring over some coral before returning the fish. So they will all be moving back into and awesome new DT.

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alabella1

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I finally settled on lights after some testing and polling and suggestions. I ended up going with 2x Neptune Skys and a Kessill A360x. I was going to upgrade the G5s to G6s, but since I ended up going all in on Neptune I figured I'd roll with the skys. Here is how that hashed out.

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Awesome progress @alabella1. Loving the aquascape.

How do you like the Neptune skys? The red sea ReefLeds are working fine but the color and shimmer isn't the same as my Kessil AP700. It creates clean white shimmer, while the ReefLeds oddly has a disco ball effect.
 
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alabella1

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Awesome progress @alabella1. Loving the aquascape.

How do you like the Neptune skys? The red sea ReefLeds are working fine but the color and shimmer isn't the same as my Kessil AP700. It creates clean white shimmer, while the ReefLeds oddly has a disco ball effect.
TBH the Neptunes have little to no shimmer. As far as brightness, color and coverage go they look pretty great. No shadowing at all. I added a Kessil A360x in the center which I can crank up if/when I want some shimmer. @Jon's Reef made that recommendation and it is a gamechanger.
 

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So... time for some pictures. Aquascaping... I ended up combining two of the pieces that were already in the DT and created one bigger piece. Today I took ALL the rocks I picked up from that guy and instead of doing mortar like last time, I opted for @Glue Masters super glue and Marcorocks Rock powder. This stuff worked amazingly well and I was able to create some cool caves, overhangs, branches, shelves.

Oh... one thing I forgot to add. All coral still remains in the RSM250 and I've been picking some stuff up here and there. The tank is ready to burst. I may try to bring over some coral before returning the fish. So they will all be moving back into and awesome new DT.

IMG_9861.jpeg IMG_9862.jpeg IMG_9926.jpeg IMG_0001.jpeg IMG_0002.jpeg IMG_0003.jpeg IMG_0004.jpeg IMG_9997.jpeg IMG_9998.jpeg IMG_9999.jpeg
Love what you have done with the different textures on these. Looks great @alabella1
 
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alabella1

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Love what you have done with the different textures on these. Looks great @alabella1
Turns out they are way bigger and heavier than I expected. Two out of three big ones are in... Gonna be tough to get the last one in there... might have to do it in 2 pieces and try to glue them wet. with some epoxy superglue sandwiches
 

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.

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  • I have not had feather dusters, but I hope to in the future.

    Votes: 25 13.0%
  • I have no plans to have feather dusters in my tank.

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