Ash's 400 Gallon Reef

[That Crusso Kid]

Hey @Ashish Patel Over 6 months since any updates. What's new? What's different? What's happening?

 

[Ashish Patel]

Tanks doing well. Unfortunately my system can't grow tenuis acros and I think its because my Nitrates are too high. 40ppm and above.

It took awhile but I am happy with the system. 120gallon waterchanges every 4-5 months. Super low maintenance

 

[Ashish Patel]

So my skimmer has been grossly undersized for my system - but i made it work by just being on top of making sures its constantly working at peak efficiency, but its just getting old quickly so I am looking at upgrading to a 12" diameter Reef octopus recirculating skimmer. I have a pump pushing water to the Turf scrubber and figured I could just replace the pump and Tee it to feed the skimmer. I definately dont want the skimmer outside of the sump so may just add it directly to the sump water or figure out a way to make a platform in the sump.

The cost of the skimmer has always been the reason why i've not upgraded but I strongly feel me having to constantly dose Vodka, and Phosphates to counter the vodka dosing, could soon be a thing of the past. I would love to just have a large enough skimmer that I can just stop or minimize my vodka dosing, which is at 26ML per day.

This is the skimmer I am leaning towards, let me know if you have any thoughts?



https://aquacave.com/reef-octopus-s...ptNeKTLCp4PS0HG-y9mtjw21e5SWzYGMaApxcEALw_wcB

 

[motoking_1990]

Following…

 

[Ashish Patel]

Ordered this skimmer - i've seen enough, most of the acros I like do NOT like high Nitrates or too much crap in the water colum. I couldnt wait until black friday i've waited 4 years wanted to upgrade but just putting it off. None of my higher end acros grow, most die and some just remain 1"frags, like the pink floyd, strawberry shortcake, and some high end corn bred acro. Find me another tank with high end tenuis acros that have super higher nitrates

Hopefully this solves my nutrients issues and i can just rely on the skimmer and algae turf scrubber once dialed.

I plan on removing my vectra m1 from my QT tank, replacing it with my ATS pump. and using the vectra m1 to feed the skimmer and the ATS. my ecotech vectra has been running continuously for almost 10 years so I worry its going to stop suddently. I think it will be nice having a controllable pump feeding the skimmer aswell as having a controllable recirculating pump in the skimmer. I figure if the nutrients do ever come down than I can just reduce the flow going into the skimmer but never completely having to shut it down.


next up figuring out how to mount this skimmer above my sump water line.

 

[Ashish Patel]

I haven’t mentioned this before — I’m a licensed financial professional with New York Life, and by night I’m a raging aquarium addict.


I help families and business owners with:
Life insurance
Retirement planning
College savings
Group benefits (Life & Health)


It’s a shame how the most important financial lessons aren’t taught in school — and that’s why I’m passionate about helping people find solutions for the things that keep them up at night.


I can’t post my business card here, but if you’d like to chat or learn more, feel free to reach out. I’m always happy to help however I can! 26776118, four,eight

 

[MONTANTK]

Ordered this skimmer - i've seen enough, most of the acros I like do NOT like high Nitrates or too much crap in the water colum. I couldnt wait until black friday i've waited 4 years wanted to upgrade but just putting it off. None of my higher end acros grow, most die and some just remain 1"frags, like the pink floyd, strawberry shortcake, and some high end corn bred acro. Find me another tank with high end tenuis acros that have super higher nitrates

Hopefully this solves my nutrients issues and i can just rely on the skimmer and algae turf scrubber once dialed.

I plan on removing my vectra m1 from my QT tank, replacing it with my ATS pump. and using the vectra m1 to feed the skimmer and the ATS. my ecotech vectra has been running continuously for almost 10 years so I worry its going to stop suddently. I think it will be nice having a controllable pump feeding the skimmer aswell as having a controllable recirculating pump in the skimmer. I figure if the nutrients do ever come down than I can just reduce the flow going into the skimmer but never completely having to shut it down.


next up figuring out how to mount this skimmer above my sump water line.

At the store I worked at we would cut pvc pipe to use as legs and zip tie it to egg crate to bring it above the water line. Can’t go wrong with a reef octopus skimmer

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Tanks doing well. Unfortunately my system can't grow tenuis acros and I think its because my Nitrates are too high. 40ppm and above.

It took awhile but I am happy with the system. 120gallon waterchanges every 4-5 months. Super low maintenance

Tank is looking amazing! Do you have a recent fts?

 

[Ashish Patel]

Tank is looking amazing! Do you have a recent fts?

Thanks, just took the pic.. FTS dont look good bc things dont grow on the right side well, I think its because my return is shooting down and skrewing things up. Also thing i dont have enough PAR so definately need to get a PAR meter and sort the light issue out, I don't believe 3 radions at 65% on my tank is sufficient, I make it work by adding lower light loving corals along the sides like montis and stylos but eventually I would like more acros, also can't seem to keep zoas happy beside the red kind, strange.

 

[motoking_1990]

Got the sump today

Just checking out your build, very cool! Can you talk a little bit about where you got your sump - what material it is and how you put your baffles in?

I was wondering the same thing.

 

[Ashish Patel]

The sump I’m using came from a place in Florida called Tanks and Barrels. It’s a 240-gallon polypropylene container that I thought would be easy to clean and would add more surface area. I had some leftover starboard from my main tank build (since I had to order a full 8x4' sheet), so I came up with the idea to cut two pieces with slits and fit them together. It wasn’t watertight, and over time I just got tired of dealing with it. Eventually, I turned one section into a small frag area by using a piece in the far corner. To make it work, I cut some holes in the bottom and used epoxy with PVC tubes as legs. That setup worked for a while, but once my snails died, I removed it and now just keep the sump open — it’s much easier to scrape and clean that way. I am sure i documented it in the build thread somewhere.


Lately, I’ve been thinking about removing the frags from the sump entirely. The hair algae grows out of control, and I’m honestly not interested in maintaining that section anymore. I’d much rather have a separate fish tank connected to the sump so I can actually see and enjoy it. Right now, the sump basically functions as a giant refugium on a reverse light cycle, so I’m hesitant to remove it since I know it helps stabilize pH and nutrients.


There’s no way I could safely keep fish or snails in the sump anyway — they’d just end up in the return or skimmer pumps. A dedicated frag or fish tank plumbed into the sump would definitely be more practical. Still, I’m glad I experimented with this setup; it didn’t cost anything and its good to have a secondary area to throw frags or extra corals.

 

[NitrateNightmare]

such a nice set up and everything has great colors. nice work. inspiring thread. i would love to have a large tank someday

 

[Ashish Patel]

such a nice set up and everything has great colors. nice work. inspiring thread. i would love to have a large tank someday

Thanks for the Nice words

 

[Ashish Patel]

Got the skimmer. The size in pictures doesn't do it justice.

 

[Ashish Patel]

Replacing this old guy

 

[Ashish Patel]

For Memories

 

[Ashish Patel]

Finally build a in sump stand for my skimmer. I used 3/4" starboard and 1.5" pvc and zip ties. Seems pretty strong..

 

[Ashish Patel]

 

[That Crusso Kid]

Good to see you active here again!

Love seeing the pic of your son with the new skimmer. Based on the size of the old vs. new, I think you're going to notice some big differences.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention my admiration of your hair style mostly because I wear the same type!

 

[Ashish Patel]

Good to see you active here again!

Love seeing the pic of your son with the new skimmer. Based on the size of the old vs. new, I think you're going to notice some big differences.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention my admiration of your hair style mostly because I wear the same type!

Lol. Thanks buddy for waking up the thread.. took awhile to accept my baldness but now im bald and proud