Biocube 32

[gar732]

Hello everyone. Been out of the hobby for about 8 years or more. Made the mistake of showing my son some pictures of my old tanks and clowns from my breeding project. Wasn’t long before he wanted to set up a tank. Had an old Biocube 14 I planned on putting a couple clowns in for him but it needed new lights and a pump. Of course the wife went to work and found me a Biocube 32 in great shape so here we are.

The plan is to keep the stock led lights and supplement with some more actinics to adjust the color a bit. I have the intank media baskets and I plan on running some chaeto in one of the compartments. Don’t know about a skimmer yet. Might just see if I can make it work without one. I have an old mp40, though I’m not sure if it still works. If it doesn’t I’ll have to explore rebuilding it or replacing with something else, not sure what’s out there right now that’s worth buying. I have a brand new ato somewhere in my basement but I don’t know quite where it is at the moment. For live stock the plan is a pair of clowns, probably Picassos if I can find some nice ones, and a couple other suitable fish. Zoas and some lps. Maybe some montis or something down the line. Want to keep it as easy and as inexpensive as possible. I know easier said than done but I’m going to try.

I still have tons of old rock so we picked a few pieces my son liked and put together a scape he was happy with. The plan was to throw a piece of live rock in to seed the tank but the fish store near me didn’t have any and there aren’t many options around me, so instead we got some live sand and a bottle of bacteria. We’ll see how well it works. I haven’t started a tank from nothing like this in a very long time.

Here it is with the tank filled. I’ll try to get some more pics tomorrow when the water is a bit clearer. It’s hard to tell from the pics but we tried to make as many flat surfaces to put stuff on. He liked the arch look so the fish could swim through. It was actually pretty cool to see him so excited about it.

 

[gar732]

Well, false start. The water level in the display is lower than it should be and the water level in the return section is high.

Upon closer inspection the first baffle in the rear sump has come loose so the water flows around it and not over it into the media baskets like it should. It’s definitely a crappy silicone job from the factory but I thought it was still holding. I have to remove the rock and drain the tank so I can clean out the old silicone and apply new silicone. Hopefully it holds. I don’t know if I can get the plastic baffle clean enough to get a good bond. Not sure if anyplace around me sells aquarium safe silicone. I ordered some from amazon that’s should arrive tomorrow morning in case I can’t find any tonight.

 

[jaymer]

Looking good! I just started my own 32g Biocube after being out of the hobby for 8+ years. Following along to see your journey!

 

[gar732]

Thanks. I’ll have to check out your thread. We can compare notes.

I drained most of the tank today and the rear sump. Taking a real good look at that seal now I doubt this tank ever had good flow through the rear section. There are gaps in the silicone that look factory all the way. To the bottom of that seam. You can kind of see it in this pic.

The top was partially attached on one side but let go so the water would just flow around the whole baffle.

I didn’t want to take the rock work apart because I probably couldn’t get it back together the same way to I just dropped the water level as low as I had to to dry out the rear compartment.

The down side was not being able to move the tank out to work on it. It make applying the silicone a complete mess but it should work.

Normally I’d break out the tape and try to keep my lines as clean as possible but it was was hard to get to, I just wanted to get it done, and no one will ever see it. Now to let it dry and then add all the water back in so I can properly restart this cycle.

The rock has been completely cleaned and soaked for a days before going in the tank. There is live sand and a bottle of bacteria but really nothing to get the cycle going. I figured I’d add some food to get things going. I’m thinking about picking up some chaeto to introduce some pods too.

Oh and here is a top down shot of the rock work.

 

[gar732]

Water is back in the tank and at the proper level, cycling is back on track.

 

[gar732]

Cycling is boring. I did some digging through my old reef equipment. I have more stuff than I thought I did. I found my tunze ato, though I’m not sure if I’ll use it considering I’m not loosing too much water. Manual top off might just be easier for now. I did find a waveline dc2500 I might swap in as a return pump just because I have it. Found my old mp40 but unfortunately it’s toast. The motor is expanded. I did get rid of some things a while back so I might have sold my old mp10. I have an old koralia nano that I have to test. Everything else I have is too big I think. If anyone has recommendations for a power head please let me know.

 

[kevgib67]

Cycling is boring. I did some digging through my old reef equipment. I have more stuff than I thought I did. I found my tunze ato, though I’m not sure if I’ll use it considering I’m not loosing too much water. Manual top off might just be easier for now. I did find a waveline dc2500 I might swap in as a return pump just because I have it. Found my old mp40 but unfortunately it’s toast. The motor is expanded. I did get rid of some things a while back so I might have sold my old mp10. I have an old koralia nano that I have to test. Everything else I have is too big I think. If anyone has recommendations for a power head please let me know.

I ran a a Hygger 2600 wave maker for over 4 years, it seemed perfect. It’s adjustable.

 

[gar732]

I’ll looking into it, thanks.

 

[gar732]

I ran a a Hygger 2600 wave maker for over 4 years, it seemed perfect. It’s adjustable.

Can you tell me what settings you ran it on? I’m thinking I might pull the trigger on it.

 

[kevgib67]

Can you tell me what settings you ran it on? I’m thinking I might pull the trigger on it.

Oh jeez, I wish I could be more helpful, that was four and a half years ago. I just fiddled with settings until I found the flow I liked. Programming isn’t that difficult. Directions and 4-5 programs were easy to use and decide from. I kinda picked a preprogrammed random flow and set it on moderate I believe.

 

[gar732]

No worries. Gives me a starting point. Thank you.

 

[kevgib67]

No worries. Gives me a starting point. Thank you.

Any time!

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Following along!

 

[gar732]

I was sorting through all my reef supplies and I came across a jeboa rw8. I thought I sold the two that I had but apparently not. I can’t run it on any of the wave functions since it blows all my sand around, and it’s not fine sand it’s the bigger reef sand. On the H function it’s just steady flow and seems to work just fine. There seems to be plenty of flow at the lowest setting so I’m going to try this out for now and see how it goes.

 

[gar732]

Well, seems like the bottled bacteria did its job. Ammonia was good and nitrites were up last week. Looks like diatoms starting. I guess I’m getting into the uglies. I’m currently not running the full white lights as there isn’t anything in the tank that needs it and I figure it’ll likely help fuel an algae bloom. I have a ball of chaeto in there that needs to be relocate to the back chamber soon. I have it in front in hopes that it might seed some pods. I didn’t see any though so we’ll see what happens. I’m going to need to start shopping for some clean up crew soon.

 

[overhead]

I just started...well not just, I started a Biocube in March. It will be interesting to watch what you do.

 

[Project1004]

I dont think blasting your new tank with white light is a good idea. It will cause algae to grow ALL over your surfaces including rocks and sand and it will be very hard to defeat it at that point.
I balst my SPS tank with t5 and radion and had to live hair algae for long time but my LPS tank rarely gotten hair algae using radion 15 blue light.
I think adding extra nuetrients (N&P) while having your lights very low would be more helpful which i wish i did when i started. :)

 

[PacoPetty]

The best advice I ever got when I started a tank was to keep the lights off for about six weeks.

 

[gar732]

I just started...well not just, I started a Biocube in March. It will be interesting to watch what you do.

Always good to be able to follow the process of a similar tank to see what works and what doesn’t. You had the benefit of live rock, I couldnt get any locally. I look forward to see yours progress.

 

[gar732]

As far as the lights, the white lights will continue to stay off until I need them. Don’t plan of wading into corals for a while. We do finally have an inhabitant so we’ll run blues for him. A pair of clowns have always been in the plan, just wasn’t sure which to get. I’m partial to Picassos. They have always been my favorite and I used to breed them but my son likes the storm clowns. He wanted an orange and a black storm. We came across this guy and he has a similar pattern to a Picasso and everyone liked him so it was a good fit. Down the road we’ll be looking for a nice black storm.

He is on the smaller side so I worry about him getting sucked into the power head. So far he’s done a good job of staying out of it but he likes to hang out near it so it seem as though he’s constantly swimming upstream. If he’d just hang out on the other side of the tank it’d be so mush easier for him, lol.

I also added a couple of the 21 LED actinic reef bars that kevgib67 used on his biocube. The stock lights are definitely lacking in the blues, this helps to correct that. Though with the white lights on it’s still very white. The plan is the run the whites for as short a time as possible to get some coral growth.