Bipolarbear's new kitchen (with 225gal peninsula)

[Bipolarbear]

The next major milestone was getting a fish order in from Marine Collectors. We had ordered a collection of tangs and wrasses from the site back in January but the first batch of fish didn't arrive till April. The 2 clowns were doing great and even though the cycle was complete I was still testing nightly for Nitrate which was reading 0. During this time I had been dosing Microbacter 7 and Microbacter Clean every week which was really helping fight any algae outbreak.

The tangs arrived and after acclimation everything seemed to be fine. We added a White Tail Tang, a Blue Tang and a Blonde Naso Tang.

The stress of shipping must have been a high as we lost the Naso Tang that night. The next morning we found her in the rock where she had gone to sleep =(

 

[Bipolarbear]

The great news was working with Marine Collectors was easy and I decided to replace the Naso with additional wrasses. A few weeks later the wrasses came in:
Rhomboid
Melanarus
Pin Tail Fairy
Rosy Scale Wrasse x2

The Rhomboid was very stressed out, and after 3 days of not eating I was finally able to catch him and put him in the sump to isolate him and get him to start eating. After a week of feeding him in isolation and making sure he was doing well I was able to put him back in the display tank and I still have him to this day.

Unfortunately the shipping stress also impacted the Melanarus wrasse really bad. This Melanarus and the following replacement Marine Collectors sent us died in the first 24 hours. I contacted Eliot directly to review the tank and the setup before the 3rd Melanarus was sent. We started by isolating the 3rd Melanarus in the sump for observation before adding him into the display, and after a week we were able to successfully transfer him into the display tank.

At this point we decided that any fish that was shipped to us would first need to be in isolation in the sump to reduce stress and allow us to feed without the fish having to fight for food.

 

[Drew Hitt]

By the end of September I was able to get the tank sanded and polished, we also installed the luxury vinyl plank flooring ourselves to save some money. October would come and go without any work on the kitchen as we were still waiting on the cabinets. We wouldn't see cabinets in the house until the week before Thanksgiving.

I can totally relate to that picture of your daughter on your back. I’m assuming she is the one with autism? I have two children that have high functioning autism, 5 children all together… jumping on my back while working seems to be just the right thing to do for any of them LOL

 

[Bipolarbear]

I can totally relate to that picture of your daughter on your back. I’m assuming she is the one with autism? I have two children that have high functioning autism, 5 children all together… jumping on my back while working seems to be just the right thing to do for any of them LOL

Yeah that's her, she is getting to the point where she is almost too big to pick up but still demands I lift her up every day.

Sucks to think about the fact that one day she will be too big for piggyback rides or jumping hugs...

 

[inetjnky]

Looks great!! It’ll be interesting to see how the solar tubes work for you in the long run. I’ve only seen one other thread a while ago use them but I believe it was a FOWLR. I wish I could have gone 36 deep front to back but I could only do 30. The extra space is nice for aquascape!

 

[ScottW]

Great build! Do you have any photos of inside all of the cabinet work?

 

[Fiziksgeek]

I am in the infancy of a peninsula build, currently thinking 72x36x30. Would love to see more details about your build, Specifically how your flow is set up, looks like there are a couple lines coming in at top of the viewing end of the tank, are those your returns or is there a closed loop? Also interested to see more of your sump area. I am planning a remote sump in the basement, on the far side of the house form the tank placement. Looking to be efficient with my set up and maximize the space.

 

[inetjnky]

Post removed.

 

[wackyreefer]

Man, I absolutely love this build with it's solar tubes. Well-done!
Not sure if I missed it in the thread but have you measured the PAR to see what numbers you getting with the solar tubers and the bars at peak sunlight? I would love to do a build like this.

 

[Bipolarbear]

So it's been a while since I have posted, and the fish list has expanded quite a bit since my last post. Here is the current stock list:
White Tail Tang
Royal Blue Tang
Powder Blue Tang
Purple Tang
Rhomboid Wrasse
Melanarus Wrasse
Rosy Scale Wrasse
Diamond Goby
Blue Spot Jawfish
Bimac Anthias
Ocellaris clownfish x2
Bellus Angelfish
Lamark's Angelfish
Swallowtail Zebra Angelfish
Watanabei Angelfish

We lost one of the Rosy Scale Wrasses and the Pin Tail Fairy just randomly. They had been eating like normal with no issues one night and the next morning the clean up crew were picking at their bones =/.

I also installed a 120 watt UV sterilizer after losing a Flame Angel to ich. It was extremely frustrating after spending a bunch of money on the quarantined fish to still end up having ich in the system. At this point I'm just planning on overfeeding, maintaining good water quality and blasting everything with UV.

So a few questions were asked about the inside of the cabinets and the plumbing so here are a few pictures of that. First the inside of the cabinets to the right of the tank contain the overflow and the Apex main unit. The insulated flex plumbing are the return lines of which there are 3. I have 2 return pumps but one of them is split to run the chiller and UV allowing me to adjust flow rates through the UV as needed. There is no closed loop on this system and I run 2 MP40s and a RedSea Gyre attached to the eurobracing to reduce the visual impact on the end of the tank.

This picture shows how I cut through the wall leaving only the siding and ran the plumbing outside. Once the plumbing was in and I was happy with how everything was going I back-filled in the space with spray foam.

Here is a picture of the plumbing coming outside. I insulated the plumbing that runs water on a constant basis, the uninsulated line is emergency only for the Herby system. The giant black tube is the 120 watt UV system that is usually run on a pool or pond. I couldn't pass up the unit for the price I paid, and I'm able to run my return pump at full speed and it's still in range to kill fish parasites.

Once the water enters the fish room it goes into the first sump which contains my skimmer, this is also where the chiller sits.

Next the water falls into the second sump which has filter socks and 2 Marine Pure blocks and 2 Brightwell bricks. The return pumps are in the final section of this sump, 2 Fluval Sea SP6 pumps.

The top level has a DIY alge scrubber and the Trident. I may eventually redo this level into a coral grow out system.

 

[Bipolarbear]

Here are some pictures of the new Angelfish:

Also a video right before we got the Angel's showing how the RedSea Gyre is attached and it gives you an idea how bright it is during the day. I don't have any Par readings but all of the SPS are starting to encrust nicely over everything which was my primary concern with this approach.

 

[inetjnky]

Did you QT your inverts as well or buy them QT?

 

[Bipolarbear]

I did not QT the inverts which is how I think I got ich in the system. Its not something I had ever done or considered until I got ich and started doing some research.

 

[inetjnky]

Yeah, I’m trying to buy all my inverts from QT vendors now when I see they have them in stock.

 

[Bipolarbear]

So I haven't posed in a while but things are still going great. I have add a bunch of coral and will be slowly adding more wrasses and smaller fish. Picked up a possum wrasse and have him isolated in a QT tank for now.

I also decided to pickup some Smart Plugs to see if I could program them for my lights and powerheads. The cool part is I was able to set them up to free up one of my EB 8 power strips and at the same time figured out how to trigger feed mode on my Apex using Google Assistant.

"Ok Google feed the tank" now turns on one of the programmable plugs for 30 seconds which is wired to a relay that on the other side is wired to the Apex breakout box. This simulates pressing a feed button on the breakout box which turns off the return pumps, skimmer, and sets the MP60's to nutrient mode.

 

[Bipolarbear]

 

[Sltloser]

Definitely need an update!

 

[A Young Reefer]

Following

 

[Dreamscapesaquatics]

What a build. Thanks for sharing in such detail. I really enjoyed reading threw this thread. I honestly usually just look at the photos. Well done.

 

[Bipolarbear]

Someone mention update?

Last month I made the switch to a Calcium Reactor. I was really struggling to maintain a consistent alk and calcium level with 2 part dosing. I was using the Trident to adjust the 2 part but was seeing huge swings and if I needed a day to mix up chemicals things would take a week to get back to normal.

I was also having to dose crazy amounts of alk and calcium something like 800 ml per day just to maintain my levels at 8.5 and 460. I'm not sure if that was due to my choice of salt mix (Reef Crystals) or the fact that I'm doing continuous water changes but I can't imagine my corals are using that much yet.

I decided to purchase a used CaRx system from a local reef club member which included a Geo reactor, regulator, Kamoer pump and 2 CO2 tanks.

Initially I was having problems with CO2 bubble build up in the Geo reactor which would eventually stall the circulation pump. I tried pulling the reactor completely apart and sealing all of the connections with silicone but it still didn't solve the issue.

After doing some research I discovered that the older Geo reactors were intended to be used with a pump pushing water into the reactor instead of the Kamoer pulling water out of it.

Understanding this I decided to relocate the effluent line and extend the circulation loop into the reactor in order to trap the bubbles and pull them out of the reactor which worked perfectly.

I also added a second chamber to the reactor just using a leftover BRS media reactor.

My numbers are much more consistent now and I love not having to mix up chemicals every month.