Charles4400's Waterbox 100.3 Seahorse Build

Charles4400 · Apr 10, 2020

Did some tests today and wow was surprised at what I found.

Cycling is going INSANELY fast!

-Ammonia .15 (hardly any yellow if at all, but did not look like 0) - Salifert
-Nitrite .25 - salifert
-Nitrate 25 - salifert (wow!)
-Phosphate .08 (hanna)
-Alk 8.5* (hanna - actually hanna read 9.1 but when I compare it to my Trident readings from another tank hanna consistently reads .5-.6 higher. So I now go by Trident conversion of -.6 for my hanna alk.)
-PH was reading extremely low at 7.48 (Apex)…..I turned on my skimmer with cup off and its currently 7.64 as of right now and has only been on for an hour or 2 and still increasing steadily.
-temp steady at 72.8-73.3 but I don't have lights on the tank yet so will see how easy it is to keep there.

I first put water in on Tues. 4/7 and just put turbo start yesterday 4/8. So today is only DAY 3 of the tank's life. these are Insane readings for a 3 day old tank.

I plan on doing tests daily now to make sure its not a fluke on the test, but the trend seems to indicate an almost instant cycle. If so I attribute it to the live rock, live sand and the fritz turbo start.

By this weekend I will probably add in an ammonia source (ammonium chloride) and see how fast it takes it down. If it goes down within the day, I plan on ordering some cheato and maybe some starter fish next week to really get the tank started (thinking some pajama cardinals which should be good tankmates to seahorses).

Hope I'm not getting too excited too early, but if the numbers keep on their trend, this tank will move along ALOT faster than I was planning.

count krunk · Apr 10, 2020

The KP rock will speed things up a bunch

Charles4400 · Apr 10, 2020

count krunk said:
The KP rock will speed things up a bunch

It definitely did! I only got 25# of it too and probably have about 80-84 gallons total water. Worth the buy for sure.

count krunk · Apr 10, 2020

I got TBS rock for my 40 breeder, 23 pounds. Agree, well worth the buy.

Charles4400 · Apr 11, 2020

Added some ammonium chloride today. Brought ammonia to 1.5. (I was aiming for 2-3 but guess I didn't put enough). Will see how long it takes to come down. Ammonia test last night was pretty much undetectable (I couldn't tell if it were 0 or less than .15 on salifert). So time to try a high dosage and see how tank handles it.

Also installed some GHL fans. These are expensive fans. They are basically just computer fans in nice housing but they had the cleanest look that I could find. 3 units totalling 7 fans. Should cool down tank for when it gets really hot. If those alone wont do it I also have a fan for the sump but wont install that unless needed.

Had to modify the ghl fans to shorten the bracket width on the overflow fan and also to have bracket screws face the back of the tank instead of the front. Not super difficult but rather time consuming as you have to take all the plastic rivets off and take the fan assembly completely apart to do so. (I wont go into fan mode details here).

Still waiting for saltwateraquarium.com to refund or credit the lights I sent back. They received them fri. But I haven't heard back yet...sigh. Really anxious to get lights over my tank. Think I will go with Kessils now , 2 of the a360x. I wont need the intensity of these lights but since this tank wont have t5s with LEDs, I really want the legendary shimmer present without being able to see individual led colors. Hopefully will hear from them by mon.

Charles4400 · Apr 12, 2020

Looks like tank is not in insta-cycle mode but still happy with progress. Did ammonia check today and def not down to 0. Less than 1.5 but far from clear. Just going to wait it out at this point and let the tank take it's time. Have some bio spira but was holding that off until before I put any livestock in. Tempted to add some now but will just let nature take its course. So unlikely to put anything in the tank next week.

Just waiting for that bacteria population to increase enough, have a feeling it wont take that much longer. Really want to get some cheato in there to start absorbing those nitrates as soon as ammonia can predictably drop to 0.

I'm determined to not have to battle hair algae for the next 6 months on this build with this cycle.

Charles4400 · Apr 13, 2020

Red Sea pulled through on getting my replacement reefwave controller out to me. It arrived today, Sunday!

Reported problem on Thursday and got the replacement to my door on Easter Sun. That's amazing, thanks Red Sea!

Cycle update.

Ammonia going down slower than I'd like to see. It's at 1 ish now.

Nitrites are up high at 2 and nitrates high at 50.
The fact that these 2 paramus are high indicates cycling still going strong.

Interestingly enough my phosphates have dropped to .01. I suppose it makes sense as nitrifying bacteria does use phosphate, I just think this is the first time I've ever checked phosphate during a cycle.

I will be sure to get these numbers under co troll before putting the tank on a good light schedule. Bad news is my live rock looks like it is losing its coraline algae. It's definitely losing color and turning white...yikes!

Charles4400 · Apr 18, 2020

Still waiting for nitrates to zero out, wondering if the lower temp is making it take a bit longer. Tank temp is stable so far at 72.8-73.4.

In the mean time I got a sump baffle kit from Otco Aquatics ( @cromag27 ) to split the skimmer chamber into 2 allowing for a refugium. Its a very nice kit and I chose the one designed for the waterborne 100.3/100.4 sump.

It is designed to have the water pass from filter socks, to regium, then to skimmer and looks sharp and looks like it will work out perfectly.

Installed:

Charles4400 · Apr 18, 2020

Got a nice refugium light as well the Kessil H160 with gooseneck and 90adapter (,which I ended up not using). Fits perfect for my soon to be fuge section.

I added 2 pieces of black acrylic to the left and right side of the fuge chamber just to block out any light bleed from the Kessil to prevent unwanted algae growth in the filter sock or ato chamber..

( the rock ruble in bags is not permanent, just have those there in case I want to glue softies or macro algae to them when the time comes. Fuge will just be for cheato.)

Robertellis30 · Apr 19, 2020

With the sump dividers, do you think it would help support refugium mud or would it turn into a mess. what’s your thoughts on converting the ATO into a ref.?

only ask cuz I’m torn between this tank or a RS xl300

ams_reef · Apr 19, 2020

Everything on this build looks great so far.

I am a curious, why so much flow and light for a seahorse tank? I kept dwarf seahorses for years, and albeit a much different animal, a lot of the setups prepared like a traditional reef didn’t fare well for seahorse keepers on a seahorse forum I used to frequent. I found out with my own dwarf system that the things I really liked (Live rock, sand, macro algae) actually made keeping seahorses unnecessarily more difficult. Just my 2 cents.

Hope all works out and I’ll look forward to seeing all the new updates!

Charles4400 · Apr 19, 2020

Robertellis30 said:
With the sump dividers, do you think it would help support refugium mud or would it turn into a mess. what’s your thoughts on converting the ATO into a ref.?

only ask cuz I’m torn between this tank or a RS xl300

With the divider I got it would be a no go for refugium mud. The slots are on the top and bottom of the divider and it is actually the bottom slots which allow the water to pass through to the skimmer section. The top slots are only there for emergency overflow.

I believe some people do use the ato chamber for a fuge but for me I need it as an ato. I have a linen closet directly behind this tank where all my electronics are including controller. I don't want to put an ato reservoir in there and risk humidity in the closet (would be terrible to find moldy sheets in there one day! ) I have to have everything there or under cabinet, no room for an ato on the side either.

I was also looking at the xl300 but it was the extra width that sold me on waterbox. I also wanted to try out waterbox as well since my other tanks is a red sea (rsmax s650).

Robertellis30 · Apr 19, 2020

I was looking at the size difference and it’s about 400$ difference for 2 inches.

Thanks for your input. Appreciate it.

Charles4400 · Apr 19, 2020

ams_reef said:
Everything on this build looks great so far.

I am a curious, why so much flow and light for a seahorse tank? I kept dwarf seahorses for years, and albeit a much different animal, a lot of the setups prepared like a traditional reef didn’t fare well for seahorse keepers on a seahorse forum I used to frequent. I found out with my own dwarf system that the things I really liked (Live rock, sand, macro algae) actually made keeping seahorses unnecessarily more difficult. Just my 2 cents.

Hope all works out and I’ll look forward to seeing all the new updates!

You are right, the gyres and kessils are way overkill for this build! Truth be told since I am trying this new build (which is experimental in general because I have never tried seahorses before), I wanted to try different equipment as well. If I like the Kessils I may change my ai hd26s currently over my rsms650s to kessils and if I like the gyres I may use them on that tank instead of my mp40s.

I got the lights and gyres on the seahorse tank thinking if they were too much I could always switch them out with the equipment on my larger tank and also just to see if I like the equipment in general. Gives me a better idea of what I can use on future builds!

Plus I really wanted to have that kessil shimmer on this build since shimmer won't be subdued with any t5s like it is on my other tank.

I will be tuning the gyres turned way down and probably the kessils as I don't plan on having any sps in the tank but macro algae and softies. But its good to know I have the ability to have the tank house more light demanding corals and can increase flow if necessary. Also for the gyres I wanted to have a low profile look and wanted x2 so I could put them on either side of the overflow vertically to keep the sides free from any pumps. Also wanted a controlled sway for the macro algae and softies.

As far as the live rock and sand, I never thought of setting up a marine tank without it! I am not a fan of barebottom tanks (except frag tanks) so that was a must. As far as what to expect and how things will fare, I honestly don't know, but hope for the best. This is my first jump into something other than a reef tank so kind of exciting but also because I don't have experience with it I suppose I have been following the setup like a traditional reef tank

Have never grown macro algae in the dt on purpose before so have no idea how easy or difficult that will be!

Charles4400 · Apr 19, 2020

ams_reef said:
Everything on this build looks great so far.

I am a curious, why so much flow and light for a seahorse tank? I kept dwarf seahorses for years, and albeit a much different animal, a lot of the setups prepared like a traditional reef didn’t fare well for seahorse keepers on a seahorse forum I used to frequent. I found out with my own dwarf system that the things I really liked (Live rock, sand, macro algae) actually made keeping seahorses unnecessarily more difficult. Just my 2 cents.

Hope all works out and I’ll look forward to seeing all the new updates!

What were some of the difficulties you encountered with the live rock, sand and algae?

Cstar_BC · Apr 19, 2020

Very interesting build ! Look forward to seeing all the equipment in

ams_reef · Apr 19, 2020

Charles4400 said:
What were some of the difficulties you encountered with the live rock, sand and algae?

Seahorses are stressed by high lighting, typical reef and macroalgae displays are too much light for them. Dwarf seahorses even can grow algae on themselves since they move so slow. The high light with heavy feedings and sand bed can become a bit of an algae problem.

As far as live rock it’s the hitchhikers, many are really unsafe for even larger sized species. Live rock with low flow is ideal for aiptasia, which also is harmful to scale-less seahorses.