Dave's 40g Breeder. First Attempt at SPS!

[HawaiianReef]

A local reefer is moving, so I had a week to get a tank up to take over his SPS collection. He had a 40g breeder, so that's the route I went. Get another 40g up and running to transfer the animals. Here's how it went so far:
I picked up 40 breeder at 50% off from Petco, built a stand from scrap lumber I had taking up space and found a spot that the wife didn't mind.
Nothing ever goes this well for me... But I'll take it when it does!

Next I made some mounts for a couple a360we lights I had as spares. I didn't want to spend $70 for new gooseneck mounts, so I used 1/2" conduit, bent it and painted it black. I also was able to mount it to the stand so I could keep the stress off the tank glass.

You might notice a few extras in the pic as well.
I never tried a gyre and BRS has the Icecap 1k at 10% off. No better time to try it out. I also picked up an Ehiem 200 watt heater and cleaned off an old Skimz nano skimmer.

 

[HawaiianReef]

I added 25g of fresh saltwater and got the temp adjusted to 78*. I was pressed for time, so I didn't take any pics of the tank.
During the week I found a set of Hanna checkers. Ca and DKH and a potassium test kit all from one guy here, on R2R in the marketplace. Excitement building up!

Yesterday, I got a message. The tank is ready to break down. I headed over with a couple coolers and 3 5g buckets, a box of gallon ziplock bags and a lot towels.
We got everything out without a hitch. Every animal was safe in a ziplock and submerged in the coolers. I helped breakdown the equipment and we moved the tank, sump and stand out to his back yard. Then I drove home.
At the house I spent the next 2 hours setting up. I took all the bags and floated them in the new tank. I also took about 15g of his old water to add to my new water. I found some decent places for the corals and the anemone that I also scored found his place as well.
Within hours, I had impressive polyp extension on all the corals. I fed the tank some LRS reef frenzy and some reef roids. I also added a little bit of Hikari pellets for the snails that came along.
Today is day one for me as an SPS reefer. I plan to get some base parameter numbers today and compare them daily. I am using IO Reef Crystals. I should also point out that I am going to dip these as they do have some brown flatworms. At leaset thats the plans right now. But I do want the corals to first acclimate to the new lights and water. So maybe in about 2 to 4 weeks I'll start dipping them.

I would love to hear what you guys have to say, good and bad. Criticisms can be a useful tool for beginners like myself.

Thanks for checking out my build/project!

David

arg!! I wanted to post some pics of the loaded tank, but my files are too big. I'll add them in just a bit.. sorry..

 

[HawaiianReef]

I got some pics with my phone tonight:

 

[HawaiianReef]

Today the huge colony of gsp on the left was irritated. You can tell by the pics. Last night it was beautiful and extended. I was thinking its getting blown by the gyre at 20%, so I brought it down to 10. But all day it would bring polyps out, then retract. I run the lights at 50% and at one point, it was completely retracted. So I turned up to about 75-80. Some polyps came out. I turned it up to 100. I kept an eye on the other corals and the gsp brought out more polyps.
I'm not sure what's going on. The sps look ok, and gsp is hungry for more light??
I slowed down, which is hard for me, and thought I might be chasing my tail while the gsp is acclimating. So I stopped screwing around with it.
I have a seneye, but I never used it or loaded the app. I'll set that up tomorrow so I can read what the lighing is at. At the very least, I'll feel like I'm being productive.