DivineStyler's 30 GAL LED "Rimless Lagoon"

[kungfujoe]

very clean set up..

 

[DivineStyler]

Beautiful tank and thank you for all the insight, pictures, and info. I have a 30 gallon tank, roughly 36"x16"x12" and I'm having an issue with heat. This is brought on by my ambient temp + my PC lights. I haven't had great coral growth from my PC lights though it maintains most things ok. Currently not terribly much photosynthetic (zoas, kenya, acai). I've had this tank running for about 3 years (minus the current coral inhabitants) and the one thing I've always had doubts about was the PC lighting. I've been toying with getting a chiller but I have to say that I'm not in love with that idea at all and was thinking about purchasing these ecoxotic leds in hopes of promoting better coral response with this small tank as well as taking care of my heat issue.

I guess what I'm wondering is, from your experience, would the 23 1/2" fixture be suitable for me? Ecoxotic recommends either 1- 23" or 2- 17" units. I noted that your setup is not as wide as mine but thought perhaps you could aid in my decision?

Thanks!

I think you would be fine with the 23 1/2 unit. The two 17.5 units would only give you 2 more panorama modules than one of the 23 1/2 fixtures (24 more watts). It's also worth noting that the optics don't point directly down, so you'll still get quite a bit of light on the sides of the tank. If anything it might work a little better than mine. I get a little light spill on the sides, with my tank only being 1/2" wider than the fixture width. You'll definitely need your SPS up top under the fixture, but I'm sure acan, chalice, zoa, etc will grow fine on the sides.

I'll post some more pics shortly. I had a small battle with cyano and did a little rescaping since my last pictures. All of my SPS is still keeping color and showing good growth. The only piece I'm having a little trouble with is the Hawkins Enchinata. It's growing pretty decent, but has browned out quite a bit. I had the same problem with my Green Sylo and it started getting color back after about 6 weeks. Seems like some of these corals need a little bit to acclimate to the LED's (maybe the lack of UV?). We'll see if I have the same response with the Hawkins.

 

[DivineStyler]

some more pics...

FTS

Growth of the Green Acro (Top photo is mid April, bottom mid June)

ORA Plum Crazy

 

[newnanoboy]

Erich,
How much growth have you gotten from those z's and p's? just wondering in comparisons to what i see in my tank. Also, how's that miami coming along? How many eyes do you have now?

 

[DivineStyler]

Erich,
How much growth have you gotten from those z's and p's? just wondering in comparisons to what i see in my tank. Also, how's that miami coming along? How many eyes do you have now?

I've had mixed results man. it seems like they either thrive or completely crap out.

the second frag of Sunny D's you gave me has 5 polyps now (it had 2 when you gave it to me). The hippies have atleast doubled, if not tripled in polyps.

The frag in focus in this picture has atleast 8 or 9 polyps now (don't remember the name if you could remind me). The 3 that are out of focus all died.

Paly Grandis died, both Hawaiian Sticky punch frags died, the Miami Chalice never healed and started receding on the cut side, so I tried to pull it from the plug and accidentally broke it into like 5 pieces, eventually killing it (this one really bummed me out!).

Other than that, everything else I either purchased or moved from my JBJ12 is doing good. I've went from 2 heads (in the JBJ12) to at least 15 on my Darth Mauls. I've fragged them twice and gave a couple to my buddies and they're all doing good. Here's a picture of one of the plugs with a 4 polyp frag.

Got a couple chalice that have showed good growth and colored up nice. Acan's and Favia are doing really well. All of my SPS besides the ORA Hawkins and ORA Green Stylo kept color and responded favorably to the lights. Both the Stylo and Hawkins are coloring back up after adjusting to the lights.

All in all I'm pretty happy with the results. Don't really have anything to compare to as I went from PC straight to LED. They're definitely growing better than under the PC's, but I'm not sure what my results would have been under T5 or MH.

For better or worse I'll keep this thread updated, to help anyone else thinking of making the switch to LED.

BTW: Still dosing B-Ionic 2 part (15 ML daily) and Kent Mag (15 ML weekly), along with weekly 10% water changes and a little MB7 now and then.

 

[revhtree]

Your aquarium is beautiful and aquascaped very nice!

 

[nikesb]

nice build, ive got a similar sized tank and i like what you've done with yours!

 

[newnanoboy]

erich,
do u have a better shot of those palys? i can't tell by looking at that pic what it was. i can't believe the paly grandis didn't make it. i've never had one die on me before. same with the sticky punch... do you think the l.e.d.'s were a bit too intense and they somehow stressed out? oh well, next time i frag them again, swing by my house and i'll replace the one's you lost. no worries bro.

 

[DivineStyler]

erich,
do u have a better shot of those palys? i can't tell by looking at that pic what it was. i can't believe the paly grandis didn't make it. i've never had one die on me before. same with the sticky punch... do you think the l.e.d.'s were a bit too intense and they somehow stressed out? oh well, next time i frag them again, swing by my house and i'll replace the one's you lost. no worries bro.

No biggie bro. I don't expect you to keep replacing the frags I kill! I'm sure it's something I'm doing or just certain things don't like the LED's.

I think my tank was too young when we did the initial swap. The grandis did ok for a couple weeks and then just closed up. I probably should have cycled it longer before adding corals.

I'll take a closer pick of the frag tonight when the lights are on.

 

[johnanddawn]

nice set-up

 

[DivineStyler]

did a little rescaping over the weekend... removed a few rocks to open it up a bit.

 

[nata]

Love that style tank ..very classy!!!

 

[thewackyreefer]

Man, I really dig this tank!

 

[Acefspds]

Very nice. How are the sps doing under the led's?

 

[DivineStyler]

Very nice. How are the sps doing under the led's?

Thanks!

If you go back to page 2, you can see a nice image showing the growth of one of my SPS frags over a 2 month period. It's growing nicely and colored up really good.

For the most part my observation has been SPS seems to need some time to adjust to the LED spectrum. Most of my SPS frags browned out a bit when I first added them. After about 2 or 3 weeks they all start to color back up and start to show growth.

 

[DivineStyler]

took a couple pics from the side.

pic of the aussie.

 

[GR808]

that is an incredible tank. GREAT JOB. the aquascaping makes everything so proportional and if u took a picture of just the tank, u'd never guess it was a 30G.