Diving Back In - Innovative Marine 170 EXT

[Dom_P]

The CUC crew is in. As is the magnificent foxface and the orange spotted goby.

I also ordered and received a BattleBox today from @Battlecorals. They are currently sitting in a frag rack. I’ll get some pictures posted once I mount them. In the meantime, here’s the list of frags. They also threw in a bonus Westside Rainbow Tort frag.

I did add the solenoid to the CO2 scrubber. pH is a little too high even with the solenoid open (8.5). I removed a third of the media today to try lower it a bit

 

[Gumbies R Us]

The CUC crew is in. As is the magnificent foxface and the orange spotted goby.

I also ordered and received a BattleBox today from @Battlecorals. They are currently sitting in a frag rack. I’ll get some pictures posted once I mount them. In the meantime, here’s the list of frags. They also threw in a bonus Westside Rainbow Tort frag.

I did add the solenoid to the CO2 scrubber. pH is a little too high even with the solenoid open (8.5). I removed a third of the media today to try lower it a bit

Can't wait to see pictures of your corals!

 

[Dom_P]

Well folks the ugly stage has begun.

I was managing lighting prior to adding the SPS but now that they are in no more of that.

There’s a very large pod population growing in the tank as they are all over then glass. And the CUC is in. But they are no match for the green hair algae.

I added an ORP probe yesterday and starting running ozone. ORP was around 170 to start. Which isn’t unusual for a new tank. I’m slowly raising it and plan to run it between 330 and 350. Water clarity has improved quite a bit already. I had to adjust skimmer to skim dryer as a result. Hoping it will help a bit with the hair algae.

I started dosing All for Reef at about 52ml a day. Im trying to dial that in to keep Alk around 8.2 dKH.

I also started dosing NP-Bacto-Balance yesterday at about 1.8ml/day

I ordered a macro lens for my DSLR from eBay and will try to get some photos when it arrives

 

[Üter]

Well folks the ugly stage has begun.

I was managing lighting prior to adding the SPS but now that they are in no more of that.

There’s a very large pod population growing in the tank as they are all over then glass. And the CUC is in. But they are no match for the green hair algae.

I added an ORP probe yesterday and starting running ozone. ORP was around 170 to start. Which isn’t unusual for a new tank. I’m slowly raising it and plan to run it between 330 and 350. Water clarity has improved quite a bit already. I had to adjust skimmer to skim dryer as a result. Hoping it will help a bit with the hair algae.

I started dosing All for Reef at about 52ml a day. Im trying to dial that in to keep Alk around 8.2 dKH.

I also started dosing NP-Bacto-Balance yesterday at about 1.8ml/day

I ordered a macro lens for my DSLR from eBay and will try to get some photos when it arrives

I like the scape. good luck with the ugly situation. I had went all live ocean rock and only ugly I really had was a brief event I think from silicates not getting filtered out of my RO.

 

[Dom_P]

Well, things are starting to get a bit “hairy” in the tank. But am dealing with it.

Parameters are looking ok, but still tweaking All For Reef and NP-Bacto-Balance.

pH: 8.3-8.4​

Alkalinity: 8.9 dKH​

Nitrate: 4.8 ppm​

PO4: 0.08 ppm​

I did promise some pictures of the coral. Im also working on my photo skills with the macro lens so they aren’t fantastic but are improving. Will post some better ones in a few days

 

[Dom_P]

The uglies continue. It’s pretty much all GHA, so just pulling what I can and waiting for it to run its course.

In the meantime, my nitrates and phosphate completely bottomed out last week (both reading zero). I decided to stop dosing NP Bacto Balance for now and let the tank just get thru the uglies on its own.

Feeding the fish a little heaver has brought nitrate and phosphate back up which is good because the SPS was starting to lose its color. I also dosed some sodium nitrate solution as the GHA seemed to be doing too good a job lowering nitrates. SPS looks happier now that it isn’t starving for N and P.

I’ve got some new critters coming in next week. A hippo tang, a juv emperor ;), some turbo snails and a blue tuxedo urchin to help with the GHA and a few fighting conchs and a cleaner shrimp.

Also will be ordering some more SPS soon

 

[bradreef]

It's definitely a hard balance trying to annihilate the algae while maintaining nutrients. Why not dose ammonia instead of nitrates as many have found great success with that?

 

[Dom_P]

It's definitely a hard balance trying to annihilate the algae while maintaining nutrients. Why not dose ammonia instead of nitrates as many have found great success with that?

@bradreef I did think about just that, and even purchased the ammonium bicarbonate before buying the sodium nitrate. But I started thinking that the GHA might prefer the ammonia over nitrates. Maybe nitrogen is nitrogen and I’m off base with that thinking? Any thoughts on that?

 

[bradreef]

@bradreef I did think about just that, and even purchased the ammonium bicarbonate before buying the sodium nitrate. But I started thinking that the GHA might prefer the ammonia over nitrates. Maybe nitrogen is nitrogen and I’m off base with that thinking? Any thoughts on that?

I don't. I personally have noticed polyp extension respond better with ammonia on SPS. At the end of the day, the goal is to get the coral to uptake nutrients over the algae. I bet Randy has an idea though.

 

[Dom_P]

I don't. I personally have noticed polyp extension respond better with ammonia on SPS. At the end of the day, the goal is to get the coral to uptake nutrients over the algae. I bet Randy has an idea though.

Well, I can give it a go. My decision was more based on gut feel than any real science anyways and I already have the ammonium bicarbonate. I’m not overly concerned about the GHA. Im more worried about dinos and the SPS starving at zero N and P. Im shooting for somewhere around 0.03 ppm phos and 5-ish ppm nitrate.

If @Randy Holmes-Farley does happen to have some thoughts on the matter maybe he’ll see this and chime in

 

[bradreef]

I got past it in my Im 170 dosing ammonia. I also did everything I could for Dinos and eventually beat them with a UV sweeper which worked for the type I had. I currently still have to dose ammonia but my phosphates are maintained with feedings. This is months after Dinos been beaten.

 

[Dom_P]

I got past it in my Im 170 dosing ammonia. I also did everything I could for Dinos and eventually beat them with a UV sweeper which worked for the type I had. I currently still have to dose ammonia but my phosphates are maintained with feedings. This is months after Dinos been beaten.

Fingers crossed that I will stay away from dinos and just have the GHA runs its course and have enough fish and CUC to keep it in check. I fought dinos in my old tank years ago. It was brutal. But back then the prevailing thought was to shoot for zero N and P. So I ran GFO and I had a ton of macro algae that together stripped them down zero. That likely made the whole situation worse.

 

[Dom_P]

Hey @bradreef.

Just wanted to thank you for nudging me to try the ammonia dosing. Within seconds of putting 0.1ppm in my tank some of the SPS frags started getting more color at the tips. Within minutes they darkened throughout and started extending polyps.

Now time will tell as to what it does to the GHA but I’m going to flip over to dosing ammonia vs nitrates for a while.

 

[amr952]

Thank you for posting this amazing build thread. I have also been out of the hobby for years but just placed an order for an IM 170 EXT earlier today. It was hard to pass up 50% off an In Stock model. Looking forward to following in your footsteps in the coming months!

 

[Dom_P]

Thank you for posting this amazing build thread. I have also been out of the hobby for years but just placed an order for an IM 170 EXT earlier today. It was hard to pass up 50% off an In Stock model. Looking forward to following in your footsteps in the coming months!

Thanks and best of luck! Looking forward to seeing your build thread