Dreamy Fluval Evo 13.5

[robottaway]

I added one of the Jebao Nero knock offs. They make a smaller size than what Nero provides that while pricey for my cheap tank setup does fit the bill nicely. Moved a few corals around seeing I had to get in the tank to remove bubble algae forming on my mushrooms. No idea where it came from, about a month ago, with no new additions in past 6 months. Maybe the extra flow from the Jebao kicked it up? Tank looks more interesting now.

 

[robottaway]

Oh and the back wall is quickly developing coraline algae!

 

[robottaway]

Tank is established good bit over a year. Came to the realization I have been a bit too light on feeding. Zoa growth has been very slow, one of my two mushrooms actually is more or less dead (I know how do you kill a mushroom). Phos and nitrate are bottomed out per ATI kit. Started feeding reef roids direct few weeks ago. Too late for the mushroom but other corals are responding. Already 3-4 new heads on my joker zoas. Thinking maybe add one more fish (total 2) so I can feed more see if that helps get those params up and more growth.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Any updated pictures on your tank? Glad to see you have made it a year though!!!

 

[robottaway]

Thank you! Here are some shots I just took. I fed reef roids and mysis about fifteen minutes ago so things are a bit closed up.

 

[robottaway]

went to lfs today and brought home a new fish. Any clown experts want to take a guess at which variety?

edit: video upload did not work. Adding pics.

 

[Subliminal]

Wow. I’m impressed with the amount of coralline on the wall with the stock light!

 

[Brit’s Fish]

went to lfs today and brought home a new fish. Any clown experts want to take a guess at which variety?

edit: video upload did not work. Adding pics.

Extreme Frostbite? I have a female that looks almost exactly like yours but I also can’t remember if that’s what she was called.

 

[robottaway]

Wow. I’m impressed with the amount of coralline on the wall with the stock light!

Surprises me it grows so much faster than it ever did in my last tank, an im 30l with two kessil 160we blues. That tank even had a longer light cycle. No dosing just water changes ~2 weeks. I do use carbon and change frequently. Really took off 3 or so months ago for no obvious reason.

 

[robottaway]

Extreme Frostbite? I have a female that looks almost exactly like yours but I also can’t remember if that’s what she was called.

Thank you! That could be it. Looking at some pics I googled very similar. Only difference I see is the bottom fins being all black on mine. He already is grown so maybe as they age the fins darken? wanted a mature clown due to other fish being a blue devil. Make sure he can give it back as good as he gets it.

 

[robottaway]

Upgraded to one of my two Kessil lights and added the Intank basket. Got a bit lazy on maintenance while feeding too much and having some issues with algae. All seems under control now. Snails are doing a pretty fair jobs of mowing down the green hair.

 

[robottaway]

Been awhile! Things have been going well in the tank.

Way overdue cleaning of the sump portion of the aio. Added one of the InTank media baskets to the Fluval a while back and it collects a lot of this gunk in the first chamber now. Ran tests after didn’t see any shifts in ph/orp/nitrate/phosphate.

Recently reintroduced my homemade ChemiPure blue media. Had stopped running for 6-8 months due to my phosphates not wanting to come up from zero. Forgot how nice and sparkling the water looks with it in.

Added in four bumblebee snails last week. The vermitid snails have proliferated past my liking. After 4-5 days can’t tell any difference but the snails do a lot of moseying around the aquarium.

 

[Flameback Pair]

@robottaway nice tank!!! Tell me about your homemade chemipure? Subscribed.

-Mitchell.

 

[robottaway]

@robottaway nice tank!!! Tell me about your homemade chemipure? Subscribed.

-Mitchell.

Thank you Mitchell!

The home made chemipure is just a mix of carbon, purigen and phosguard. I found the idea somewhere on this site. Could substitute similar products for the purigen and/or phosgaurd. Think I spent a bit over $40 2+ years ago for the products listed and some small drawstring bags. I have used about half the materials. Very cost effective. Can mix according to need. For example leave out the phosgaurd or add a reduced amount if phosphates are stable.

 

[robottaway]

Quick update on the vermitid snails. Been a bit over a week and the last few days I have not seen any feeding response from them. This is when feeding the tank but I also watch for them during later day hours when the lighting is in moonlight mode. I always could see them feed during these times. Bumblebee snails seem to still be active. I have noticed them moving about cleaning up leftover food and waste.

 

[robottaway]

Tank has had a few upgrades in the past 5-6 weeks. Made a sizable upgrade to the tank flow by adding a new pump and VCA Random Flow Generator.

The pump is ioaoi’s smallest dc pump. Having run it over a month I can say some things about it. First off it fits better than the original pump. It uses less space because of its vertical design. With the extra space I was able to move the heater from the middle sump compartment in with the pump. It is dead quiet. I say this having never heard a single sound from the pump. This tank is in my bedroom so less noise the better.

The pump controller is simple but effective. Unliked the 2x$ AI wifi controlable version, this pump has an inline controller with two buttons that allow for constant and wave flow modes, intensity, and a 10 minute feeding function. I have it on constant flow 7/10 setting and have noticed a positive response in my corals. The filter pads have been catching a lot more gunk too.

Lastly unlike the fluval pump there is no sponge material collecting gunk and slowing down flow over time. This helps keep flow more consistent which can only be good. Makes me think that I should have removed the sponge filter in the original pump. Have taken the pump out to clean twice and so far clean as a whistle both times.

Not a lot to say about the VCA RCG. Using the 1/2” rather than their dual 1/4” they market for this tank. Added some 1/2” loc line so that it sits a bit further out from the sump wall. Can verify it does create varied flow patterns. Not sure if it was worth the price but it does look good ‍

I also bought a probe holder. Brand is TL Reefs. Solid design and well built. When I started messing with the other equipment I realized how annoying it was having the probes just floating in the pump compartment of the sump. Unsightly too! When cleaning the pump I would have to yank them and find another place for them. I also figured for probe longevity sake them being mostly submerged was bad for them. With nothing holding them in place they would end up fully underwater.

Now that the middle sump compartment is empty I have thought a bit about a hang on back skimmer. Research turned up the Aquamaxx/Aquaready bullet-1 which looks like it would work quite nicely. Honestly though this tank stays pretty clean with weekly water changes. If anything trying to convince myself the aerating of the wayer would be the main benefit

 

[robottaway]

Starting to see cyano on the back sand in the tank take hold. Not much has changed in past couple weeks. Flow has increased after the upgrades noted above. That said the places the cyano is showing are the low flow spots. I have been dosing very small amounts of All For Reef (1-2ml a day) past couple months. That wouldn’t cause this would it?

I posit this is possibly related to doing a large sand vacuum of the tank. I may have gone overboard as I did 50%+ of the sand in one go. not seeing any show up in the rocks which I attribute to good flow. Have seen very small bits on random spots like the return nozzle. Any tips for monitoring and managing this? Is not concerning rn, but figure I can get ahead of the issue.

In other news spent around $20 to get the bits to move my rodi under my bathroom sink. Had been hooking it up to the back porch hose bib past few years which had its issues. Lot less hassle now. Next up is a kit to have the a larger 10 gallon rodi container with auto cutoff.

 

[robottaway]

Been so busy I completely neglected updating this thread.

First I figured out my cyano issue. Tl;dr carbon stage needed replacing.

Carbon filter was the cheap AL brand one so about a $10 fix to swap. My water here is not bad and I would say the filter lasted well into 9-10 months at around 100 gallons per month. Looking to buy two full size stages online ($20ish) and some higher end carbon blocks ($20-$30). I think that’ll improve filtration and save me needing to replace them as often. I will set a yearly reminder and have some time to get them swapped when it comes.

While at it I bought a large di stage and swapped that for the aquatic life one. Should save me a lot of hassle and money over time. Cost was a hair more than two of the AL brand di stages. It came with resin and should last 2.5+ as long as the AL ones if quantity of resin scales.

Continuing upgrades to the rodi setup I added a regulator so pressure won’t go over 70 gph, and a gauge to see what I am pushing. I get a steady 60-61 gph.

So I also changed out the waste water regulator on the membrane. It was rated for a 50 gpd membrane and I had swapped in a much higher quality 100 gpd membrane some time ago. I did not realize that I should change the regulator! So what did that do? I saw the tds drop from 11-12 to 3. Obviously this does not sound like much but realize that this is as much as a 75% reduction. The di stage now will last quite awhile longer and also the membrane should last longer. This did mean a bit more waste water is produced but water is cheap and I just fill up the tub with the waste and take a bath

Last I used some push to fit parts I ordered to create an easy way to flush the membrane. Basically the waste line has a Y fitting going to the regulator on one side and a shut off valve on the other. They then feed together into another Y fitting and I run the rest of the line from there to the drain. When I flush I simply open the valve and let it run around five minutes.