After being out of the hobby for about 14 years, last October I finally found an opportunity to set up another 90. Even though the tank is new, I've been around the hobby as far as I can remember. Growing up I went from freshwater to eventually a 90gallon FOWLR tank that I bought used through a newspaper ad. I had that tank up for about 4 years. When it came time for college I took the tank down, and sold everything but the stand. The stand, a custom cherry wood with lacquer stain, has stood the test of time. It's spent some time in the back of my parents unheated garage making it through about 4 WI winters. It got run into by a few cars and now has a few license plate scratches on the front door panel. It served as a bar during some parties, moved around with me throughout my active time in the military and eventually became a TV stand. 14 years and about 12 moves later, I'm finally settled and ready to start things up again.
I decided to setup another 90gallon in my office as a starting point, and found a 90reef ready Marine land tank from a local fish store. I thought about going larger, but thought the 90 would be a good opportunity for me to get back up to speed with things . In the long run, I'll likely get a larger tank if I can fit it down the basement stairs, or in the living room and plumb the fish room in the basement. I've seen lots of amazing builds on here just searching and continue to come up with more ideas. With that said, the amount of changes I'm seeing in the hobby are amazing. Lots of great tech out there to make managing the tank so much easier. The amount of information online is great, but I'm glad I kept all the books about the hobby to get up and running again.
Equipment
Water flow in the tank
-2x MP40s (currently set around 50%, alternating between reef crest mode and constant flow)
-Sea Swirl on the return line
Sump
-Lifereef CLF1 Berlin, signature series
-Mag12 pump
-Skimmer upgraded to a flanged SVS3, signature series
-Mag 9.5 pump for media cylinders
-3x Media Cylinders, sig series. Currently running XL bio pellets in 1, carbon in another, have GFO in the 3rd but not running it as Im not sure if Im on board with the ultra low nutrient type of tank.
-1x 150w Eheim heaters (the pumps keep the tank right around 77/78f)
-Lifereef 10gallon refugium
-Lifereef LRC2 Calcium reactor, sig series. Very low drip, not consuming much calcium at the moment
Lighting
-2x Radion XR30 G4 Pro's w/filters. Running a program similar to the WWC program with increased levels to what I found online after mapping out with the apogee PAR meter.
Control
-Reef Link
-Neptune Apex
-Neptune ATK
So 5 months in, I've started stocking the tank with frags sourced from Frag House Corals, WWC, Jason Fox and local stores. I've also come to learn live sales are addicting...
As it sits now, I've got a mixed reef tank of LPS, SPS, Zoa's. Its taken me about 4 months to learn how to keep the water parameters consistent, and honestly it seems like the less I do the better results I'm getting. I do bi weekly water changes of 10-15%, am using Tropic Marin Reef Pro salt (recently switched from regular tropic Marin) . I am dosing Mg to keep it around 1300 (red sea test), and have a very slow drip out of the Ca reactor. Ca has been high, around 500 but my consumption is low. kH is now stable around 8. When I started with the Ca reactor it went up to 15 causing some issues, but over time I corrected it and pin pointed it to the Ca reactor having too much going into the tank. pH is a lil low, averaging at 7.9 though is up to 8.2 during the day, and a lil lower at night but I'm learning how to keep things consistent and stable.
All the pictures I have up so far can be found on my flikr album
https://flic.kr/s/aHsm6UEJUo
Setup Pictures
The cabinet to the left houses all the electronics, and initially a 5gl bucket for ATO. Now it houses a the Neptune dosing pump + reservoir, plus a 10 gallon tank for the ATO. I'm seeing about 1.5gls per day evap.
Basement RODI station. BRS RODI unit with 2x 35gl water tanks that I picked up at a farmer supply store. I wanted larger standing tanks vs this style, but once I saw what shipping was, I went with what I could find locally.
Picked up 120lbs of waltsmith liverock from TBS as well as 60lbs of sand to mix in with the amount I already put in (so about 180lbs sand total). Tons of critters! Part two of the package went in on the 10th of November 2017. Ammonia at setup had a short spike, but then held at 0 and never went very high. TBS does a great job shipping everything, getting it from their farm , boxed and on the plane. I live in the chicagoland area, and Midway Airport with southwest shipping is very easy to work with.
After a little over a month of being setup, I changed the overflow plumbing a bit, converting the reef ready to a herbie overflow. Started with a true union ball valve then switched to a spears gate valve as the union valve was hard to be precise with. With that said, it worked, it just wasn't as easy to adjust.
Ecotech battery backup added to one of the MP40s yesterday, and I finally got around to adding in the media reactors. Every inch of space is used in the cabinet. All of the electrical is in a separate cabinet to the side and is packed itself.
For ATO, I ended up getting a 10gl tank from petco which fits perfectly in the side cabinet. Started with a 5gl bucket, but it wasn't keeping up. The 10gl lasts about 5 days for me. When I'm out of town, I use one of the 32gl brute garbage cans.
DSC_0988 by E, on Flickr
More tank pictures , plumbing pics etc. by E, on Flickr
IMG_0159 by E, on Flickr
IMG_0152 by E, on Flickr
Refugium is holding lots of critters (gorrilla crabs, pistol shrimp, and 1 mantis shrimp) that I found checking over the liverock. Mantis is ruling this tank.
DSC_1007 by E, on Flickr
DSC_0004 by E, on Flickr
So from all of that, heres the office in action.
I realize I don't have much for livestock photo's and will start adding those when I can. Overall, lots of learning going on in these past 5 months and hopefully it will get me ready for a larger tank in a year or two.
Thanks for looking!
I decided to setup another 90gallon in my office as a starting point, and found a 90reef ready Marine land tank from a local fish store. I thought about going larger, but thought the 90 would be a good opportunity for me to get back up to speed with things . In the long run, I'll likely get a larger tank if I can fit it down the basement stairs, or in the living room and plumb the fish room in the basement. I've seen lots of amazing builds on here just searching and continue to come up with more ideas. With that said, the amount of changes I'm seeing in the hobby are amazing. Lots of great tech out there to make managing the tank so much easier. The amount of information online is great, but I'm glad I kept all the books about the hobby to get up and running again.
Equipment
Water flow in the tank
-2x MP40s (currently set around 50%, alternating between reef crest mode and constant flow)
-Sea Swirl on the return line
Sump
-Lifereef CLF1 Berlin, signature series
-Mag12 pump
-Skimmer upgraded to a flanged SVS3, signature series
-Mag 9.5 pump for media cylinders
-3x Media Cylinders, sig series. Currently running XL bio pellets in 1, carbon in another, have GFO in the 3rd but not running it as Im not sure if Im on board with the ultra low nutrient type of tank.
-1x 150w Eheim heaters (the pumps keep the tank right around 77/78f)
-Lifereef 10gallon refugium
-Lifereef LRC2 Calcium reactor, sig series. Very low drip, not consuming much calcium at the moment
Lighting
-2x Radion XR30 G4 Pro's w/filters. Running a program similar to the WWC program with increased levels to what I found online after mapping out with the apogee PAR meter.
Control
-Reef Link
-Neptune Apex
-Neptune ATK
So 5 months in, I've started stocking the tank with frags sourced from Frag House Corals, WWC, Jason Fox and local stores. I've also come to learn live sales are addicting...
As it sits now, I've got a mixed reef tank of LPS, SPS, Zoa's. Its taken me about 4 months to learn how to keep the water parameters consistent, and honestly it seems like the less I do the better results I'm getting. I do bi weekly water changes of 10-15%, am using Tropic Marin Reef Pro salt (recently switched from regular tropic Marin) . I am dosing Mg to keep it around 1300 (red sea test), and have a very slow drip out of the Ca reactor. Ca has been high, around 500 but my consumption is low. kH is now stable around 8. When I started with the Ca reactor it went up to 15 causing some issues, but over time I corrected it and pin pointed it to the Ca reactor having too much going into the tank. pH is a lil low, averaging at 7.9 though is up to 8.2 during the day, and a lil lower at night but I'm learning how to keep things consistent and stable.
All the pictures I have up so far can be found on my flikr album
https://flic.kr/s/aHsm6UEJUo
Setup Pictures
The cabinet to the left houses all the electronics, and initially a 5gl bucket for ATO. Now it houses a the Neptune dosing pump + reservoir, plus a 10 gallon tank for the ATO. I'm seeing about 1.5gls per day evap.
Basement RODI station. BRS RODI unit with 2x 35gl water tanks that I picked up at a farmer supply store. I wanted larger standing tanks vs this style, but once I saw what shipping was, I went with what I could find locally.
Picked up 120lbs of waltsmith liverock from TBS as well as 60lbs of sand to mix in with the amount I already put in (so about 180lbs sand total). Tons of critters! Part two of the package went in on the 10th of November 2017. Ammonia at setup had a short spike, but then held at 0 and never went very high. TBS does a great job shipping everything, getting it from their farm , boxed and on the plane. I live in the chicagoland area, and Midway Airport with southwest shipping is very easy to work with.
After a little over a month of being setup, I changed the overflow plumbing a bit, converting the reef ready to a herbie overflow. Started with a true union ball valve then switched to a spears gate valve as the union valve was hard to be precise with. With that said, it worked, it just wasn't as easy to adjust.
Ecotech battery backup added to one of the MP40s yesterday, and I finally got around to adding in the media reactors. Every inch of space is used in the cabinet. All of the electrical is in a separate cabinet to the side and is packed itself.
For ATO, I ended up getting a 10gl tank from petco which fits perfectly in the side cabinet. Started with a 5gl bucket, but it wasn't keeping up. The 10gl lasts about 5 days for me. When I'm out of town, I use one of the 32gl brute garbage cans.
DSC_0988 by E, on Flickr
More tank pictures , plumbing pics etc. by E, on Flickr
IMG_0159 by E, on Flickr
IMG_0152 by E, on Flickr
Refugium is holding lots of critters (gorrilla crabs, pistol shrimp, and 1 mantis shrimp) that I found checking over the liverock. Mantis is ruling this tank.
DSC_1007 by E, on Flickr
DSC_0004 by E, on Flickr
So from all of that, heres the office in action.
I realize I don't have much for livestock photo's and will start adding those when I can. Overall, lots of learning going on in these past 5 months and hopefully it will get me ready for a larger tank in a year or two.
Thanks for looking!