Erics red sea xxl 750

[ESH]

Check out coloration of my forest fire digi. I blanket fed the tank reef roads, and between the shadowing, orange, green, brown colors it almost turned it into something else. Normally this is just green and red.



Co2 Scrubber modification: I saw a post about extending the life of c02 absorbent media, and setup my scrubber in a semi closed loop fashion. Mostly closed, but there is still an air hole in the top of the skimmer cup. This setup pulls in water vapor, which helps extend the life of the media and keep my venturi free from salt build up. Previously when I only connected it to the venturi, salt would build up causing the skimmer to stop working.


Refugium light upgrade: The one I had (Zet light) was good (seen in above photo), but better suited for a smaller tank and was not growing enough chaeto to keep the nutrients down to where I'd like them. I picked up a Kessil H380, and made my own hanging kit out of some hardware store parts. The ballast on this light gets really hot, more so than any of my other lights.


Chaos! Not everyone can be organized. Thats why I love having a basement sump room.

 

[ESH]

Picked up a few more additions from Pacific East Aquaculture recently.
-2 more scolys: They're acclimating now and not happy from shipping so I'll get better pictures up later on,


-First bubble tip Nem for the clowns in the frag tank. I really liked the white coloration and orange tips. The clowns took to it right away.


Clowns by E, on Flickr

Light acclimating how to: use un used filter socks and a post it note.

 

[NY_Caveman]

Whoa, I am loving those colors! Crazy!

 

[ESH]

Scoly corner! Moved the two new ones into the display tank, and then moved the croc's in the corner with the rest of the scolys. Hopefully the croc's and others don't fight!

Not sure why I didn't do this a long time ago, but I figured out that if I tape the tail end of the filter roll to the new roll, I can swap these things out with out having to shut the main pump down.

I'm also starting to see GHA make a come back in the display tank. Today I manually removed a bunch, and I've been testing the phosphate and nitrate levels. Phosphate got back up to .12, and over the last week Ive brought it down to .04. I'll keep working on bringing it down to .02 as that seemed to be a good spot for the tank.
Nitrate's been holding pretty good at 2 to 5 ppm.

 

[Blackice615]

Looking great bro. Keep up the great work

 

[ESH]

New experiment. Ran a 16ft line from the skimmer to the outside with the hopes to draw in fresh air and boost the tanks ph. The inlet is pointed down, and wrapped in mesh. Hopefully it will block larger spiders. The c02 scrubber setup was sort of working, but was taking in too much moisture. This was keeping the Venturi clean, but the pH was dropping too much.

 

[ESH]

Been some time since I’ve done any updates.
Let’s see, GHA is still a challenge in the display as it keeps coming back. Water parameters are reading good and the refugium is growing both GHA and chaeto and other algae. I just put in an order for an algae pack from algae barn and also keep manually removing as much as I can with hopes the refugium will take over. Maybe I need to increase the fuge size, and include the frag tank as part of it all.

I also finally got around to finishing my water change station. It was such a simple thing to do and I don’t know why I didn’t do this 10 months ago. The station has been operational, only used it to store RODI. I now have one container I can use for mixing saltwater and will be able to pump it upstairs post water changes.

next task on the list will be more cable management. cables on the floor are temporary.

 

[ESH]

Nothing too new with the tank. The great hair algae battle continues. I added another mp40 to the display so I can get more flow behind and through the rock work. My best guess at this point is detritus build up is part of the problem. I’m actually starting to pull some great colors from my corals, but growth remains slow.

the red sea reinforcement kit came in and was an easy install. Hope it helps!

 

[ESH]

Took some photos of the tank as the lights were dimming down.

this guy has been splitting recently.

 

[ESH]

Upgraded the firmware/software on my Alkatronic last night. Pretty easy to do and great to see pH measurements show up now too. Tests are significantly faster. The info provided says less noise, I was used to the old sound so I don’t know if I noticed. Only challenge I had was on my end. The upgrade requires a pc and I use a Mac. I had to boot up an old pc, wait for some updates and then everything worked.

Also testing out one of these mini tanks... do I need a new build thread?

 

[ESH]

Tiny tank! (Beer not skimmate)

couple of shrooms and a toadstool from my frag tank.

 

[ESH]

So I’ve been toying with the idea of adding in my old 90 to this system. It would become my frag tank, and the frag tank would become the refugium. The current refugium could stay as is or simply be more space for live rock.
mock setup:

The location looks good, the challenge will be connecting it. My first thought is to cut out the corner overflow, plug up the bottom tank holes (or actually... I could setup as a closed loop... hmm so many ideas!) and If I can drill the side of this tank, then I could add an overflow that is higher then my current sump. I might have to raise the tank stand slightly but could easily build a box frame or something. All I have to do now is take some measurements and find out if this tanks side glass can be drilled.

 

[ESH]

Did a little research today. Marineland states on their website Q&A that the bottom of the 90gl is tempered, even though it is drilled. The 4 sides are listed as not tempered, specially listing as annealed. Never heard of that term so using google, it appears you can drill Annealed glass. I suspect that is the term used for most non tempered glass but don’t hold me to that. I also tried the polarized sunglass trick to double check and it looked like normal glass.

so I am going to remove the factory overflow, and order a Vectra S2 to use as a closed loop. Then on the other end, I’ll drill the tank and add a Eshops overflow. I don’t know how muchin height I’ll have to raise the tank or the best way to do it yet but it looks doable.

for lights the new frag tank will be getting a 48” noopsyche t5 hybrid and I’ll use 2 radion xr15s. This should be a pretty sweet add on.

 

[ESH]

90gl is drilled!
looks like in order to connect it to my display tanks sump, My choices are to either lower the sump, or raise the 90. If I lowered the sump I would then have to build a whole new stand for the sump. While that would be my preference, it would be the most time consuming. Raising the tank only requires building a stand for the tank. I will need to raise it at least 11inches, so I built a box made out of treated 2x12 cedar with stainless steel screws and placed the current stand and tank on top. I will need to go back and trim the 2 center braces as they slightly protrude causing the tank to rest on them.

Plumbing is test fitted. I need to adjust the return line and then figure out the plumbing for that.
The immediate down side of raising this tank is that a step ladder is needed to work on anything.

once the LED mounting brackets get in I can put that together. I’m not sure what height I should put them and will have to play around with things. I’ll be moving things over from the current frag tank and then making that tank into the primary refugium.

My biggest fear adding in this tank to my display system is that it will throw my parameters out of wack. I will be watching the water chemistry non stop during this process.

 

[ESH]

Most of the Plumbing is done. Just need to connect the return line.

Closed loop - not sure the flow of the Vectra S2 is enough but we shall see how things go. I plumbed in a quick drain line for easy water changes. Which when leak testing, proved useful as when I put things together a bulkhead came loose causing a pretty good drip. Gravity draining the tank only takes about a minute or so. My PVC plumbing skills were tested... I was reusing old plumbing parts to put this together which is why theres an extra coupling and union in there. The Way the tank was drilled made for some odd angles too.

Water is in the tank, salt is mixing and I'm bringing the temp up to match the display system.

T5's tested. The Noopsyche hybrid is a solid light fixture. Its wider than my tank, though since the wings bend in it should work well. Just waiting on the LED brackets before I mount this to the ceiling.

 

[ESH]

T5's are up, water's flowing. Power outage test went well too. The tanks drain doesn’t seem to want to get a siphon right away. Lots of tweaking to do.

Can't wait for the LED brackets to come in so I can get them mounted!

 

[ESH]

Last night I was able to move everything from the 20cube and into the 90. In moving my anemone, i found it was in the process of splitting and so I accidentally helped it along and now there are 3. Clowns should be happy.

Total tank volume should now be 310 gallons less displacement from the live rock in the display tank. Overall I’m pretty happy with how this turned out.
Next in the list is setting up the automatic water change system. I’m also looking for some larger tanks for my water change station. It’s a great setup but if I can find at least 100gl tanks that will fit through standard doorways then I’ll change them out.

 

[ESH]

I haven't posted any updates in a while, so heres the good and ugly of whats been happening with my tank.

Good:
-GHA gone. Since mid december I was able to get rid of my GHA from my tank. I got back on track with bi weekly water changes, scrubbed as much as I could out of the tank with a tooth brush, and then when that wasn't getting rid of it all, I started using vibrant. GHA is gone from my display and frag tank. Once gone, I stopped using vibrant.
-Once the GHA was taken care of, I moved on to getting rid of the byropsis that I had in my frag tank. This was a carry over from my previous frag tank. Reef flux was dosed, and appears to have taken care of it. Its been a few weeks since dosing and things are still looking good. The recommend procedures were followed and a water change was done at the end of the process.
-For a good week, the tank looked the best its ever looked, and then Cyano took over. I let this go for a few weeks, trying to manually deal with it through turkey basting rocks, but since it kept getting worse, I resorted to using liquid Chemi clean. Ive used this in the past and it worked great. This was done 1 week ago, and following the instructions on the bottle, carbon was removed and UV was turned off. Cyano is now gone.

and here is where my troubles have just began:
-Earlier in the week, I started noticing one of my monti's color fading. I thought it was simply stressed from the past month of additives to take out the 3 issues. I've seen this occur before, and corals usually recover. About mid week, I noticed my bounce shroom much more deflated than previously seen. I thought nothing of it, as its done this before. Friday night, I noticed that my red montipora had lost most of its color, though the polyps were still there. Looking around the tank further, I noticed that all of my montipora's were starting to fade and appeared to be bleaching out. This concerned me, and I started realizing some of my mistakes.
Problem 1: After the previous weekends chemi clean treatment, I didn't put my carbon back in the tank. I run a mixed reef: mostly SPS and LPS, and though they are seperated and I've never noticed any stinging, I try not to chance things and typically run carbon to take out any chemical warfare going on between corals. I've also kept a medium sized sarcophyton in my frag tank, and I've read accounts of this causing issues in tanks.
Problem 2: UV was turned off and not turned back on.
Problem 3: I didn't do the recommended water change.

Friday night I added some carbon back to the tank, turned the UV back on, and mixed up new saltwater, though the saltwater wasn't up to temp until saturday morning.

-Saturday morning: Red plating monti was bleached out and dead. This included the main colony, and random frags I had placed throughout the tank, and also in the basement frag tank. This makes me assume it's something in the water. All my other monti's are now looking worse, or just as white. My birdsnest, and a few other sps are starting to look pale, and polyps are receding back. My LPS throughout my display tank also started slimming up, with many receding with skeletons showing. Not looking good. Oddly enough, my Acroporas look fine. In the morning I did a 30gl water change (roughly 10% of the total system volume).
-Saturday afternoon: All monti's dead, LPS not looking good. I removed the dead skeletons and put in my sump with some other live rock. I did a second water change with the remaining 20gl I had mixed up.
-Sunday morning: Most LPS are mostly bleached out and down to skeletons. Some could still make it though I'm not to optimistic about their survival. Acro's all currently appear to be fine. Considering everything going on, this strikes me as odd. All fish appear fine.

Throughout this process, while I made a few mistakes with the chemi clean treatment process, and I suspect this is what caused things, I did test the water pretty frequently and for the most part things looked fine. Also regarding the chemi clean, the bottle I used was purchased 7 months ago and previously used. I did not see any expiration date on the bottle, but maybe the liquid should not be used after sometime?

Salinity: 34.5/35. This has remained relatively stable and I use a hana pen to check. My last recalibration was less than 1 month ago.
pH fluctuates between 7.9-8.2 throughout the day. Calibration was 1 month ago.
Alk/Cal/Mg via the Trident
Alkalinity: 8.5 average - though typically I keep around 9. 1 week ago my Co2 tank ran out causing this to drop into the 7's. Luckily I had a replacement, changed it out the next day and got it back up throughout this past week
Calcium: 468 average with no significant variations
Magnesium: 1445 average, no significant variations
Nitrate: 1ppm on 20 January, 5ppm 25 January. Possibly related to the Cyano kill off.
Phosphate: .02ppm 21 January, .08 25 January. Possibly related to the Cyano kill off.

No changes have been made to my lighting.

Looking through my notes on my tank, other possible causes to issues:
-Flow from my main return pump was increased 1 month ago and I removed my filter roller because it was going through 1 roll a week.
-Over the past week, my 3 tuxedo urchin's were losing spines. They were still moving around, though this morning it looks like they might have died off. Upon further inspection, they are dead and removed from the tank. I likely killed off their food source, though they always seemed to eat more coralline algae then GHA.
-A serpent starfish was losing bits off its legs, and I started noticing this about a week ago, and this morning it appears to be down to nubs in the front of the tank, though still squirming around. It has been removed from the tank.
-Refugium tank flow increased. It's possible that this stirred up detritus and who knows what sitting underneath it all causing the tank to react adversely. I wanted to increase the flow here after killing off the cyano so the chaeto could suck up more nutrients.
-I read that macro algae can bleach out / reproduce, causing tank crashes, but Its all mostly green still so I don't suspect this as an issue.
-New frag tiles added to frag tank. Over a 2 week period, I added about 10 new 3x3" ocean wonders frag tiles to my frag tank, all with new frag's from online orders and with some Acropora cuts from my display. All frags were glued down using polylabs frag glue. I'm not saying this was the cause, simply one more chemical added to the system. I can imagine larger scale operations add a lot more glue to their systems at any given time, though they likely do more frequent water changes avoiding excess buildup. So you never know.
-My blue tang has been picking up everything not glued down and throwing it around the tank. This resulted in me gluing down all my scolys to 3 more frag tiles. Initially the scolys looked fine, but now they are receding. The frag tiles were simply washed off and scrubbed down before putting into the tank, as per the instructions they should be ready to put in the tank.

I'm not aware of any external chemicals that could of gotten into the tank. There are no candles or air freshners used near the tank or anywhere in my house, and no cleaning products have been used on the floors near the tank. Tables/surfaces nearby are usually wiped down with wipes due to a 1 and 4 year old in the house, no sprays used. Our kitchen is in the room next to the tank and earlier in the week while cooking the oven burned some food up causing smoke to come out, though doors and windows were opened.

So that's where I'm at right now. It's unfortunate to go through what I'm calling a tank crash. It's a bummer to lose so many corals that I've had for over 2 years now, but I guess that's part of challenges with this hobby. On the positive side of things, this has given me an opportunity to fix some of the rock work in the tank and make it more stable.

 

[Whip]

Thanks for sharing the good AND the bad... I should take lessons from you and share the “bad” in my build thread. I’m sorry to hear you are going through this right now. I remember you started your tank just a touch before I did, so I always kept an eye on your build to learn.

Anyway, I’m not qualified to attempt to help you (hopefully someone on here will help you out). I am, however, qualified to talk about two and four year olds dumping unknown substances into sumps and tanks. Do you have childproof features on your cabinet?

 

[ESH]

Thanks, appreciate the comments and I've been following your build as well and thought I read when you found a kiddo adding things to your sump. The good news is that my sump is in my basement, and raised off the ground well above arm and head height. No need for child locks on the cabinet, though I suppose they could get into the power strip and start flipping switches upstairs. At least the failsafe there is that it only controls the lights and power heads, and is easily reversed. I'm the only one who puts hands in the tank, so it's possible I introduced something without evening realizing it.

I did find all of my urchins dead, and they likely died off over the past week. Between killing off their food source and other chemical treatments I likely starved and stressed them out. While I did notice their spines falling off, I thought this was normal and expected them to grow back as Ive seen this happen in the past. Maybe they released some sort of chemical in the water causing this - Edit: looking this up I cannot seem to find anything that claims they do, in fact it appears they don't. Its likely they increased some ammonia levels in the tank. that's the only thing I haven't tested for.

At least Im not freaking out about the loss of so much live stock, mostly just bummed out and surprised to see the same exact corals die off at the same rate even though some are up in the display tank and others in the basement frag tank. My idea of having spare frags in case something like this occurred has failed. I think the coral Im most bummed out about losing is a large maze brain I've had for over 2 years. It was initially added to my 90gl, well before I should of added anything to my first tank and has made it through all of my past learning, only to die off suddenly. It was actually doing really well in this tank and growing.