Flippers reef 125 gallon

[Flippers4pups]

Hi! Quick questions, I read in the beginning pages of your build thread that you used carisea special grade sand. Is that still the original substrate? If it is, are you happy you went with it? How easy is it to vacuum and keep clean? Sorry for all the questions but I'm planning on changing sand in my tank because the current fine sand blows around too much and is difficult to vacuum. Thanks

I'm glad to answer your questions. I originally set the tank up using Marco sand. It was a combo deal with the Marco rock I bought. That sand was sold as aragonite sand, but it had "chunks" in it. So for most of the life of the system, it had this sand.

Some time ago I replaced it with Dry Caribsea special grade aragonite sand. I rinsed a pound or two at a time with tap water using a old fish net in the utility sink down stairs and drained it the best i could. Placed it in a bucket, filled it enough with RO/DI water to cover the sand and added some Prime to deal with any chlorine residual. Drained that off the sand.

Using a syphon hose, I removed sections at a time and added the new sand using a piece of PVC pipe long enough to reach the bottom of the tank, dumping small amounts down the pipe. I want to say it took about a week to remove and replace the sand in the entire tank.

As I stated in the build thread, I was battling dinoflagellates for years and tried every trick in the book to get rid of them. During this time I would vacuum the sand using a gravel vacuum. Special grade size is perfect for a reef and is easily vacuumed. It's size is perfect for sand sleeping wrasses and sand sifting gobies.

I haven't touched my sand bed for a long time since beating dinos.

Hopefully this answers some of your questions.

 

[fishybizzness]

Thanks flippers for the response! I have some slippery "richard" wrasses and them having a substrate they can burrow in easily is essential! The finer sand is a pain to siphon and always gets sucked down the hose. How is the look and color compared to regular fine sand? Is it pretty white or more on the tan side? I'm almost done with my dino issues and will be replacing my 55 gallon dt with a sca 50 cube and want to start off with the new sand. I also want to replace the current sand in my 120 with the special grade as well. My current tanks and sand!

 

[Flippers4pups]

Thanks flippers for the response! I have some slippery "richard" wrasses and them having a substrate they can burrow in easily is essential! The finer sand is a pain to siphon and always gets sucked down the hose. How is the look and color compared to regular fine sand? Is it pretty white or more on the tan side? I'm almost done with my dino issues and will be replacing my 55 gallon dt with a sca 50 cube and want to start off with the new sand. I also want to replace the current sand in my 120 with the special grade as well. My current tanks and sand!

Special grade is like 1-2mm in size. It's white sand that is pure aragonite which is ancient coral crushed into fine particles and sifted for grain size. So it shouldn't have much of any other sand in it.

I have a couple of these in different sizes:

I just start the syphon with the bulb and use my finger at the end of the tube to adjust the flow in the pick up tube to keep sand from being sucked up.

 

[fishybizzness]

Thanks for the reply, it's very reassuring that I'm making the right move! It's always great having members like yourself giving advice from your hands on experience. It makes this hobby so much more enjoyable and successful!

 

[Flippers4pups]

Thanks for the reply, it's very reassuring that I'm making the right move! It's always great having members like yourself giving advice from your hands on experience. It makes this hobby so much more enjoyable and successful!

Your welcome!

Side note: I should have just started out with Special grade, but i got a deal through Marco and regretted it. I've used Special grade with previous tanks through the years and it's been the best reef sand i've ever used. Can't go wrong. One other thing is I would get the Dry. It's cheaper and it will populate with bacteria very quickly so no need to buy the live sand.

Helping other hobbyists is part of giving back and helping them to succeed as well.

Fins up!

 

[Flippers4pups]

Random Friday night tank shots:

 

[Flippers4pups]

 

[Flippers4pups]

Cali tort coming back!

 

[fishybizzness]

Nice! I just ordered 2 40 lb bags from brs.

 

[Bleigh]

Cali tort coming back!

Love the coral pictures!

 

[Flippers4pups]

Update:

Over the weekend was me and Stephanie's wedding anniversary, so spent time away locally and had a great time. 11 years married!

On the topic of reefing, I ordered a new heater to replace a older heater i've had for some years now. It's a good thing to replace them every so often as a preventative and with the colder months now, it was time.

So now I'm running two 150 watt heaters and one 100 watt heater. Total of 400 watts. I was running 300 watts total before, but with the addition of the 56 column as a frag tank, the extra 50 watts made sense.

"What heaters are you using?" Aqueon Pro's.
Maybe not the best heaters on the market, but they haven't let me down in all the time this system has existed. (Knock on wood!)

Since the heater addition and slowly dialing it in, tank temp is stable at 79.8 Fahrenheit.

 

[TriggerFinger]

Hey @Flippers4pups, what’s are the fittings called that’s circled in the pic? Are they threaded to each other? And there is glued pvc between that fitting and the union?

 

[Flippers4pups]

Hey @Flippers4pups, what’s are the fittings called that’s circled in the pic? Are they threaded to each other? And there is glued pvc between that fitting and the union?

That is a threaded/slip adapter fitting. On this application, female threaded 1" to 1" slip adapter fitting. The threaded side screws on to the pump volute (impeller housing) with some teflon tape to seal it. The "slip" side allows for pvc pipe to be glued into it and is glued into the True union.

Hope this helps!

 

[TriggerFinger]

That is a threaded slip adapter fitting. On this application, female threaded 1" to 1" slip adapter fitting. The threaded side screws on to the pump volute (impeller housing) with some teflon tape to seal it. The "slip" side allows for pvc pipe to be glued into it.

Hope this helps!

Prefect, thank you! I’m trying to plumb one of those to send water up from my basement.

 

[Flippers4pups]

Update: Thursday evening i come home from work and the circuit to the return pump has tripped again. This circuit is tied into the main circuit for the whole fish/basement room.

One of two things is going on here. One, the whole circuit is near capacity because of the additional light and pumps to the frag tank or Two, the GFCI at the switch for the return pump is weak and the ATO switch kicking on causes it to trip.

Either way i'm making changes tomorrow. One i'm replacing the GFCI. Two i'm splitting the main circuit into two separate circuits.

So tomorrow i'm off to Lowe's for a main 15 amp breaker, GFCI, Some wire nuts and hog nose nails. I've got plenty of 14/2 wire. This should solve my issues.

 

[ShoreReefer]

Update: Thursday evening i come home from work and the circuit to the return pump has tripped again. This circuit is tied into the main circuit for the whole fish/basement room.

One of two things is going on here. One, the whole circuit is near capacity because of the additional light and pumps to the frag tank or Two, the GFCI at the switch for the return pump is weak and the ATO switch kicking on causes it to trip.

Either way i'm making changes tomorrow. One i'm replacing the GFCI. Two i'm splitting the main circuit into two separate circuits.

So tomorrow i'm off to Lowe's for a main 15 amp breaker, GFCI, Some wire nuts and hog nose nails. I've got plenty of 14/2 wire. This should solve my issues.

Just a suggestion but if you are able to, instead of splitting the circuit into 2x15 amp circuits why not just add a new 20 amp circuit? You’ll have 2 dedicated circuits with one being a 20 amp. This way you’ll have plenty of juice for a few more frag systems down the road

 

[Flippers4pups]

Just a suggestion but if you are able to, instead of splitting the circuit into 2x15 amp circuits why not just add a new 20 amp circuit? You’ll have 2 dedicated circuits with one being a 20 amp. This way you’ll have plenty of juice for a few more frag systems down the road

Cost.

 

[Flippers4pups]

Update: Water change day. I've been Aiptasia hunting so far today. Got seven of them.

The wiring has been put on hold. I decided that the issue wasn't overloading the circuit, but a bad GFCI. I replaced the GFCI with a new one and cleaned the ATO pump. After cleaning the pump it wouldn't restart. This could have been my issue all along with a bad pump. So i replaced the pump and so far all good.

Next is to clean the inside glass with a razor blade and mount the wave maker power bricks i've let hang under the DT stand.

More to come.......

 

[NDIrish]

Do you still using the Inkbird to control your heaters?

 

[Flippers4pups]

Do you still using the Inkbird to control your heaters?

No i stopped using them a few years back.