IM EXT 50

[Arkayology]

The cyano is sticking around so far. I've vacuumed the sand to a filter sock in the sump twice. It's a new tank thing.

 

[Arkayology]

The cyano is sticking around. I've been dosing Ammonium chloride and P04 to keep levels up, but the P04 is fueling the cyano. I really don't want to use chemiclean to fix this on a 4 month old tank mostly because it will just continue the instability. My current plan is to stop dosing the P04 and keep dosing the Ammonium chloride to give the bacteria a chance to outcompete the cyano, but I worry that the SPS will suffer if P04 get too low. I've been vacuuming the sand every couple of days and blowing the rocks, but the cyano is persistent. I've also been dosing TM Nitribiotic and Prodibio. It's not a flow issue - the cyano is actually forming long strings (no bubbles, no dinos) because of the flow.

What would you do in this situation?

 

[Arkayology]

Update! Things are going well. The cyano outbreak has taken care of itself. It took about three weeks of heavy dosing of ammonium chloride and neophos, but it is almost gone. Parameters are beginning to stabilize - I think that the rock/sand was consuming a lot of P04.

Params:
dkh - 10 (when P04 got to .5, consumption went down and dkh went up. doser is off until I get back to 8.5)
P04 - .5ppm
N03 - 20 ppm
sg - 1.026
temp - 77F

FTS - 05/21/2026

maxima clam is settled in and growing

rainbow loom - lost a lot of color, but is slowly getting back some purple

bill murry (left) and pink tip sarmentosa (right) also coloring up

red planet

I think it is a greg hiller purple something?

sold to me as a bowser cyphastrea - it is growing and loving life.

GARF bonsai - encrusting and growing

 

[Arkayology]

I ordered a red dragon, ultimate efflo, green slimer, and some zoas from POTO off reefnbid last week. Shipped Tuesday but showed up today (2 days in shipping)- thanks FedEx for the "overnight" shipping. Red dragon and Green slimer are DOA.

 

[Arkayology]

I'm looking to get a couple more small fish. Currently, I have a yellow coris wrasse, midas blenny, lubbock's wrasse, and a damsel. Any suggestions?

 

[TheWB]

I'm looking to get a couple more small fish. Currently, I have a yellow coris wrasse, midas blenny, lubbock's wrasse, and a damsel. Any suggestions?

Chalk Basslets or Zebra Barred Dartfish might be cool choices? A pair or trio of both are currently on my wishlist.

 

[Arkayology]

Chalk Basslets or Zebra Barred Dartfish might be cool choices? A pair or trio of both are currently on my wishlist.

I hadn't considered either of those. Thanks.

 

[X-37B]

I hadn't considered either of those. Thanks.

Chalk Bass are super jumpers.
This is what my old one did.
Jumped from the nano to the frag system. Guess it did not like the nano, lol.
Note: I have lids on all systems now.

 

[X-37B]

I run 3 xr15 gen 5 blues on my ext 50. I was getting 200 par on the bottom with 2. With 3 it jumps to 300+ with the crossover.
1 30 centered will work well and you would have less par toward the edges for lower light corals.
If I did not have 5 xr15's already I would have went with a photon 32.
I run 2 50's on my ext 170.
This is my 50 with just the center light on running ab+ at 30%.
Its only a few weeks old.

Pic of the 50 today. Its a 1/2 frag system since startup. Slimer on the back wall was an eraser nub. System is 2 years old this month.

 

[Arkayology]

I am back from a month long research trip. The tank was completely untouched except for my wife topping up the ATO reservoir. Overall, the tank did amazingly in my absence. The cyano and dinos are gone and growth and colors of all the SPS are getting better. The only thing I lost while I was gone was the lubbock's wrasse to jumping. I know... I was in the process of designing a lid but the Plank complicated it and I didn't finish ordering it. That is on the to-do list.

I will be ordering new fish and more SPS within the next couple weeks. Pics soon!

 

[Arkayology]

Welp, my Orphek Natura seems to be bricked. It wasn't on and was having difficulty connecting when I got back from my trip. I opened it up and found this. This cannot be good. I am working with Orphek tech support right now, but the light is out of their meager 1 year warranty, so I may be boned.

I ordered a Straton X from saltwateraquarium.com over the weekend, but that will probably not be here for a month or more given supply issues. I took the Kessil a360x off my frag tank, but that really isn't enough light for my SPS. I may have to find a second used kessil to tide me over until I get the Straton X.

 

[TheWB]

Welp, my Orphek Natura seems to be bricked. It wasn't on and was having difficulty connecting when I got back from my trip. I opened it up and found this. This cannot be good. I am working with Orphek tech support right now, but the light is out of their meager 1 year warranty, so I may be boned.

I ordered a Straton X from saltwateraquarium.com over the weekend, but that will probably not be here for a month or more given supply issues. I took the Kessil a360x off my frag tank, but that really isn't enough light for my SPS. I may have to find a second used kessil to tide me over until I get the Straton X.

Aw man, thats a real bummer. Sorry that happened. Just over a year too? Thats always the way it goes.
I will be excited to see how the Stratton X does over your tank though. Should be really great coverage over the Lagoon 50.

 

[Arkayology]

Aw man, thats a real bummer. Sorry that happened. Just over a year too? Thats always the way it goes.
I will be excited to see how the Stratton X does over your tank though. Should be really great coverage over the Lagoon 50.

Yeah, it really is. Something shorted out on it I guess. I am excited for the Straton X as well. I really didn't like the spread I was getting from the Natura anyways.

 

[TheWB]

Yeah, it really is. Something shorted out on it I guess. I am excited for the Straton X as well. I really didn't like the spread I was getting from the Natura anyways.

I've been thinking about light spread lately. I have a Reefi Uno and two Neptune Sky's over a 48x20 display area and I still have some shadowing. They are lined up right down the middle of the display so there's nothing over the front or back edges to provide light from a different angle. I'm not in a position to spend a bunch of money on lights right now but at some point I'm really thinking about selling what I have and trying 4 of the Quanta Helix bars, spreading them out, and going for some T5 like blanket coverage. I think thats the most effective way to do that although I am also intrigued by the Stratton Flex even though that gets me back to a single fixture down the middle. I've read some good things about the spread. Thats why I'm interested in how you like the Stratton X although I realize with its configuration it's going to be different from the Flex.

 

[Arkayology]

I've been thinking about light spread lately. I have a Reefi Uno and two Neptune Sky's over a 48x20 display area and I still have some shadowing. They are lined up right down the middle of the display so there's nothing over the front or back edges to provide light from a different angle. I'm not in a position to spend a bunch of money on lights right now but at some point I'm really thinking about selling what I have and trying 4 of the Quanta Helix bars, spreading them out, and going for some T5 like blanket coverage. I think thats the most effective way to do that although I am also intrigued by the Stratton Flex even though that gets me back to a single fixture down the middle. I've read some good things about the spread. Thats why I'm interested in how you like the Stratton X although I realize with its configuration it's going to be different from the Flex.

I don't have a PAR meter but I think that based on how the corals have responded I have 100 PAR or less outside of a 20'' area of the center of the tank. This is just my impression - I have no idea how accurate it is. The SPS on the outer edge of the light were growing towards it too. I will do my best to give some impressions of spread and shadowing when I get the Straton X. Based on what I have read, I should get much more PAR spread out then I was before.

The bars spread out will likely be a good way to go, but still not cheap.

 

[Arkayology]

In happier news, I got a new tank battery backup (AKA - new car!) It's a Hyundai Ioniq 5. It has a vehicle to load adaptor that allows me to plug in a regular household electronic device (like a return pump, heater, etc.) to the car and draw from the battery. I guess I can drive it around too.

 

[McPuff]

Welp, my Orphek Natura seems to be bricked. It wasn't on and was having difficulty connecting when I got back from my trip. I opened it up and found this. This cannot be good. I am working with Orphek tech support right now, but the light is out of their meager 1 year warranty, so I may be boned.

I ordered a Straton X from saltwateraquarium.com over the weekend, but that will probably not be here for a month or more given supply issues. I took the Kessil a360x off my frag tank, but that really isn't enough light for my SPS. I may have to find a second used kessil to tide me over until I get the Straton X.

Yikes, this doesn't seem like a normal warranty issue. Could have been much worse. I hope Orphek will come through for you.

Years ago I had a light catch fire and shut down my entire reef. Caused nearly everything to die.

 

[Arkayology]

Yikes, this doesn't seem like a normal warranty issue. Could have been much worse. I hope Orphek will come through for you.

Years ago I had a light catch fire and shut down my entire reef. Caused nearly everything to die.

I am waiting for Orphek to see what they will do for me. I am not hopeful given that I am a year outside their warranty. I am not sure what caused the light to fry but I hope it is not a "normal" thing that others can expect. It could have been a lot worse though! I am glad that nothing bad happened to my tank or house other than the light dying.

 

[Arkayology]

Orphek got back to me. They said that it looks like the PC and LED board fried and will need to be replaced. Since I am out of warranty, it will be $225 + shipping to get the parts to fix the light. I am not sure if I really want to put that money into this light. What's with companies only giving 1 year warranties on lights? To be fair, ATI only gives a 1 year warranty as well. For something so expensive for the consumer, I would expect a little more time. Regardless,

 

[TheWB]

Orphek got back to me. They said that it looks like the PC and LED board fried and will need to be replaced. Since I am out of warranty, it will be $225 + shipping to get the parts to fix the light. I am not sure if I really want to put that money into this light. What's with companies only giving 1 year warranties on lights? To be fair, ATI only gives a 1 year warranty as well. For something so expensive for the consumer, I would expect a little more time. Regardless,

That does stink but it’s what I expected would happen. I really appreciate people like Daniel at Reefi who puts a 3 year warranty on his light if I’m remembering that correctly. I got two of the first gen 1 UNO’s off the boat so it’s been a while and my warranty has expired. But they never broke so I never had to deal with it. I’m only using one of them right now so I’ve got a backup. I really wish he would develop an app that dumb people like me could use, I’d never even think about another brand.
If I ever replace them I think I’m going with Quanta Bars and those have 2 years warranty. That gives some peace of mind plus they are much less expensive if replacement is needed.