JHunt's 30x30x18 SPS Shallow Cube

[jhuntstl]

Whenever things are going really well, that's when you should expect the worst! I feel like I've learned that lesson a few times now in this hobby. I was about to hit the 1 year mark and everything was starting to feel increasingly auto pilot...y.

The basement frag tank is at 8.32 right now. Display is at 7.92. Kalk has not dosed in a while now down there, the frag is maintaining on it's own. I actually have the probe set to control it to 8.2-8.24(I lowered it due to current circumstances). The relationship between the two tanks, their opposite light cycles, and how they balance each other's pH is interesting to see now I suppose. =p

I did get a doser and 5g bucket of kalk upstairs. I set it to what I think my evap will be over 24 hours. 2.6ml/min. About a gallon. I will likely set the frag tank doser to something similar, rather then let the pH probe have control. Now that the systems aren't tied together, I'm not sure I want to find out how much kalk it takes at night to prevent the pH drop.

 

[Gedxin]

 

[jhuntstl]

Thanks for asking!

I finally got a hold of Advanced Acrylics today. They're sending me everything I need to fix the overflow.

The display is doing just fine though. It's really only missing a skimmer. I haven't noticed any upset coral. PE is still nuts. Po4 still very high last I checked.

Since I got a doser setup upstairs, my pH has been fantastic! I had a swing of 8.28-8.45 starting with 1g/day. I noticed the water level was a little higher, so I backed off the peristaltic a bit. Currently 8.34 and was 8.23 at 6am this morning IIRC. Surprisingly stable and high pH for a 24/7 drip. No idea what alk is.

I am anxious to get things reconnected. I turned off all dosers except kalk. Trying to manage all that between two tanks would be a headache. I think a week off mag, trace, k and no3 is probably not a big deal. Hopefully will be joined back together by this weekend though.

Gotta say I am thankful to have spare equipment! This tank is running off a single peristaltic, ranco controller w/ 350w eheim, and a pinpoint pH monitor. Well and a bunch of tunze flow. I'm pretty sure it would be just fine for quite a while.

Funny how all the fishies grouped front and center for this photo. I've been feeding lighter up here and they are making sure I feel bad about it.

 

[Camaro Show Corals]

How’s your bc blood bank doing?

 

[jhuntstl]

How’s your bc blood bank doing?

Oh it's a goner. I tapped out at the end of November. It got off on the right foot, but went downhill and I never took the time to give it a better chance.

How's yours doing? I've been jealous seeing all the ones that have colored up.

 

[Mschmidt]

Well, would you look at that, I seem to have caught up on the read. Sorry about the seam failure and the trochus. the reef looks amazing.

 

[jhuntstl]

Well, would you look at that, I seem to have caught up on the read. Sorry about the seam failure and the trochus. the reef looks amazing.

Thanks for reading! <3

It's been a year of ups and downs. I think you learn the most in this hobby by failures. At least that's the positive spin I try to put on these situations. =)

And Mr. Bivalve is still doing great. TBH he may have killed Mr. Trochus.

 

[Mschmidt]

I too am learning about the ups and downs. Great coral growth too!

 

[jhuntstl]

Finally glued up the overflow today. Will let it cure overnight and hope I did a good enough job when I leak test it tomorrow.

Can't offer any thanks to John at Advanced Acrylics. He agreed to send everything needed to repair the seam. It was never shipped. Soooo.... that's just how that goes. I really was as patient as possible. I made no demands for a replacement or compensation for a 12 month old tank failure. I build for a living and understand mistakes are made. I just wanted a repair solution and his advice to make sure it was done correctly. There unfortunately was just no way to maintain any consistent contact with him.

I do want to thank @Tenecor Aquariums. I messaged them on R2R shortly after the failure. I had a response within a few hours. I got more support from them than AA. If I ever go custom acrylic again, you'll likely be hearing from me. Thanks again!

 

[Tenecor Aquariums]

Finally glued up the overflow today. Will let it cure overnight and hope I did a good enough job when I leak test it tomorrow.

Can't offer any thanks to John at Advanced Acrylics. He agreed to send everything needed to repair the seam. It was never shipped. Soooo.... that's just how that goes. I really was as patient as possible. I made no demands for a replacement or compensation for a 12 month old tank failure. I build for a living and understand mistakes are made. I just wanted a repair solution and his advice to make sure it was done correctly. There unfortunately was just no way to maintain any consistent contact with him.

I do want to thank @Tenecor Aquariums. I messaged them on R2R shortly after the failure. I had a response within a few hours. I got more support from them than AA. If I ever go custom acrylic again, you'll likely be hearing from me. Thanks again!

Hope it all works out for you. If you need anything else, please let us know. Happy holidays.

 

[jhuntstl]

Still seeing mega PE in most all coral. Even stags are fully extended. Sometimes I feel like its all going to go terribly wrong. =P I have become far too paranoid from past failures. I did send out a long overdue ICP today and hope to gain some insight on what may be promoting such PE.

On the flip side I have noticed my torches are NOT as extended. They have absolutely been smaller over the last month. Maybe it had to with the overflow failure, I'm not sure. TBH its not a bad thing as the green one especially was extending into one of the Tunzes.

I did raise all my Tunze pumps for this reason and ended up totally changing the flow. I have them all on a rapid pulse that creates a very nice wave similar to when I had a wavebox.

I actually toned it down a bit from this. But still have a significant wave.

My po4 is still very high. Straton is currently blasting whites, so browns will really be on display. Not trying to impress anyone with color!

 

[Sean Clark]

Great pics.

 

[jhuntstl]

To give some perspective on specifically my acropora PE improvement. Good growth in some, slow in others. Nutrients I am finding are a HUGE factor in color. But health? Not convinced it matters with po4. Growth? Not sure. I feel like some SPS has taken off in high po4 while others have slowed down.

Sep 3rd

Now

Sep 3rd

Now

better on 12/16

Sep 3rd

right meow

Sep 3rd

now

Sep 3rd

Now

sep 30th

meow

 

[SaltyT]

What is your PO4 level? I bet my definition of high PO4 is different than yours I still see a lot of coralline in your tank.

 

[jhuntstl]

What is your PO4 level? I bet my definition of high PO4 is different than yours I still see a lot of coralline in your tank.

It's been at least .9 for a while now. That's the max of my Hanna ULR. Last time I tested was a week ago. The shade of blue in the vial has been getting lighter as the weeks go by, so it is dropping. I suspect at one point I may have been 2.0+.

I don't think we're that far off from each other if I'm remembering our chat at Seascape correctly.

 

[SaltyT]

It's been at least .9 for a while now. That's the max of my Hanna ULR. Last time I tested was a week ago. The shade of blue in the vial has been getting lighter as the weeks go by, so it is dropping. I suspect at one point I may have been 2.0+.

I don't think we're that far off from each other if I'm remembering our chat at Seascape correctly.

I think if your PO4 gets high temporarily you don't see too many negative effects, but if it's sustained at high levels it affects things negatively. The higher my PO4 went the more coralline I lost. I ended up losing all of my coralline over the summer because I spent so much time away from my tank and my PO4 was consistently high. I have the higher range Hanna that goes up to 2.50 it would flash that number so who knows how high it really was. My coralline didn't start to regrow until I got my PO4 back down to 0.5. My PO4 is back up to 0.9 too.

 

[jhuntstl]

I think if your PO4 gets high temporarily you don't see too many negative effects, but if it's sustained at high levels it affects things negatively. The higher my PO4 went the more coralline I lost. I ended up losing all of my coralline over the summer because I spent so much time away from my tank and my PO4 was consistently high. I have the higher range Hanna that goes up to 2.50 it would flash that number so who knows how high it really was. My coralline didn't start to regrow until I got my PO4 back down to 0.5. My PO4 is back up to 0.9 too.

Appreciate your insight! That's interesting about the coralline. I've never heard that. I don't intend to keep it this high. It just happened and I prefer not to react with GFO, lanthanum, etc. It is taking much longer than I expected to fall, but slow is usually better.

 

[SaltyT]

Appreciate your insight! That's interesting about the coralline. I've never heard that. I don't intend to keep it this high. It just happened and I prefer not to react with GFO, lanthanum, etc. It is taking much longer than I expected to fall, but slow is usually better.

With how purple your rocks are, I don't think you have to worry about losing your coralline lol I ended up using phosguard to lower mine. I also use the DIY calcium carbonate coral snow mixture which helps bind PO4. I'll probably always struggle with PO4 levels since I feed my tank so much.

 

[jhuntstl]

Tested today at 1.5 no3 and .06 po4. Quite the dramatic change! I admitedly had not tested in a while. Both lower than I'd like, so will take a stab at raising these up again. Maybe something like 10-15 no3, .1-.2 po4.

I actually took the time to investigate exactly what happened with the po4 dosing incident. I thought perhaps it was a calibration issue. It was not. I misread the instructions...

1ml per 125g = .1ppm (not .01 like I believe I thought at the time)

I'm fairly certain I started at 5ml/day(.05ppm). In reality this was .5ppm/day. Or let's say 3.5ppm a week! My original goal was to maintain .15, so I missed the mark there quite a bit...

I set it up late September. I left that doser running for a solid month @ .5ppm a day for a total of 15.0ppm of po4. Pretty nuts!!! I had a good amount of growth since then.

Looking back though I can see why I had some acro losses in October. I lost a few newer ones from SBB and an established tenuis that I was really dissapointed to see go. Interesting how well the tank did though all things considered.


Current FTS

 

[billyocean]

The PE king!...lol