Ludders Red Sea Reefer 170

Ludders

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Thought I might as well share some pics of my build.

I started this tank 6 months ago and it's not my first.

I like the quality if the Red Sea products and am aiming for a Red Sea Peninsula in the future.

My aquascape is made from ocean rock and I went for a bit of height with it.

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I started off with Reef Octopus 110 classic and a Bubble Magus media reactor. A SunSun 11watt UVC with seperate feed pump.

I went for a Vortech MP10 and Maxspect Razor R420R 120 watt 16k.

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I used ReefFlowers Pearl white sand and got it all started. Lights are on in this pic, but I didn't run the lights during the cycle process, helping kick things off with Brightwell Microbacter7. It took a few weeks until I was comfortable adding anything and I had another reef running at the time elsewhere, so I was able to start moving stock I wanted from that over a period of a month or so, before I finally broke down my other tank.

I was running Rowaphos in my media reactor and found the stock pump over powered, so replaced the pump to something with less flow but also controllable to get the right flow for the Rowa. Soon after this I decided to add a second Bubble Magus reactor to run bio pellets. I had previously ran bio pellets and got on well with them, so this seemed like obvious progress for me.

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The sump is getting busy and well packed in by now, especially when I added a 3 channel dosing pump and reservoirs.

After temperature fluctuations too much for SPS to handle, I bought an Aquamedic titanium heater and controller. I keep the heater in my weir box and also a back up heater in the sump. The back up is set lower, so would only kick in if my main heater fails. The controller works well and I am pleased with temperature fluctuations of only around 0.3°C at most with this.

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I saw a chaeto reactor I liked the look of during one of my visits to my local store, so decided to give it a go a week before Christmas.
It has taken me a bit of getting used to, but I am seeing pretty excellent growth and I strip it once a week and remove chaeto, to make way for more growth.

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Here's a recent one of the complete aquarium.

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I added some more rock to the back right corner last weekend and want to do the same to the left and middle. The reason for this is for extra space for corals, more filtration and simply asthetics.

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Hope some people find this interesting or useful. Also happy to field any questions.

Thanks for checking my tank out.
 

GoVols

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Ludders,
Your reef is really beautiful and you've done a great job.

If you don't mind:
What's the light cycle that you run with your Maxspect Razor?

Freddie
 
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Ludders

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Ludders,
Your reef is really beautiful and you've done a great job.

If you don't mind:
What's the light cycle that you run with your Maxspect Razor?

Freddie
Thank you that's very kind, my light settings at the moment are as follows:

TP1 06:30 Ch1 0% Ch2 1%
TP2 12:00 Ch1 67% Ch2 100%
TP3 15:00 Ch1 67% Ch2 100%
TP4 20:30 Ch1 5% Ch2 45%
TP5 22:00 Ch1 0% Ch2 20%
TP6 23:30 Ch1 0% Ch2 0%

Looks great!
Thanks
 

SPR1968

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Very pretty indeed Ludders!

Great looking system.

EDIT. Yes exact same time as you were here Freddie! Lol @GoVols
 
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Thought I would do an update as a lot has changed.

I have had a few swings, mainly when I was on holiday last summer. This then led to a slow down in growth and a subsequent rise in my elements.

Long story short, it's all back under control again now and I just wanted to talk through a couple of changes I have made.

Firstly I found that with the chaeto reactor and a weekly 12% water change, I no longer required the two media reactors. The bio pellets were the first to go and I eventually got rid of the Rowaphos the other month.

The power connector on my dosing pump got damaged with how it was positioned and ended up going a bit haywire, so I bought a new Coral Box WF04 dosing pump.

Although I am not currently using 4 channels, I wanted then from a scalability perspective.

I found the pump very compact and neat to mount. Because there is no built in controller, I was able to mount the until above my UV filter completely out of the way of anything.

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The other benefits to this pump over my last one is accuracy and it calculates reservoir levels with a nice simple to use and adjust application.

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I also felt my lights were up too high, so slowly reduced them down to about 60% on W channel and 95% on the B channel.
Still feeling like it was far too much guess work for my liking, I started looking in getting a PAR meter.

Now not wanting to spend thousands, I came across the Seneye Reef, looked at a few reviews and videos and decided to get one.

I have since turned my max photo period down to 55% on W channel and 80% on the B channel. This gives me about 150 PAR in about a 12" depth of water.

Besides the PAR, I thought I might as well hook it up to the internet, so I can keep my eye on things this year when we go on holiday. Last year was insanely hot here and I did have a mobile air conditioning unit, but this was not used. This year I will be prepared as I have a split system installed now, which I can programme to make sure there are no over heats.

I have a temp probe to my thermostat in my display tank and the heater in the weir. The Seneye sensor is in the sump, so the temp appears to fluctuate more than you would like, but it's just recieving the heated water reading and in reality the larger volume of the DT fluctuates very little.

Here's a screenshot of the UI, but you can see the live Seneye data at http://www.seneye.me/ludders

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I'm very pleased with it.

Finally here's one taken today of the DT sorry there's some light reflection on the glass, unavoidable taking photos during the day time.

20190228-123550.jpg
 
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Ludders

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It's generally running well. I have my ups and downs being honest and not always plain sailing.

I am considering getting a reef cam next, so should be able to provide a live feed to it if I do.
 
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Ludders

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It has been 3 years since I set this reef up and it's still all fine.
I relinquished all the media and chaeto reactor etc.
Whilst they probably all had their benefits, they were also a maintenance overhead and simple filter socks, filters in the bubble trap and protein skimmer seem to be working well for me with 12% weekly water changes.

I have always wanted a penninsula aquarium, but house layout never really suited and we were considering moving, but I found a cheaper alternative, by expanding and knocking down the odd wall here and there.
This does mean I can soon upgrade, but am looking at a drop-off style around 60 gallons.
I will create a new build thread and maintain both systems for a transition period until I am happy the new reef is stable and mature enough to be able to start transferring my stock.
20200908_174805.jpg
 

Totallytollied

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What an absolutely stunning tank, will you run this as well as your new peninsular as it would seem such a shame to pull such a beautiful tank down.

Am looking forward to your new tank build and am certainly going to follow as I have a new project myself to start next year and found this thread both interesting and enjoyable.

Well Done!



Paul
 
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Ludders

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Thanks Paul, it is a shame, but I will reuse a lot of the coral and the rest can go to serve someone else in the hobby, who will hopefully get as much enjoyment as I do.

I think it will be early into the new year when I purchase all my new kit, I still have work to finish off on the house before Christmas.
 

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Looking forward to you new build thread and good luck with finishing the house, I have always intended to start a new reef after failing with constant algal attacks in my original reef over 25 years ago but put it off to finish the house.

Things didn’t go to the original plan and since then I have built three houses and am finishing a barn conversion which is absolutely my last meaning that the time has come to set up the tank.

Like you I have probably 4-6 months’ work left and am using this time to research and acquire the equipment needed which is how I found your thread. I have to say that I found it very inspiring (especially the photos) as so many other threads emphasise all the problems (of which I have had plenty of experience) it was especially refreshing to find someone shedding equipment rather than accumulating it whilst presenting such spectacular results.

As I said before – Well done – and please keep on posting!



Paul
 
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Ludders

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Thought I would post a current pic of my reef. Not much has changed really, I am just in maintenance mode at the moment whilst I wait for me new tank.
20201108_160938.jpg
 

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I've never seen such as awesome tank under r420r's
Impressive
Are you still running the 80B 40 W ?
I have a 60 gallon cube that I just moved and I'm using the same exact lights. Would Appreciate any advice you might have
Thanks
 

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