Official Build Thread of a 135 Gallon Reef tank

[Dilan Patel]

04/23/18

So I moved the frame onto my tank to move it out of the garage until the weekend. The opening is 21 inches and the total height is 27 inches including the bottom trim and will go closer to 30-32in when finished.

 

[Dilan Patel]

05/05/18

Happy Cinco de Mayo everybody,

So I have been working on the tank a little bit since the last update. For starters the canopy has a back and now holds lights . I replaced my temp tops with screen tops for the first time and I must say I like the lightweight factor of them. As well as I don't get the weird streaks of light like I used to with egg crate. I made a stand for my dosers to sit on as well as programmed some of my dosers. I am now currently running an experiment that will dose my aquaripure denitrator automatically for me so I do not forget to do so. So far so good will update later on. I also did a nice cleaning of the glass for the first time since I got the tank. I also ran test today which will be posted below. Any questions please feel free to ask!!! One downside is I am now seeing aiptasia ughhh. The copper is not doing his job...but im going to allow him to stay because he looks cool and i trained him to eat nori and frozen food which is a plus. The Fish are doing amazing and eating well. The Blue throat is eating and swimming well as well as the vlamingi who is putting on size. The corals have done somewhat well meaning they have gotten better color since I added dkh fro what used to be 6 and the colors sucked and stuff. One of my colonies I took from my big tank is starting to stn but I think that is part due to what used to be low dkh around 2weeks ago. This is what prompted me to setup my doser today. Now it is time to test for a few days successively and see the trend.

Parameters:
Nitrate:0(salifert)
Phosphate:3ppb(hannah)
Salinity:1.024(little low)
Magnesium:1395(salifert)
Alk: 170ppm(hannah)
Calc:474ppm(hannah)

 

[Dilan Patel]

05/12/18

Hey guys so I have been wanting to add another wrasse into my tank and yesterday I found out that my LFS had thsi beautiful dot dash wrasse and I decided to go pick it up. It is eating LRS and has good coloration and thickness. Will get a pick soon of it. Also got a butterfly for my other tank.

 

[Dilan Patel]

05/16/18

I unfortunately lost my new wrasse due to known reasons. Chemicals are all perfect and the fish was eating.

05/18/18
I was now able to add my t-5 setup to supplement my LEDs. I got the bulbs in from BRS in perfect condition and threw those things on the tank. Updated pic coming soon. new corals have been added as well.

 

[Dilan Patel]

05/19/18

Well today was not such a great day. I found my ruby head wrasse on my screen top crispy. He managed to make it through a .5in gap on my screen netting. Will be fixing the screen soon to combat any more fish jumpers. I really liked the fish but this has turned me off of wrasses for a little they just seem to come with some issues whether that be internal parasites or risks of jumping. I guess that is the only update as of now. Just hasn't been my week with this tank I guess. Every tank has its ups and downs. Just gotta make sure the tank bounces back.

 

[Dilan Patel]

06/18/18

Hey guys so I have been struggling with some sps corals lately. Parameters are fine. I never thought to check the par on my lights. Good thing I did At 100% from each channel I was getting only 240 Par at the TOP of my rock structure. So I just moved them down a whole 12inches so that they sit at 12inch above waterline. We will see now how much par I gained. What I am expecting is what I get in my other tank which is similar dimensions as well as height off the waterline. I am also looking to get a blonde naso tang in the near future hopefully in the next couple weeks.

 

[Dilan Patel]

06/29/18

so I was able to get a blonde naos tang which i was happy about. he is a struggle to get feeding lol but making orogress. tank is going through something with heavy cyano and algae on the rocks. probs time to change gfo and carbon out Vlamingi tang is getting BIG and fat. probs just as fat as my trigger. the picture does not do the naso justice on size. it has streamers too.

 

[Dilan Patel]

07/15/18

Hey guys so the tank and fish are doing great! Still cannot keep sps but the lps I have are doing fine. The cyano has died down as well. I just cut oputt eh top pannels for my canopy and plan to paint and add them to the canopy this week hopefully so stay tuned for pics of that.

 

[Dilan Patel]

07/16/18

So the boards are cut attached and now waiting for paint and some handles here is what they look like. i made all 4 pannels removable for easy access anywhere in the tank. also you may see the really high canopy. that was also made for acessobility. i found that on my main display the average height of a canopy is too small for me to work in. i wanted this new tank to be easy to work in and i think i accomplished that lol.

 

[Dilan Patel]

11/19/18

Hair algae has diminished greatly. The fish all seem fat and happy. The Vlamingi is almost the size of the blonde naso. Blonde naso looks extreamly healthier than before. Added a new fish today. A neon dottyback who I hope will add a nice color going in and out of the rocks. The algae that remains is brown algae on the rocks and red cyano so I will hopefully get all that squared away. Will hopefully get a pick of the tank up this week some time.