Olds Family Reef Build Thread

[Whiskeyboy84]

Some more progress today got the RO/DI system mounted and plumbed did water test on the mixing station having some drippage from the bottom bulkheads drained them silicone applied to the outside gunna let that sit over night, then stand them up the bulkheads are plenty tight I am guessing the issue is the blow mold ridges in the bottom of the barrels wanna try and silicone the inside as well but the opening isn’t big enough for me to reach the bottom any ideas would be awesome.

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Finally getting her wet! Picking up a pair of clowns this evening as well as two roller mat rolls gotta let the water settle out messed up and kicked the gyres on with the flow blowing straight down at the sand bed “oops”

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Circulating through the Sump now! Powerheads still turned off at the moment

 

[gnarlydudecory]

Welcome!

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

So we have cycled the system, the Radions didn’t end up working so we have opted for Chinese Blackbox’s at the moment waiting to rent a par meter to see what these Vipar Spectra’s put out. Need to get a camera filter to take better pics of our residents lol. We have an Emperor Angel, two storm clowns, 8 damsels, 14 Chromis, a cleaner wrase, lawnmower blenny, naso tang, horseshoe crab, plethora of snails, and a coral banded shrimp.

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

 

[CoralB]

Welcome !! :cool:

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Took the time today to mark my common water change levels with percentages by utilizing a tank volume calculator. Having a little bit of an ugly phase to be expected, had the skimmer ingest some debris and was slow to figure it out totally newbie move. Did a 50% water change today will do a 25% next week and then start on my weekly 12% water changes wanted to let the tank get “dirty” to help mature the rock and ceramic filter media before starting to add corals. Hoping to start adding Corals in March. Also having issues trying to tune my roller mat I bought the Trigger V2 used and it works well but is going through a roll every 10 days tried to reprogram it seems to be set to run on timed settings but the display is inoperative. Will eventually add either an Apex or Hydros controller but at this time not in the works. I am wanting to upgrade the Curve 7’s pump when I took it apart and cleaned it the pin wheel hub has a small crack so figure it’s a good excuse to update to a DC controllable skimmer pump so I don’t have to unplug the skimmer for feedings. Nice to just hit the feed mode buttons and do my feedings then let the timer count down.

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Also, I have some picky eaters in this tank none of them will eat pellets I have tried a few different brands and they reject the pellets let them sink and until I vacuum the sand they just push around with the flow. I have a local pet supply that stocks all different types of frozen food so these guys are getting a wide variety of frozen. I have 10 damsels, 12 Chromis, a juvenile Emperor Angel, Juvenile Naso Tang, Juvenile Cleaner Wrasse, a lawn mower blenny and a single coral banded shrimp, looking to add one of two more coral banded shrimp, a pin cushion urchin, and that will be it we do feed a sheet of Nori everyday as well currently we are giving four cubes out of the standard blister packs, was feeding 6 but I think I was way over feeding all are fat and happy. Any insight on how to get these guys on pellets or if pellets are a waste of time would be appreciated my last aquarium the fish would take both frozen and pellets, however I believe fish have personality and every fish is different so maybe I just have a bunch of picky eaters.

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Ended up having to change lighting went with wall to wall viparspectra’s mounted 9 inches off the water and did a 50/50 wide angle lense swap to help spread the par a bit better so we have 50% of the lenses as 90 degree optics and the others are 120 degree optics

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

@TopShelfAquatics thanks for the great coral Haul just ordered frags for this tank build

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

 

[Whiskeyboy84]

Took the old school algae scrubber offline and built a fuge out of an old all in one aquarium have a small golf ball size piece of clean cheato in it and even have it slow tumbling something I could never achieve in my past aqariums.