RFBF's 90 Gallon Déjà vu All Over Again

[redfishbluefish]

Hey thanks Kevin. I get a kick out of cutting little tiny pieces of wood and gluing them back together.

 

[redfishbluefish]

All done, but I want to give it a day for the paint and glue to dry.

Front.- to hold two MP10 controllers, a Jebao powerhead controller and the controller for the Fathom sump light.

Back - to hold two MP's power supplies (in the black box) and the Fathom power supply zip-tied down low.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Hooking it All Up

Done.....well almost!

First a DOH! The slot holes I made were all 5/8 inches. Never looked at all the wires. Who knew Jebao's have an enormous wire connector.

Easy fix....used a power rasp on my drill to open up the hole.

Here's the back side of the board wired up:

The front side wired up:

And the control board slid back into the stand:

All organized and if I need to get at anything I can slide it out to adjust and fix whatever. Now the one thing that is missing is one of the power supplies to the MP10. I just used my last backup power supply a week ago, and talk about it HERE. I just guess my luck.....two Ecotech power supplies dead within a week. This powerhead was working a week ago when I decided to move it to the DT. When I plugged it in I did hear a little pop. The replacement power supplies are on back order and won't be shipped until February 21. Very happy with the organization.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Hinge Free

Since I had the side door off the stand to do the control board (above), I took the opportunity to remove the hinges. This is the last door on my stand and equipment cabinet that still had hinges. These were just off-the-shelf 3/8 offset hinges that I had already replaced once before because they turned into rust-buckets from the salt air.

With this side door, I put one biscuit centered in the bottom door frame with a slot in the stand floor to fit the biscuit. This is looking down at the door that is partially open where you can see the biscuit and the slot in the stand floor.

At the top of the door I counter sunk two neodymium magnets in the corners and then mounted what I call Mickey Mouse ears on inside of the door frame. These too have neo magnets glued inside them and aligned with the magnets in the door. So the biscuit/slot holds the bottom of the door while the magnets hold the top of the door.

 

[redfishbluefish]

NEW POWER SUPPLIES AND A DOH! MOMENT

..........The replacement power supplies are on back order and won't be shipped until February 21.

They lied! The power supplies arrived today....21 days before they said they'd arrive. I'm like a 5 year old on Christmas morning, all giddy with excitement. I immediately grab the box and open it up to get one of the new power supplies. I quickly plug it in to the controller that had the bad power supply and I immediately get a flashing red/green on the controller!!!!!! Frustrated I immediately try to do a reset of the controller.....starting by holding the mode and set button.....nothing. I repeatedly try this and even switch to another power supply to see if the new supply might be bad. Again nothing....still getting red/green flashing. Now, are you able to spot my DOH! Here's the controller:

Now this probably took me about 20 minutes to figure out my DOH.

Yep, I never re-hooked up the controller with the wetside...you can see no wire to the right of the controller. Once I plugged the controller back in to the wetside, and plugged in the new power supply.....and I did do a reset.....works like a charm!

 

[redfishbluefish]

MP40 Noisy and HOT, HOT, HOT!!!

Here we go again with a bearing change on an Ecotech MP40. I have old powerheads. I think the oldest of the four MP40's I have is 2005. I don't know the age of this one that is so hot, I can't even keep my hand on the dryside for more than a fraction of a second. All four of them sing a nice little song with their wining sounds sounding like the sirens of Greek mythology. Hey, they're old and I'd expect some noise out of them.....and obviously, they are not QD's. But this one is also HOT!

So I'm hoping a bearing change will cool this hot tamale down and maybe make it a little quieter. I've done this before, years ago, and actually documented my MP10 experience on our local club forum HERE. I've just ordered new bearings, and won't get into the minutiae, but this is the hardest part because all of the different grades and hardness....and price. Some say just get the cheapest while others say get the hardest (ABEC number). For some reason I just picked a brand I know (SKF), and made sure they had metal shields (because some say they run quieter than the plastic/rubber shields). FIngers crossed and wait for them to be delivered. I plan on once again documenting this bearing change here on R2R.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Bearing replace and documented that little DIY here:

Ecotech Vortech MP40 Bearing Replacement


And just started the rebuilt powerhead up. For document purposes this is labeled "Right Front". Certainly not the quietest, but I'm more concerned about heat. I'll give it a check in another hour or so and over the day.


EDIT TO ADD
It's now been over 3 hours and the "new" dryside is oh so slightly warm....similar to the other MP's....so the bearing changed fixed the hot problem. Noise wise it's definitely better, and slightly less than the other "old" wetsides, but certainly not silent.

 

[redfishbluefish]

I was in a bit of a panic this morning. Walked into the fish room and the return pump wasn’t on and the DT was down to 73F (my heaters are in the sump). A quick go-over of the wiring found that the delay start outlet was lit up as still in “safety delay”.

This is a MiaVolt that I started using in 2018 when I found that my DC return pump wasn’t restarting after a very brief power outage. I was told it was because the impeller was still spinning while the water back-flowed in the plumbing, causing the pump to stall and not restart. The MiaVolt has a three minute delay after power loss and once installed I never had that problem again. Well now it’s crapped out. I’ve tested it and the light showing “safety delay” is just always lit up.

I’ve found a two-pack on Amazon for $24.90, so now I’ll have a backup. Tank is slowly getting back up to temperature with no apparent damages….lps not fully puffed up.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Mold / Mildew in Sleeper Sofa

The cloth sleeper sofa that's in the fish room has had issues with a mold-mildew odor that was attempted to be controlled by sprays and baking soda. Worked for a while, but the odors returned. This is all from the high humidity in that room, and the age and fabrics of the sofa. So I brought the sofa outside and took a sledge hammer and saw to it so I could cart it off to our refuse center.

Thinking that we could quickly find a replacement, we went furniture shopping.....are you ready for delivery timing.....new sofa would be delivered in 40 weeks....that's four, zero weeks!!!! What??? I could be dead by then.

After discussions with the boss, I convinced her that a futon would be a better choice for the fish room....less fabric and more open, so less likely it would get moldy, and the best part........AMAZON, here in a week. Just ordered it and can't wait for it to be delivered.

Here's the Amazon picture:

 

[revhtree]

That’s a nice one!

 

[redfishbluefish]

Elevated feeding station installed in the canopy. Works great. Documented this simple DIY HERE.

 

[revhtree]

Elevated feeding station installed in the canopy. Works great. Documented this simple DIY HERE.

Love it!

 

[acropora4u]

I am optimistic this is going to work, with roughing up the back of the acrylic and the inside of the Brute with a rasp, and with the additional surface area for the silicone.

The one thing I didn’t anticipate was the head of the heater hitting the acrylic. I remedied that by flipping the piece around 180 degrees, leaving more room for the heather head

Slathered up the back of the acrylic, placed it in the Brute and then siliconed all around the edge of the acrylic.

After a day, I mounted the heater to see how it would look.

Fingers cross while I let the silicone cure…..end of the month is the next water change.

I like this idea alot...been there done that on breaking glass heaters while sitting on bottom of bucket

 

[Miami Reef]

Hi @redfishbluefish

Can I see a FTS?

 

[redfishbluefish]

Hey @Miami Reef , don't know how I missed your post.....give me a couple days and I get one up. My wife has been cracking the whip for Thanksgiving, so I haven't had much time with the tank.

Picked up a little salt on sale at $34.99 a case:

 

[Miami Reef]

Hey @Miami Reef , don't know how I missed your post.....give me a couple days and I get one up. My wife has been cracking the whip for Thanksgiving, so I haven't had much time with the tank.

Picked up a little salt on sale at $34.99 a case:

Hey! It’s ok! I’m still here!

That salt is awesome. I ordered 4 boxes at $50 each from Amazon; yours is a steal.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Per request....and as you can tell, I'm not a photographer....you can see the reflection of the blinds in the tank! On top of that, I couldn't find my orange filter for my phone so the picture is washed out. If I find the filter, I'll post another.

 

[RocketEngineer]

Nice.

 

[redfishbluefish]

I found the orange filter, but this one looks funny too.

 

[redfishbluefish]

TIME TO CLEAN THE SUMP....actually way past time to clean the sump. My stand has a "window" that allows this portion of the sump to be seen when the door is closed. The coralline is so bad you can't see into the sump:

BEFORE

During a water change, took everything out, scrapped down the sides and used a shop vac to suck everything out, and refilled.

AFTER