rossco's 210 gallon SPS reef

[Reefahholic]

I have the Kalk reactor plumbed in line with my ATO, so it is running multiple times a day. My overall pH was raised by .2, from a low of 7.6 overnight to 7.8 now, and a high from 7.95 before to 8.15 now.

My tank evaporates about 12 gallons a week so a little less than 2 gallons of Kalk gets added to the tank a day.

Ok, well I have mine on a pump so I can control the amount to keep a consistent/stable Alk/Cal. Did you do it this way on your 75/G?

 

[rossco]

Didn't realize its been that long since I updated! Took a few photos today.

A couple Efflo's
Battlecorals Efflo 2.0

Battlecorals "Looks and Points" Efflo

Bill Murray and my Wild Pink Acro

Confetti with TGC Starphire to the right and ATL Strawberry Fields behind

TGC Starphire, love the long polyps

Pink Floyd

 

[MAB Reef]

Beautiful! Hope to some day have something close to this.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Didn't realize its been that long since I updated! Took a few photos today.

A couple Efflo's
Battlecorals Efflo 2.0

Battlecorals "Looks and Points" Efflo

Bill Murray and my Wild Pink Acro

Confetti with TGC Starphire to the right and ATL Strawberry Fields behind

TGC Starphire, love the long polyps

Pink Floyd

Your corals are looking amazing!

 

[Wonkabar]

Well, I am long overdue for an update. In mid 2014 I changed my lighting to 8 x 80 watt T5's, and now, since March of 2018, I am running 3 Radion XR30 Gen4 pro's along with 2 x 80 watt blue plus for 4 hours a day, so I am back to a LED reef, mostly.

There has been ups and downs, and I have been waiting and waiting for the tank to be in its best form for an update, and here we are over 6 years later. It is still not where I really want it, and was going to change the aquascape to a more open ridge and canyon style before making an update. I am still waiting for the large frag tank that was started last summer to settle in to where I am 100 percent confident it can house some of my large colonies while doing the re-scape.

There has been a few upgrades, a GEO CR818 calcium reactor with a second chamber, added a GEO Kalk reactor, and an ATO, and upgraded to an Apex controller. For flow there is now 4 x Vortech MP40's and 2 x MP60's.

In my case, I am going with low nutrients as the main root of my problems, coupled with forest fire smoke that happens here nearly every summer being injected via the skimmer. I have been running the tank skimmerless since July 2018.

Even running without a skimmer, the tank is so mature and consumes nutrients so efficiently that I have to dose nitrate and phosphate daily to keep detectable levels. My fish load is still fairly light. Ever since I started dosing, the tank has exploded with growth and the colors are spectacular.

This is where it is at currently. These photos have been posted in a couple of other threads so they may look familiar.

Thanks for looking!

This is spectacular. Out of curiosity where are your mps located and what settings are you running them on?

 

[Jimbo327]

It is amazing that this tank is still running.

 

[rossco]

This is spectacular. Out of curiosity where are your mps located and what settings are you running them on?

Thank you. If you zoom in on the last FTS i posted you should be able to spot most of them.

The 2 MP60's are on each end 10 inches from the front. About 8 inches from the surface.
One pair of the MP40's are also on each end, 18 inches from the front a little higher than the MP 60's.

The other pair of MP 40's are centered on each side of the overflow about 4 inches from the surface.

All of them are on reef crest, used to be all at 80 percent daytime and 60 percent overnight which possible with the Apex WXM module. As the acros grew, i turned the MP40's on the ends down because they were blowing the tissue off the side facing them.

The MP60's are Mobius so I'm stuck on one percentage setting so they are on the Reef Creat "default" 90 percent setting around the clock.

It is amazing that this tank is still running.

It's had its ups and downs, but doing pretty well now.
Gonna have to make a decision about Bill Murray, it keeps touching the front panel and i have to break a little off to clean there.

 

[JohnNYC8]

Spectacular reef---thank you for sharing it.

 

[jackson6745]

Awesome tank. Seeing it for the first time. Really well done Rossco!

 

[dangles]

Stunning. Absolutely stunning.

 

[rossco]

Kind of a surprise last month, I posted a couple FTS shots in the 2026 FTS thread, and was asked to feature my reef as tank of the month for March 2026! If anyone following hasn't seen it yet, this is the link:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...sscos-210-gallon-elevated-mixed-reef.1149855/

 

[DCMW1]

Kind of a surprise last month, I posted a couple FTS shots in the 2026 FTS thread, and was asked to feature my reef as tank of the month for March 2026! If anyone following hasn't seen it yet, this is the link:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...sscos-210-gallon-elevated-mixed-reef.1149855/

Awesome tank. Are you happy you went with acrylic instead of glass? I’m going to be starting my tank build soon and I can’t decide if I want to do glass or acrylic. Your tank looks amazing so it gives me renewed hope for maintaining an acrylic tank. Do you have any regrets?

 

[rossco]

I can’t decide if I want to do glass or acrylic. Your tank looks amazing so it gives me renewed hope for maintaining an acrylic tank. Do you have any regrets?

I like the ability to drill for the returns in the back panel without worrying. I like, the lighter weight. I like the rim around the edge and over the center to put tools on when I am working in the tank. I also like the clarity, and the clarity of the top rim and center is so good it has a minuscule if any effect on PAR. But, I have a hood over the tank, so the aesthetics of that do not matter.
Over time, the clarity fades with all the algae cleaning, but after 15 years it is still pretty good. Only I notice it, no one else - especially non reefers, will notice. In 15 year I have only put one big scratch in it and I sanded it out to be nearly not noticeable while it was running.
If I get another, a couple of things will be paramount.
First, be very persistent about cleaning coralline along the corners and panels you want to view through.
Second, keeping encrusting corals off the panels you want to view through.
Cleaning encrustment and coralline that has become established is the number one reason of most of the scratching on the lower few inches of the panels.