Shaun's 2000 Litre (530 USG) Living Reef & Red Sea Max S 650 LED Design & Build

[najer]

oops me

 

[SPR1968]

Repeat after ne, Coralus blueicus, people can spend hours serching!

Hey i did just have to google that! Lol

 

[LRT]

I dont know, its a dark blue coral probably acropora “dark blue”!

My brain wont compute coral names! Lol

Haha nice im sure there's a fancy name for it somewhere I like @najer name.
You know its blue when you can see how dark that blue is when your almost 100% color blind

 

[GBRsouth]

I dont know, its a dark blue coral probably acropora “dark blue”!

My brain wont compute coral names! Lol

This comment qualifies you for Australian citizenship Shaun! You've shown you're really one of us!

 

[Fudsey]

You know Shaun, if you went to/looked at a kitchen supply, you would have spent way less for that turkey baster

 

[SPR1968]

You know Shaun, if you went to/looked at a kitchen supply, you would have spent way less for that turkey baster

Hey Keith, we dont have very big turkeys over here you know, i needed a giant one!

You wouldn’t believe the rubbish that comes of the rocks i was astounded. And after only 13 months, it was like a moon landing or something! Lol

 

[Fudsey]

I guess your right, even UK Amazon doesn't show very big ones and they are expensive too. Here I can get one for less than 1/2 of the Fluval prices.

Here the 17" (43cm) is only $4 (2.92) on Amazon link

 

[DxMarinefish]

Thank you George

No I don’t quarantine any fish, but I am based in the UK and trust the suppliers I use, who basically tell me every time I’ve asked them, that there’s no need. They won’t sell a fish unless it’s eating and healthy and on several occasions have said the particular fish is ‘not ready’

In the large tank, I run a powerful 80w UVC 24/7 at a slow flow rate for maximum killing effect which will deal with anything that passes through it including ich, so this is a management program

I can see in certain situations why QT is needed, suppliers etc., so if you need to do it fine, but personally I don’t feel the need.

Ive never had an issue, maybe I’ve been lucky, or maybe the UVC is doing what it’s supposed to do.....

Hi, Would you mind telling me who your suppliers please?
I am in the UK (Manchester) and use Oasis and Abyss but I still QT fish for 2-4 weeks.

I also now run a D-D 80w UV (started this year Jan), but i run it faster to clear Algae. Once that is done I will run slower to act as a preventative measure against fish parasites/bac.
I would say that the water clarity is just stunning.

 

[SPR1968]

Hi, Would you mind telling me who your suppliers please?
I am in the UK (Manchester) and use Oasis and Abyss but I still QT fish for 2-4 weeks.

I also now run a D-D 80w UV (started this year Jan), but i run it faster to clear Algae. Once that is done I will run slower to act as a preventative measure against fish parasites/bac.
I would say that the water clarity is just stunning.

Hi

I have used LFS’s but the main online supplier are below. Masterfisch is the best, they have good sized WYSIWYG corals for reasonable prices, but they have temporarily suspended orders to UK from 1st January due to brexit

Buy aquarium fish online - Aquatic shop - MasterFisch UK

UK's largest marine and tropical online shop. Buy quality fish at the best prices. Benefit from Express delivery to your door and Live Arrival Guarantee. Over 2000 species available right now: marine and tropical fish, corals, invertebrates, Discus

www.masterfisch.co.uk

Affordable Premium Corals for your Reef Aquarium. SPS, LPS, Soft corals and more. - mailordercorals.com

The very best SPS, LPS, and coral frags, plus softies, liverock, critters all delivered direct to your door in the UK and Europe.

mailordercorals.com

On the UVC, if you run it slowly it does everything in one go

 

[DxMarinefish]

Hi

I have used LFS’s but the main online supplier are below. Masterfisch is the best, they have good sized WYSIWYG corals for reasonable prices, but they have temporarily suspended orders to UK from 1st January due to brexit

Buy aquarium fish online - Aquatic shop - MasterFisch UK

UK's largest marine and tropical online shop. Buy quality fish at the best prices. Benefit from Express delivery to your door and Live Arrival Guarantee. Over 2000 species available right now: marine and tropical fish, corals, invertebrates, Discus

www.masterfisch.co.uk

Affordable Premium Corals for your Reef Aquarium. SPS, LPS, Soft corals and more. - mailordercorals.com

The very best SPS, LPS, and coral frags, plus softies, liverock, critters all delivered direct to your door in the UK and Europe.

mailordercorals.com

On the UVC, if you run it slowly it does everything in one go

thanks. I wil have a look at those links.

 

[SPR1968]

What I’m writing now, is regarding changing the foundation element dosing chemicals for the Red Sea S650. The big tank uses a calcium reactor so apart from occasional adjustments, it’s not affected

I currently use the Red Sea (RS) Foundation elements A B and C, 1 kg powders mixed into solutions which cost around £26 for a 1kg box. An alkalinity box which makes 10 litres of solution lasts around 6 weeks or thereabouts in the S650 which ‘drinks it’

I’ve been researching this some more, and actually for some time, in particular looking at the actual ingredients in the RS powders which are as follows according the ingredients listed on the boxes, pictures below.

A - calcium - ingredients calcium chloride, strontium chloride - it’s supposed to have barium but no mention in the ingredients so it must be trace

B - alkalinity - ingredients sodium hydrogen carbonate - this is exactly the same as sodium bicarbonate or baking soda

C - magnesium - ingredients magnesium chloride - not a 7:1 blend of chloride/sulphate like seawater, just chloride according to the ingredients list

Interestingly, the alkalinity is not shown as being ‘sodium carbonate‘ ie., sodium bicarbonate after being baked for an hour, because of the affect on pH. It’s mentioned in the science article at the end.

So then, apart from the branding and ‘feeling safe‘, why am I paying £26 for these in RS boxes when I can buy the exact same chemicals from a well know ‘jungle site’ for peanuts. I’m not knocking RS here by the way, it’s a business and provides its own branded products, I don’t have an issue with that at all. It’s just when you dump a single 1kg box of magnesium powder in one hit, into the big tank to ‘’just partially’ increase the level, it sort of focused my mind a little. Infact something ‘twisted’! Lol

So my versions.

A 5 kg Calcium chloride Dihydrate 77% food grade £8.38

B 5 kg sodium bicarbonate 100% BP/food grade £12.99. (I’m not going to bake this to turn it into carbonate at least for the first time)

C 8 kg magnesium chloride flakes Dead Sea salts 100% pure £16.99
5 kg magnesium sulphate 100% pharmaceutical/food grade £9.99

So for the A and B I’m just going to mix them into the same ratios shown in the picture below using 1 kg of each powder mixed with RODI

For the C I’m going to mix in the ratio of 7:1 chloride/sulphate to maintain the correct ionic balance. Interesting the RS version doesn’t show sulphate is in it but... I’ve just made one up but added a bit more liquid to help it dissolve and I used 901g of chloride and 124g of sulphate in 2.2 litres of water instead of the RS 1.7. In the next batch I will reduce to 2 litres just because my container is only 2.5l so with the powder I had to throw a bit away. But at this price who cares!

In the big tank, after adding £26 of foundation C (1kg) Mg was at 1320 and I wanted it around 1350. Using my solution I assumed a volume of 1400 litres (which turns out to be an excellent guess!) actual water after displacement, because there is a lot of rock. I added the exact amount of my solution to get there, tested it the next day and it was exactly 1350.

Now I realise that the RS alkalinity supplement contains a little strontium and it also mentions barium. I’m still doing 10% water changes and these are at trace element levels in sea water especially barium, so I will assume these will be added to the system from the water changes. I might actually get some Seachem Advantage strontium powder and just add some occasionally. That costs about £9 but I shouldn’t need much if any.

As far as the actually dosing of the elements is concerned, I’m just going to leave the amounts the same as with the RS versions and then adjust as necessary following testing

So anyone reading this, please feel free to highlight any issues or potential pitfalls, errors, etc., but I can’t think of any, well yet anyway.

Here’s some science, the second one talks about strontium

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

The "How To" Guide to Reef Aquarium Chemistry for Beginners Part 2: What Chemicals Must be Supplemented by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

 

[GBRsouth]

If you're concerned about missing trace elements like strontium and barium, Triton do trace elements in individual bottles. So this could be a solution for you. I think you have a good plan as long as the purity is good. It's too early here so I'm not going to check your maths is right though!

 

[GoVols]

What I’m writing now, is regarding changing the foundation element dosing chemicals for the Red Sea S650. The big tank uses a calcium reactor so apart from occasional adjustments, it’s not affected

I currently use the Red Sea (RS) Foundation elements A B and C, 1 kg powders mixed into solutions which cost around £26 for a 1kg box. An alkalinity box which makes 10 litres of solution lasts around 6 weeks or thereabouts in the S650 which ‘drinks it’

I’ve been researching this some more, and actually for some time, in particular looking at the actual ingredients in the RS powders which are as follows according the ingredients listed on the boxes, pictures below.

A - calcium - ingredients calcium chloride, strontium chloride - it’s supposed to have barium but no mention in the ingredients so it must be trace

B - alkalinity - ingredients sodium hydrogen carbonate - this is exactly the same as sodium bicarbonate or baking soda

C - magnesium - ingredients magnesium chloride - not a 7:1 blend of chloride/sulphate like seawater, just chloride according to the ingredients list

Interestingly, the alkalinity is not shown as being ‘sodium carbonate‘ ie., sodium bicarbonate after being baked for an hour, because of the affect on pH. It’s mentioned in the science article at the end.

So then, apart from the branding and ‘feeling safe‘, why am I paying £26 for these in RS boxes when I can buy the exact same chemicals from a well know ‘jungle site’ for peanuts. I’m not knocking RS here by the way, it’s a business and provides its own branded products, I don’t have an issue with that at all. It’s just when you dump a single 1kg box of magnesium powder in one hit, into the big tank to ‘’just partially’ increase the level, it sort of focused my mind a little. Infact something ‘twisted’! Lol

So my versions.

A 5 kg Calcium chloride Dihydrate 77% food grade £8.38

B 5 kg sodium bicarbonate 100% BP/food grade £12.99. (I’m not going to bake this to turn it into carbonate at least for the first time)

C 8 kg magnesium chloride flakes Dead Sea salts 100% pure £16.99
5 kg magnesium sulphate 100% pharmaceutical/food grade £9.99

So for the A and B I’m just going to mix them into the same ratios shown in the picture below using 1 kg of each powder mixed with RODI

For the C I’m going to mix in the ratio of 7:1 chloride/sulphate to maintain the correct ionic balance. Interesting the RS version doesn’t show sulphate is in it but... I’ve just made one up but added a bit more liquid to help it dissolve and I used 901g of chloride and 124g of sulphate in 2.2 litres of water instead of the RS 1.7. In the next batch I will reduce to 2 litres just because my container is only 2.5l so with the powder I had to throw a bit away. But at this price who cares!

In the big tank, after adding £26 of foundation C (1kg) Mg was at 1320 and I wanted it around 1350. Using my solution I assumed a volume of 1400 litres (which turns out to be an excellent guess!) actual water after displacement, because there is a lot of rock. I added the exact amount of my solution to get there, tested it the next day and it was exactly 1350.

Now I release that the RS alkalinity supplement contains a little strontium and it also mentions barium. I’m still doing 10% water changes and these are at trace element levels in sea water especially barium, so I will assume these will be added to the system from the water changes. I might actually get some Seachem Advantage strontium powder and just add some occasionally. That costs about £9 but I shouldn’t need much if any.

As far as the actually dosing of the elements is concerned, I’m just going to leave the amounts the same as with the RS versions and then adjust as necessary following testing

So anyone reading this, please feel free to highlight any issues or potential pitfalls, errors, etc., but I can’t think of any, well yet anyway.

Here’s some science, the second one talks about strontium

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php

The "How To" Guide to Reef Aquarium Chemistry for Beginners Part 2: What Chemicals Must be Supplemented by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

Can't complain about the Red Sea product line either.

Still can't find better trace elements than their Colors Program with my cal reactor. Went back to Reborn media that supplies strontium / melted off all the Tunze media.

Lol, Shaun
Tried about all others out there and just wound up going back to the 4 Red Sea colors, every time.

Did you think about going with a cal reactor for your S-650?

 

[SPR1968]

Did you think about going with a cal reactor for your S-650?

Yes Freddie, and I nearly ordered another Deltec Twin Tech, but at the last moment decided the cost wasn’t worth it to me to be honest. It was another one to maintain and hence me going back to look at the ingredients list and the above post it what I concluded.

I did also look at standard reactors, but again bottom line it’s something else to maintain, and go wrong

Ive just mixed the first 4 1/2 litre batch of alkalinity using my sodium bicarbonate in the same dosage and it looks exactly the same, probably because it is!

I don’t know if you saw the post from @ScottR but the Red Sea alkalinity foundation B in Asia, is labelled at sodium ‘carbonate’ The UK and USA version is labelled as sodium ‘bicarbonate’ baking soda and ‘unbaked’. Also different code numbers on the box as well. They have slightly different affects on pH but I guess Red Sea, assuming there labelled correctly, have decided the pH effect is negligible in most systems.

Now I don’t know about the USA, but the UK has very strict laws on chemical labels, hazards and ingredients so I assume Red Sea have complied with these or they would be in trouble, So on this basis one can assume we are getting the bicarbonate and unbaked version.

I purchased 5kg of sodium bicarbonate (yes baking soda) for £12.99 as opposed to around £26 for 1kg of Foundation B so you can see the difference.

 

[ScottR]

Yes Freddie, and I nearly ordered another Deltec Twin Tech, but at the last moment decided the cost wasn’t worth it to me to be honest. It was another one to maintain and hence me going back to look at the ingredients list and the above post it what I concluded.

I did also look at standard reactors, but again bottom line it’s something else to maintain, and go wrong

Ive just mixed the first 4 1/2 litre batch of alkalinity using my sodium bicarbonate in the same dosage and it looks exactly the same, probably because it is!

I don’t know if you saw the post from @ScottR but the Red Sea alkalinity foundation B in Asia, is labelled at sodium ‘carbonate’ The UK and USA version is labelled as sodium ‘bicarbonate’ baking soda and ‘unbaked’. Also different code numbers on the box as well. They have slightly different affects on pH but I guess Red Sea, assuming there labelled correctly, have decided the pH effect is negligible in most systems.

Now I don’t know about the USA, but the UK has very strict laws on chemical labels, hazards and ingredients so I assume Red Sea have complied with these or they would be in trouble, So on this basis one can assume we are getting the bicarbonate and unbaked version.

I purchased 5kg of sodium bicarbonate (yes baking soda) for £12.99 as opposed to around £26 for 1kg of Foundation B so you can see the difference.

I’m going to look into this Shaun. I did a quick google yesterday but came up with nothing. RS is pretty good at sweeping things under the rug.

 

[Laith]

Do you know how much trouble a stupid little crab can cause !?

So today I should have been on a beach in Cape Verde, looking like something from bay watch...... But no, I’m stuck in the freezing snow here in the UK. Luckily.........

I came down this morning and heard an ‘unusual’ water noise which didn’t sound good. So having gathered myself together I checked the emergency overflow pipe, and water was pouring down it and the tank water level was about 1 inch from the very top. So I guess the emergency overflow did it’s job and saved me from a severe ‘telling off’!

Anyway I turned the Abyzz A200 down a bit and also opened the gate valve on the main down pipe and as I did so, a crab came shooting down the pipe into the X Filter roll.

The crab had seemingly climbed over the overflows weirs, and down the main down pipe and got stuck, and more importantly, severely reduced the flow back into the sump. So then the ATO kicked in....

So of course when the crab was removed, flow turned back up, the sump level was to high because of all the extra water dumped in by the ATO....

This is when Apex has its uses. A float switch was tripped which turned of the skimmer before it freaked out, and also the Tunze Osmolator just in case that was ever the cause of a problem.

So as I speak, the skimmer and ATO are off, awaiting evaporation of all the additional water, after which it will turn back on as the sump level lowers. Salinity dropped just under 1 so all ok, and will slowly return to normal over the next day or so. And sparse feedings until the skimmers back on.

So on the basis this crab thing has now occurred twice, and at this time of year, normally I wouldn’t be around, best implement a solution to try and stop a repeat event

I considered a 40mm pvc coupling over the main down pipe with some mesh over it, but that just seemed like it may reduce flow as eventually it clogged or needed cleaning. I had some fine black garden netting so basically I’ve zip tied it to the overflow weir to hopefully try and prevent anything climbing over the top of it which I think is what happened

Ive always had a black cover over the area but that was a precautionary measure to stop fish jumping and going down, I never even considered critters mountaineering up and over it!

Anyway here’s the pictures, you cant actually see the netting or anything when the cover is on, so it doesn’t cause any visual issues.

I have one of these on my main siphon drain in the overflow... you may want to get one?

They exist in 30mm and 40mm (and smaller as well I think).

 

[Dark_Knightt]

Woah. How are water changes done on this monster?

 

[SPR1968]

I have one of these on my main siphon drain in the overflow... you may want to get one?

They exist in 30mm and 40mm (and smaller as well I think).

I was actually going to do something like that Laith and I might still do so thanks for that. Whats is actually called, I was looking at plastic leaf guards and all sorts ?

I decided against it, but only because I thought it might need cleaning or it could affect the actual flow over time. I’ve just remembered this was the reason! Lol

I’ve put fine mesh across the top of the weir combs fastened with zip ties to try and stop anything climbing over, there a picture about a page or so ago I think

Im actually going to install an emergency float switch at the top edge of the tank hidden with the overflow etc. If the water level ever got to high and was about to overflow for whatever reason, it will cut the main pump off.

The emergency downpipe was dealing with the water, but it was only about an inch or so from the top of the tank so it’s made me a little nervous when away for any period etc. I would normally have been away the day this happened for a week or so.

 

[SPR1968]

Woah. How are water changes done on this monster?

Hi, I use Apex DOS on both systems and there currently on 10% per week divided into daily amounts

I was doing higher amounts do to a defective nitrate kit, but it was messing the water parameters up, so I’ve gone back to 10%

 

[Laith]

I was actually going to do something like that Laith and I might still do so thanks for that. Whats is actually called, I was looking at plastic leaf guards and all sorts ?

I decided against it, but only because I thought it might need cleaning or it could affect the actual flow over time. I’ve just remembered this was the reason! Lol

I’ve put fine mesh across the top of the weir combs fastened with zip ties to try and stop anything climbing over, there a picture about a page or so ago I think

Im actually going to install an emergency float switch at the top edge of the tank hidden with the overflow etc. If the water level ever got to high and was about to overflow for whatever reason, it will cut the main pump off.

The emergency downpipe was dealing with the water, but it was only about an inch or so from the top of the tank so it’s made me a little nervous when away for any period etc. I would normally have been away the day this happened for a week or so.

They're called a Aqua Connect Drain Cube and I found them here.