Swedish fish - behind the scenes rebuilding a public aquarium

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Are you sure on those numbers? Now I can't remember exactly but I think nitrate usually is lower than 1ppm, even in Swedish nutrient rich waters. Of course it varies, but doesn't go that much higher.

I was surprised to see numbers that high. Now I'll look for those papers.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Just ordered this, for next stage of dendronephthya coral aquaculture. In by April 8th or sooner. In clear only made upto 13 gallons. Bummer
Wish it was bigger

 

[Tastee]

7. As the time goes many of the opportunistic algae will be outcompeted by coralline algae. Ones the coralline algae takes over the space on the substrate the opportonistic algae won’t have anywhere to grow. When the tank is in this phase you could add all the nutrients you want(well, in reasonable quantities) without getting hair algae for example.

Now that’s a very interesting view to hear and makes sense. As someone who has been battling GHA in my 18 month old tank for about a year now and seem to be finally winning, this is very encouraging, as I do have good coralline growth in patches. Hopefully it will now spread a little and help stop the GHA getting a foothold again.

I’ve been reading your, and lots of other’s, posts in detail for quite a while now and am gradually building my own understanding and applying that to my tank - certainly helps to understand some of the theory to be able to make sense of what is happening in the tank. Thanks!

 

[najer]

Now that’s a very interesting view to hear and makes sense. As someone who has been battling GHA in my 18 month old tank for about a year now and seem to be finally winning, this is very encouraging, as I do have good coralline growth in patches. Hopefully it will now spread a little and help stop the GHA getting a foothold again.

I’ve been reading your, and lots of other’s, posts in detail for quite a while now and am gradually building my own understanding and applying that to my tank - certainly helps to understand some of the theory to be able to make sense of what is happening in the tank. Thanks!

What a great post, I love when people start seriously thinking about their little boxes of water.
They are all different but it is just a balancing act, working at understanding your tank and what works for you is the key!

 

[Sallstrom]

Now that’s a very interesting view to hear and makes sense. As someone who has been battling GHA in my 18 month old tank for about a year now and seem to be finally winning, this is very encouraging, as I do have good coralline growth in patches. Hopefully it will now spread a little and help stop the GHA getting a foothold again.

I’ve been reading your, and lots of other’s, posts in detail for quite a while now and am gradually building my own understanding and applying that to my tank - certainly helps to understand some of the theory to be able to make sense of what is happening in the tank. Thanks!

Thanks! Glad you found it useful. And glad you're on your way to win the battle with GHA!
It was quick summary, so let me know if you want to know more.

Maybe it sounded like it's easy to get rid of all types of algae. It's not, for sure. GHA might take long time to battle and win against. Cyanobacteria might also be hard to get rid off in some cases. Diatoms are easier IMO, since there are a lot of herbivors that love to graze on them. So patience is perhaps the most important thing dealing with algae.

At the moment we don't have any unwanted algae that bothers me or the corals, except some Valonia(bubble algae). My permanent headache though is to keep corals from dying. Which is almost impossible when having corals in about 45000L water and spread over 11 tanks. Corals die here every week. But most of the time the growth is far more than the die off, so I'm trying to be satisfied with that! #honestreefing

 

[Sallstrom]

What a great post, I love when people start seriously thinking about their little boxes of water.
They are all different but it is just a balancing act, working at understanding your tank and what works for you is the key!

Absolutely! Don't take any advice from anyone too seriously. Read a lot, then try yourself and find out what works for you and your tank. It's all about finding your own "method"!

 

[Sallstrom]

Update on the builing process.
This week we hope to decide(together with the engineers and architects) how to solve the question how to do the pipes through concrete walls and how many they will be. We have decided that just the largest sump, together with the tanks for RO water, saltmixing, water for back-washing sand pressure filters etc, will be concrete tanks. The rest will be in plastic. And the plastic ones we can design later on in the process.
Here's my drawing for some of the pipes. Some for pumps but most of them for emergency overflows. I want to use some of the emergency overflows to fill other tanks instead of just going to the drain(like RO -> saltmixing tank).
It will be really nice to get through this phase and into the next one!

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

I don't know why all piping cant be ran in a chase, I'm thinking it would increase budget. But if piping can be ran thru a chase where in future all piping can be repaired or enlarged. Like a long cement trench piping in it, with plastic grates on top for walking over that area

 

[Sallstrom]

I don't know why all piping cant be ran in a chase, I'm thinking it would increase budget. But if piping can be ran thru a chase where in future all piping can be repaired or enlarged. Like a long cement trench piping in it, with plastic grates on top for walking over that area

That was want we from the Aquarium wanted from the beginning. I think that idea fell on that the bottom concrete floor would have needed to be thicker in that case. So they would need an even deeper hole for the Aquarium building. So we had to give up on that idea.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

That was want we from the Aquarium wanted from the beginning. I think that idea fell on that the bottom concrete floor would have needed to be thicker in that case. So they would need an even deeper hole for the Aquarium building. So we had to give up on that idea.

Can you have them run above high? Then it's an issue of walls, not major issue. Easier to work on in future too like working with fire sprinklers

 

[Sallstrom]

Can you have them run above high? Then it's an issue of walls, not major issue. Easier to work on in future too like working with fire sprinklers

Too late to change now The long pipes will be inside the concrete. What we will decide this week is just how to get the/mold the pipes through the sump wall, for returpumps and skimmers etc.

 

[Sallstrom]

Today I pretended to be a Plummer
The temporary Aquarium will soon be ready for water! Hopefully next week. At least some tanks..
Now six tanks have overflows. Return pipes I hope I got time to fix tomorrow.

 

[crusso1993]

Today I pretended to be a Plummer
The temporary Aquarium will soon be ready for water! Hopefully next week. At least some tanks..
Now six tanks have overflows. Return pipes I hope I got time to fix tomorrow.

Well done!

 

[Sallstrom]

An update on the temporary Aquarium build.
Yesterday we glued the overflow pipes for the six acrylic 800L propagation tanks.
We tried first without gluing, just using tape(which English name is somewhere in this thread). That didn't work out, too many leaks So I took it all apart and glued it together instead. On Monday we'll find out if I did a good job!

We filled one of the tanks with water. All good. My colleague is in the picture for size comparison.

And a picture from the bamboo shark reef!

Ten LEDs fixtures on their way from Hong Kong and return pumps on their way from France. Both shipments will hopefully arrive next week.
So I hope things will move on now with the new tanks.

 

[crusso1993]

An update on the temporary Aquarium build.
Yesterday we glued the overflow pipes for the six acrylic 800L propagation tanks.
We tried first without gluing, just using tape(which English name is somewhere in this thread). That didn't work out, too many leaks So I took it all apart and glued it together instead. On Monday we'll find out if I did a good job!

We filled one of the tanks with water. All good. My colleague is in the picture for size comparison.

And a picture from the bamboo shark reef!

Ten LEDs fixtures on their way from Hong Kong and return pumps on their way from France. Both shipments will hopefully arrive next week.
So I hope things will move on now with the new tanks.

I was just wondering about any updates with you and BOOM! You provide updates.

I am happy the fittings with tape leaked now as I could almost guarantee they would leak sometime in the future. One is not supposed to use tape on threaded PVC fittings. It's a common misnomer and mistake. Here is a link to a giant manufacture of PVC and their way to properly put threaded fittings together.

http://www.lascofittings.com/threads

 

[Sallstrom]

I was just wondering about any updates with you and BOOM! You provide updates.

I am happy the fittings with tape leaked now as I could almost guarantee they would leak sometime in the future. One is not supposed to use tape on threaded PVC fittings. It's a common misnomer and mistake. Here is a link to a giant manufacture of PVC and their way to properly put threaded fittings together.

http://www.lascofittings.com/threads

Thanks! I know, but we love to not play by the rules
We got plenty of smaller overflows with teflon tape instead of tangit glue. Since many of our tanks are temporary (and I don't want to sniff too much tangit ), we've used tape to be able to take it apart easily and reuse the pvc. But that's for pipes up to 32 or 40mm. With the 63mm pvc we're using on the temporary tanks tape wasn't a good solution.
Pressurised pipes we glue together.

With that said, sometimes we get small leaks. But our floors are okay with some water. Usually salt will do the work fixing small leaks

 

[Sallstrom]

I was just wondering about any updates with you and BOOM! You provide updates.

I am happy the fittings with tape leaked now as I could almost guarantee they would leak sometime in the future. One is not supposed to use tape on threaded PVC fittings. It's a common misnomer and mistake. Here is a link to a giant manufacture of PVC and their way to properly put threaded fittings together.

http://www.lascofittings.com/threads

Sorry, I didn't know what you meant by threaded fittings. Now I do! The only ones like that are the bulkheads, otherwise we use pvc with fittings made for glue.
For the bulkheads I don't use teflon tape.

 

[crusso1993]

Thanks! I know, but we love to not play by the rules
We got plenty of smaller overflows with teflon tape instead of tangit glue. Since many of our tanks are temporary (and I don't want to sniff too much tangit ), we've used tape to be able to take it apart easily and reuse the pvc. But that's for pipes up to 32 or 40mm. With the 63mm pvc we're using on the temporary tanks tape wasn't a good solution.
Pressurised pipes we glue together.

With that said, sometimes we get small leaks. But our floors are okay with some water. Usually salt will do the work fixing small leaks

I have to admit that, like you guys, I also like breaking the rules!

You can avoid the leaks and still use the threaded fittings by using the proper sealant. Here is an example of one of the correct sealants.

 

[Sallstrom]

Coming out of a kind of slow period, starting up these new propagation tanks feels really great. Some of the old tanks are really overfilled and at the moment we don't have much space in the old propagation tanks.
Soon we'll have new space and an opportunity to sort out some problems. And I'm looking forward to sort the corals by species and be able to keep better track on them.

My preliminary plan is to start up the 6 x 800L tanks on one sump(two sumps connected together) and then start up two 2000L tanks on another sump. If they'll both work well after some time the sumps for the two systems might be connected as well, making one large system.
To save PVC and time water goes into the upper tanks and then from those tanks to the lower ones. From the lower ones back to the sumps.
Last we will move our current propagation tanks, 2 x 1200L, into this room as well. And some smaller tanks will be installed as well.

 

[crusso1993]

Coming out of a kind of slow period, starting up these new propagation tanks feels really great. Some of the old tanks are really overfilled and at the moment we don't have much space in the old propagation tanks.
Soon we'll have new space and an opportunity to sort out some problems. And I'm looking forward to sort the corals by species and be able to keep better track on them.

My preliminary plan is to start up the 6 x 800L tanks on one sump(two sumps connected together) and then start up two 2000L tanks on another sump. If they'll both work well after some time the sumps for the two systems might be connected as well, making one large system.
To save PVC and time water goes into the upper tanks and then from those tanks to the lower ones. From the lower ones back to the sumps.
Last we will move our current propagation tanks, 2 x 1200L, into this room as well. And some smaller tanks will be installed as well.

Sounds fun and I am a bit jealous! Any pics of the sumps and plumbing?