OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
We get mixed up all the time. We’re used to it. I’ve certainly been called worse!
Yeah, some day I’ll have a 650, that would be nice! Until then, I’ll have to stick to my 180.
Last edited:
Vette's 180 reef with basement filtration room
- Build Thread
- Thread starter Vette67
- Start date
- Tagged users None
Yeah, some day I’ll have a 650, that would be nice! Until then, I’ll have to stick to my 180.
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
I’m so bummed. This piece of turbinaria coral was the first stony coral I ever purchased, probably around 1998. When I had a massive GHA outbreak in 2012, probably more than 3/4 of the original colony died. I managed to break off this piece and saved it. A couple days ago this coral slid off its perch and fell onto a hydnopora coral, Well, you know who won that battle.... this is now all I have left. I’m not happy.
So about half of it got burned by the hydnopora before I could rescue it. But the part that’s left is still fine. I got mad at the hydnopora, and broke a small chunk off of it and then killed the colony.
I let it dry out on my tank support brace. Right next to the halides, so it didn’t last long, I’m sure. It’s not really a pretty coral, and was just a flat piece growing along the sand. It was too aggressive anyway.
So about half of it got burned by the hydnopora before I could rescue it. But the part that’s left is still fine. I got mad at the hydnopora, and broke a small chunk off of it and then killed the colony.
I let it dry out on my tank support brace. Right next to the halides, so it didn’t last long, I’m sure. It’s not really a pretty coral, and was just a flat piece growing along the sand. It was too aggressive anyway.
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
It’s not smelling too bad. There’s a little funk there when I opened the hood to take the picture. But it’s not overwhelming...Ohhhh I forgot ... that smell. The dead coral smell. Nothing quite like it.
Smarkow
Valuable Member
I’m so bummed. This piece of turbinaria coral was the first stony coral I ever purchased, probably around 1998. When I had a massive GHA outbreak in 2012, probably more than 3/4 of the original colony died. I managed to break off this piece and saved it. A couple days ago this coral slid off its perch and fell onto a hydnopora coral, Well, you know who won that battle.... this is now all I have left. I’m not happy.
So about half of it got burned by the hydnopora before I could rescue it. But the part that’s left is still fine. I got mad at the hydnopora, and broke a small chunk off of it and then killed the colony.
I let it dry out on my tank support brace. Right next to the halides, so it didn’t last long, I’m sure. It’s not really a pretty coral, and was just a flat piece growing along the sand. It was too aggressive anyway.
Punishment fits the crime?
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
I have been meaning to get rid of it for a while. It’s not a particularly pretty coral, and it is very aggressive and has killed a lot of other corals over the years. This one grew super quick and was a calcium sink. But I broke off another frag, so I didn’t kill the whole thing. It’ll grow back in no time.
Punishment fits the crime?
I have tried a few times to give big chunks away locally for free, and people hear hydnopora and say no thanks. It is very aggressive.
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
Long day. Got new halides, so I had to take out the old reflectors and cut holes on my existing canopy for the new bulbs / reflectors. So the day started out taking off my canopy and marking it up to be cut.
Got the holes marked, and then had to carry the canopy outside (with the help of my kid) to plunge cut the holes with a circular saw. Did I mention I’m in Ohio and it was a high of 27 today? Nothing like doing woodwork outside in the driveway in the snow!
Holes cut, and old spider reflectors removed. Also got the side holds for the new reflectors (that’s the 1x2 pieces on the canopy). The keyhole hand saw was to finish off the corners, because the round circular saw blade can’t make it to the corner edges without an overlap cut, which would just look stupid.
When I took the old reflectors out, I realized how much the inside of the oak plywood was de laminating, so I had to re paint he inside. I decided to go with plastikote. It’s waterproof, and supposed to be UV resistant, so we will see if it holds up. I previously painted the inside with spar urethane, and that didn’t last... so time to try something different. It was not pretty looking.
So I got the inside painted, and gave it an hour to dry; then flipped over to glue the new halides into place. I used waterproof wood glue, which will hopefully be good enough. The holds are cut at the same angle as the side of the halide reflectors and will hopefully hold everything in place when I open the hood. They really will just stop the reflectors from sliding anywhere. I don’t really need them to be able to hold the reflectors upside down...
So the side holds got a coat of stain / urethane, then wood glued into place. Of course, the canopy is 20 years old, so the stain is close, but not identical. I still think it looks pretty good. The radius on the 45’s in the back match up nicely, so it almost looks like I know what I’m doing.
Sometime tomorrow, I’ll have my kid help me take th canopy back upstairs and put it back on the tank. I guess today was a very cloudy day on the reef. Virtually no sun today. I think everything will be fine...
Got the holes marked, and then had to carry the canopy outside (with the help of my kid) to plunge cut the holes with a circular saw. Did I mention I’m in Ohio and it was a high of 27 today? Nothing like doing woodwork outside in the driveway in the snow!
Holes cut, and old spider reflectors removed. Also got the side holds for the new reflectors (that’s the 1x2 pieces on the canopy). The keyhole hand saw was to finish off the corners, because the round circular saw blade can’t make it to the corner edges without an overlap cut, which would just look stupid.
When I took the old reflectors out, I realized how much the inside of the oak plywood was de laminating, so I had to re paint he inside. I decided to go with plastikote. It’s waterproof, and supposed to be UV resistant, so we will see if it holds up. I previously painted the inside with spar urethane, and that didn’t last... so time to try something different. It was not pretty looking.
So I got the inside painted, and gave it an hour to dry; then flipped over to glue the new halides into place. I used waterproof wood glue, which will hopefully be good enough. The holds are cut at the same angle as the side of the halide reflectors and will hopefully hold everything in place when I open the hood. They really will just stop the reflectors from sliding anywhere. I don’t really need them to be able to hold the reflectors upside down...
So the side holds got a coat of stain / urethane, then wood glued into place. Of course, the canopy is 20 years old, so the stain is close, but not identical. I still think it looks pretty good. The radius on the 45’s in the back match up nicely, so it almost looks like I know what I’m doing.
Sometime tomorrow, I’ll have my kid help me take th canopy back upstairs and put it back on the tank. I guess today was a very cloudy day on the reef. Virtually no sun today. I think everything will be fine...
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
With my new metal halide bulbs / ballasts I noticed something. Going back, I used to run all my lights all the time. Meaning, VHO went on at 7:00am, and off at 9:00 pm. Been doing that for 20+ years. Then halides went on at 10am and off at 5pm. Been doing that forever too. With the new halides I decided to try something. I turned off the VHO bulbs while the halides were running, and couldn’t tell a difference in the tank. These new halides are so bright, that the 320 watts of VHO bulbs were doing nothing. So I changed my VHO to go on at 7:00, off shortly after the halides turn on, come back on just before the halides turn off and turn the VHO off for the day at 9:00 as usual. This effectively saves me 320 watts for almost 7 hours. So even though one of my bulbs went from a 175 watt halide to a 250, I expect my electric bill to go down, because of the offset of the VHO fluorescent bulbs. Now if what JDA says is true and these 250 watt double ended bulbs on an M80 ballast actually are overdriven and run at 330 watts each, then the savings may not be as great, but still should be there. I wasn’t thinking, going into this, that I would see energy savings, but I just might get an ROI on this purchase.
Smarkow
Valuable Member
I think your calculations and thought process are right, but am a bit concerned that the T5s probably helped diffuse some of the light in ways that may not be visually apparent. If you start to see loss of color or tissue at bases or if lower light corals near rock bases start to look bad, consider resuming the T5s as some of those spots may be dependent on reflected light.
just my 0.02$
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
Thanks for the input. I appreciate that. Yes, this is all fluid, and nothing is concrete at this point. If I notice some things changing, I will try to make a correction, up to and including, turning the fluorescent lights back on. I did not get these new lights to save money, quite the opposite. I want what’s best for my coral.I think your calculations and thought process are right, but am a bit concerned that the T5s probably helped diffuse some of the light in ways that may not be visually apparent. If you start to see loss of color or tissue at bases or if lower light corals near rock bases start to look bad, consider resuming the T5s as some of those spots may be dependent on reflected light.
just my 0.02$
I am definitely monitoring things at this point. So far, the only thing I noticed is my one brain coral did not like the new lights. It is puffing up in an attempt, from what it looks like to me, to protect the inner tissue from the bright light. Today, I just moved it under the 175 watt light instead of the 250 watt light. We will see if it likes its new position better. It was previously under a 175 watt MH light and seemed to like it.
Smarkow
Valuable Member
Nice
I’d love to do halides over my next build, but I’m worried getting the parts will be prohibitive in the future.
Then I see tanks like yours and the POP and I start to dream again hahaha
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
You should do it. I don't think they are going away. Hamilton has been around for a long time, and i don't think they are going to stop supporting halide any time soon. Even Phoenix stopped making bulbs back 10 years ago, and brought back their production after popular demand. That's one of the reasons I did this, was because I feel they are going to be around for a LOT longer. Especially if we support them. Besides, the ballasts I just took out of service have been in use since 2002, and they still work. They last forever. I am thinking about buying some new reflectors and try to run the old ballasts over a frag tank, possibly.Nice
I’d love to do halides over my next build, but I’m worried getting the parts will be prohibitive in the future.
Then I see tanks like yours and the POP and I start to dream again hahaha
So my personal opinion is that the fears about halides going away are overblown. I think more people are starting to realize that LED is not the only way, and are going back to halides. There's no doubt, coral love them. If you don't believe me, check out JDA's build thread. He is who I modeled my lighting after..... I went really old school because of him, getting the magnetic M80 ballasts, because they overdrive the bulbs by around 80 watts each. Might as well get the most light out of the bulbs as possible, with a minor hit to efficiency over the electronic ballasts.
It’s too bad you’re going to Cincinnati. Toledo is only about an hour and a half from me. I might be able to check your tanks out, post pandemic of course...
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
I think this is good. Almost 2 months out from removing the biopellet reactor and my nutrients are finally starting to rise. Looks like nitrate is around 12, maybe a little higher, and phosphate is at .09. I removed the biopellet reactor and turned down the level on my skimmer at the same time (by several inches). So I’m sure this is a result of the combination of the 2. Because phos is getting towards the higher side of acceptable, I turned back up the level on my skimmer to get a slightly wetter foam. We will see where things settle next week. Hopefully the corals react favorably to having both higher PAR and higher nutrients. I have no doubt been running at very near zero nutrients for a long time. Still trying to dial all this stuff in, even after having my tank set up for decades. I pretty much previously never paid attention to this stuff.
What were your nitrate and phosphate levels before you made the initial change to feed your biopellet reactor into your protein skimmer?
Vette,
Thanks for posting your build thread. I learned a lot from it.
I'm very impressed with all your do it yourself modifications over the years. It's amazing when I read these threads how the sump room seems to become the most interesting part of the system, not the display tank.
I've been in this hobby for 10 years now and have always tried to follow less is more Berlin style approach. It still makes the most sense to me.
I've recently gone down the nitrate/phosphate balance rabbit hole in a similar fashion to what you seem to be going through now. I used to rarely test or care about those parameters as long as my tank looked good. I definitely didn't know the risks associated with dropping those values too far and bought into the belief that the goal was to keep these as low as possible at all times. My eureka moment came when I drove my phosphates into a black hole with a massive chamber full of rowaphos and almost lost my entire system to a Dino outbreak. Like you I'm currently trying to re-establish that magic balance of nutrients in my system. I'm going to look into the aquabiomics test as I truly believe biodiversity is the key to all this. How can it not be, that's how it is in the natural world!
Good luck with your system and I look forward to following along.
Thanks for posting your build thread. I learned a lot from it.
I'm very impressed with all your do it yourself modifications over the years. It's amazing when I read these threads how the sump room seems to become the most interesting part of the system, not the display tank.
I've been in this hobby for 10 years now and have always tried to follow less is more Berlin style approach. It still makes the most sense to me.
I've recently gone down the nitrate/phosphate balance rabbit hole in a similar fashion to what you seem to be going through now. I used to rarely test or care about those parameters as long as my tank looked good. I definitely didn't know the risks associated with dropping those values too far and bought into the belief that the goal was to keep these as low as possible at all times. My eureka moment came when I drove my phosphates into a black hole with a massive chamber full of rowaphos and almost lost my entire system to a Dino outbreak. Like you I'm currently trying to re-establish that magic balance of nutrients in my system. I'm going to look into the aquabiomics test as I truly believe biodiversity is the key to all this. How can it not be, that's how it is in the natural world!
Good luck with your system and I look forward to following along.
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
You want me to be honest, I think I had a solution in search of a problem. I had the biopellet reactor set up for so long, that I don't even remember why I set it up. Years.... Then I worked to make it more efficient, because I read that's what you should do. So once I actually started looking at things correctly by testing, I realized it wasn't necessary at all. My most recent test from a few days ago shows N and P right about acceptable levels. Nitrate somewhere around 15ish (12<NO3<25 on that Nyos kit), and phos at 0.05. I apparently have nutrients at acceptable levels using a big skimmer and a refugium, that I don't know why I was using the biopellet reactor in the first place. These are the things you learn when you react to data, instead of guessing. I used to do a lot of "reef by guessing" in my past, trying to read my corals. I prefer looking at actual data now. It leads to much more intuitive solutions. Yes, I used to not care about testing either. I have changed my mind on that one.
Now don't get me wrong. I still think it's important to "read your corals". They are a great indicator that something may be out of whack that you need to respond to and test for. I use that now as more of an indicator of health, rather than a decision maker.
Lol, So classic! With all the new gadgets and opinions out there I often have to stop myself from adding stuff just for the sake of it or 'cause someone else is doing it.
I'm the same as you now testing nitrates/phosphates regularly. I just use phosphate as an overall indicator and test that regularly. Nitrates I just do every once in a while (mostly because I find using the colour charts basically impossible to read at the lower levels, and I find the Hana nitrate checker insanely complicated). And since I don't "dose" nitrates and phosphates directly I don't really have a way to change that ratio anyway. It's either increase my nutrient export with my protein skimmer and photoperiod over my fuge, or increase my nutrient contribution with increased feedings.
Hope your corals come back to their previous health. Will be following.
OP
OP
Vette67
Reefing since 1997
My halide transformation is now complete. Same situation as before; I had to do woodwork on my canopy outside, in my driveway, on a 27 degree cold Ohio day. But it is done. I realized I had a few corals that seemed to be retracting from the new intense 250 watt double ended bulbs, so I decided to just keep a 175 watt bulb on the left side of the tank. So this is just a new reflector with the original mogul base and same ARO ballast I have been using for years. Well, decades....
So I will put the high light stuff in the center and right side of my tank and the lower light stuff on the left. Seems to be a good compromise.
But I am happier with how the lights look. The tank is more evenly lit, having raised the bulbs at least 6 inches higher off the water level. And no doubt, I am reflecting a lot more light into my tank instead of around the inside of my canopy.
The new reflector is slightly bigger than the double end reflector. The DE reflector is 12” square and the mogul reflector is 13” square, so the left reflector is slightly bigger.
So I will put the high light stuff in the center and right side of my tank and the lower light stuff on the left. Seems to be a good compromise.
But I am happier with how the lights look. The tank is more evenly lit, having raised the bulbs at least 6 inches higher off the water level. And no doubt, I am reflecting a lot more light into my tank instead of around the inside of my canopy.
The new reflector is slightly bigger than the double end reflector. The DE reflector is 12” square and the mogul reflector is 13” square, so the left reflector is slightly bigger.
Similar threads
