What's the best piece of equipment you have purchased for your reef?

[austibella]

When I bought 3 echotech radion xr30

pro lights and reeflink. Big game changer corals doubled in size

 

[RUKelly]

RODI. My very first tank was run with conditioned tap water... you can imagine how much of an uphill battle that was!

Second choice would be an ATO.

Been there with the conditioned tap water, for a few years long ago. It is a frustrating battle.
Now I have hired a aquatic pro to do my water changes, and life is good.

 

[Hydrored]

#1 Trident
#2 ReeFi's
#3 AWC
#4 Four E's Pipetter

 

[Griev]

For me it was the Apex+Trident+DoS combo. I ran my tank for a year before I got it, and I'm so much happier with how stable my tank is, how much less time regularly spent testing, and how much more confidence I have that I could walk away from my tank for two weeks and everything would be fine.

They're not perfect and I definitely had a little learning curve getting it set up correctly, but I'm glad I did.

Now that I've had a chance to think a bit more. I think a close second would be my 3D Printer. As of now I've printed for my tank;

• LED Light Mounting Bracket/Mount
• Webcam Mount
• Water cooling fan mount
• Mangrove Planter Box for Sump (V3 coming soon!)
• Random Flow Generator
• Trident Reagent "Cones"
• Tons of assorted cable guides and clips

Really lets me literally think outside the box and greatly expands what I can do with an All-In-One with very limited sump space.

 

[Katrina71]

Moonshine and Excedrin.

 

[Ike]

My MP40's, hands down, I have 7 of them, 4 original models, and I've had to replace a bushing and a wetside in many years of use and all are still going strong.

 

[Griev]

My MP40's, hands down, I have 7 of them, 4 original models, and I've had to replace a bushing and a wetside in many years of use and all are still going strong.

+1

I'll never buy a different wave maker. You get your money's worth. Built like tanks, easy to fix and maintain when something eventually does break after a decade, lol. Ran my MP-10 for 4 years with no problems. MP-40 for 2 with no problems.

I bought cheap Jaebos before and they always died. Usually right about at the year point. I wish I'd just bought quality from the start, would have saved money!

 

[o-townFLA]

Automatic Top Off...!

 

[andrewey]

Four E's Pipetter

A good pipetter is one of those pieces of equipment seldom used in the hobby, but it brings so much joy.

 

[mclane]

Hopefully this t5 hybrid setup I'm about to install next week lol as of now probably the apex even though I use it for basic functions . I never had one until 2 years ago , then all I could think of wow that was silly to go that long without one

Can you tell me the product you purchase and what are you upgrading from?

 

[SixtyFeetUnder]

I know this will sound silly with all the hardware on our tanks but for me it was the Avast Marine Barrel tender. Someone said to me “so is that like and ATO for your ATO drum?” In essence that’s exactly what it is. If you are like me turning valves off and on to make water stresses you out. Did I leave it on? I better go check again. Once set up it fills your drum whenever it gets low, stops 2” from the top every time. Pump water into another drum to make water change water; it kicks on and fills back up. Besides the convenience and stress relief; my water quality has improved and I’ve noticed less algae due to reduced TDS creep making large batches at a time. I have no affiliation with Avast but think every reefer should get one of these:

Barrel Tender V2

The Barrel Tender is a unique device designed to automatically regulate reverse osmosis (RO) water production and greatly reduce the negative effects of TDS creep. The Tender senses when the RO reservoir is nearly empty, then turns on the RO system until the reservoir is full. This allows the...

www.avastmarine.com

 

[Bigbadfishy]

Calcium reactor.

 

[tautog83]

Can you tell me the product you purchase and what are you upgrading from?

if youre talking about the light i just got an aquatic life 61" and keeping my 3 xr30s... for apex i just use an apex el

 

[X-37B]

Tunze carx and AGA 2 stage regulator.

 

[bsn_rn_cen]

Ato by far the best thing I have bought so far

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

This system sounds really cool. Does it really produce zero waste water?

Sure does, just started using. But instructions says, when flow slows down. Open 1/4 inch valve for 10-15 seconds and continue using. Flow still strong for now

 

[ADAM]

Trident took the cake for me; I used them for 4-6 weeks while I manually dosed as always. Those first few weeks of graphs looked like a heartbeat monitor!
The candles on the cake would have to be the RODI, but the one negative effect of that is no more bi-monthly trips to the LFS for “water”.... $300 and 7 hours later for a 30-45 minute car trip

 

[Zionas]

For those of you who moved from simply keeping softies to LPS and SPS, how much of an equipment upgrade did you need? Was it a significant rise in spending?

 

[anth]

For me it was about 3 months ago i turned my reactor into a co2 scrubber and hooked it up to my aeraqua duo skimmer. The very next day my triton core 7 dose went up 5x what i was dosing before and seen massive difference in sps growth.

 

[mxnutz]

1. screen top to keep the fishes from jumping out.
2. bandsaw
3. veegee refractometer