Zach’s 180 mixed build

[zbryant91]

Got 5 more frags from another battlebox because adam was doing another sale. Definitely going to have to move some to the rocks soon since my rack is full.

 

[zbryant91]

Well unfortunately when we went on vacation about 6 weeks ago my ATO pump died, I had someone come by and manually pour in some RO water but the 5 gallons they put in swung the salinity a little more than the sps cared for and I ended up loosing a lot of my battlecorals which was pretty frustrating. came home to my scopas dead as well. Though I suspect that is due to starving. I have the avast feeder running but didn't have anyone add in nori in while we were away.

very expensive loss. I think i have 5 or 6 frags that survived out of ~20.


since then, i've mostly just been letting things run. got a few frags this week from the POTO sale last weekend. Also added 2 more mp40s so I have 2 on each side of the tank.

And the other big thing I've been working on is a QT for fish. I ordered some fish from harrys marine a few weeks ago and didn't feel comfortable dropping them in the DT. So I did 2 5 day treatments of prazipro and slowly brought the coppersafe up to 2.0. Been sitting at 2.0 for around a week and things are going surprisingly well. everything is eating and looks great. still trying to figure out how long to leave them in the copper. none of them have shown any signs of anything over the last 3 weeks so i'm not sure I need to leave them for 30 days at therapeutic levels.

got 4 female lyretails, 1 purple tang, 1 spot foxface, and a algae blenny. I also ordered a timor wrasse but it wasn't in the box. and I've reached out to harrys twice with no response which is a bit disappointing.

 

[zbryant91]

Unfortunately I spoke to soon on the QT tank. Lost the Foxface last night. I'm pretty sure due to starvation. I hadnt seem it eating as much after the copper got up to 2.0. Still haven't seen any spots or odd behavior on the rest of the fish so feeling hopeful on those. I've been feeding what I feel is heavy, mostly for the anthias. So not really sure what happened/

I've also been printing some parts for the 180. I printed covers for my mp40s to hopefully reduce the risk of fish getting stuck and hopefully help keep them clean longer. Also sat down to start drawing my own light shades for the xr30s and it happens that someone else uploaded some to thingiverse a couple weeks ago. so #2 is printing now after verifying the 1st one fit. photo is taken from my desk where the glare has been bugging me a bit. definitely prefer the look without them, but working from home has made this preferred.

 

[zbryant91]

Been updating some things slowly but too much to dump in a post. I've had slight amounts of cyano for the last few months and had an uncomfortable amount a few weeks ago. Used some chemi clean and now its all gone. Very happy with the way it worked. I also didn't do the suggested water change since timing was just awkward but the skimmer calmed down after a week or so. I have my AWC still doing 4 liters a day so it happened, just took a while.

And got another battlebox since they were on sale for black friday. So hopefully this round fares better than the last. This also forced me to clean off the frag rack and actually mount some on the rocks, which was overdue.

Also finished my light shades. Loving them so far. Might raise the lights up some to help with some shadowing.

 

[zbryant91]

And the most recent projects, due to other black friday sales. I picked up a EB8 for the water closet so I can have some extra control in case of a leak. I have leak sensors in the closet as well and now have a little less to worry about. Also wanted the option to be able to power off the Versas if something goes haywire since there is still no wifi control.

And I picked up a Avast swabbie for the skimmer. Was a little more DIY than I was expecting and I had to do a few more holes than I cared for, but it works and should make maintenance a bit easier.

 

[zbryant91]

And most recent update, I 3d printed a filter roll tool to help push off the spent roll that matches the tool that comes with the new gen 3 rollers. Got to test it today for the 1st time. 1st roll lasted exactly 5 months. I'm running 2 of them and the spacing works fine when they are both clean at the same time but I had to use the adapter to raise up the new one to avoid contact with the 2nd roller. still quite happy with this setup.

Also probably going to be making panels to cover the sump this month to appease the wife. I quite like having it open but it's getting a bit messy.

Also need to mount some controllers and my DOS for better access. I've ripped some 1/2" pvc sheet last time I had the table saw out but still need to cut them to length and mount them. Just need to make the time..

 

[zbryant91]

I've been doing a lot of little things lately to tidy up the stand, primarily in mounting controllers and cleaning up the rats nest of wire behind the tank. Also started building panels for the stand. Front panels are done, still need to finish and paint the sides. I'll do more photos of this after getting the other panels done. Ended up scrapping the idea for the button fix connectors I originally bought and have printed my own hardware that is more conducive to warped plywood...

The big thing that happened today though is doubling my livestock. Local reefer had a tank split over the weekend and needed to unload everything. Ended up getting about a dozen fish and a ton of coral. mostly softys. large chunk of birdsnest, few BTAs, lots of euphilia, and several inverts. several nice shrimp of different varieties, and some regular clean up crew.

 

[Zach B]

I've been doing a lot of little things lately to tidy up the stand, primarily in mounting controllers and cleaning up the rats nest of wire behind the tank. Also started building panels for the stand. Front panels are done, still need to finish and paint the sides. I'll do more photos of this after getting the other panels done. Ended up scrapping the idea for the button fix connectors I originally bought and have printed my own hardware that is more conducive to warped plywood...

The big thing that happened today though is doubling my livestock. Local reefer had a tank split over the weekend and needed to unload everything. Ended up getting about a dozen fish and a ton of coral. mostly softys. large chunk of birdsnest, few BTAs, lots of euphilia, and several inverts. several nice shrimp of different varieties, and some regular clean up crew.

Wow! Looks great: )

 

[zbryant91]

Wow! Looks great: )

Thanks! Unfortunate that it was a tank crash that led to the big haul, but I’m glad to have a lot more color in the tank

 

[Zach B]

Think of it like this, you saved all of those animals... once again tank looks really good

 

[zbryant91]

Think of it like this, you saved all of those animals... once again tank looks really good

Definitely. I'm curious to see how the nutrients react since I added a lot of fish and coral. wondering if the influx of fish will be balanced by the coral uptake and keep things relatively stable.

Since I've been using a kalk stirrer I've been having to dose phosphate, but I'll keep an eye on that. Everything else has been reasonably stable. My last batch of battlecorals are still looking good and encrusting which has been a huge relief.

 

[Zach B]

Just make sure to keep your fish well fed and the fish should feed the corals pretty well. Might not even have to dose phosphate after a while Best of luck

 

[zbryant91]

Big update since it's been a while. Tank has been up for about 11 months and things are looking up.

I've added a alkatronic and mastertronic over the last few weeks and changed around my dosing pumps. Think I'm going to sell the trident as I just don't trust the calcium and mag. mastertronic seems so much better so far but time will tell.

I picked up some firefish and pajama cardinals a couple weeks ago. And I lost the algae blenny. The rest of the fish are getting fat and definitely growing so that's great to see. And not really seeing any aggression. I think I want to give anthias a try again and may buy them from TSM. But haven't decided what kind.

Corals are growing great. I have lost a big hammer but all the rest of the euphillia still look great and are growing so not sure what it was. It's really cool seeing consistent growth from everything, this is really the 1st tank I've had this kind of success with.

Nitrates have been sitting pretty solid 11-13. Phosphates are still dropping, up to dosing 9ml of neophos a day and waiting to see the effects of that. but haven't seen them below 0.03 for a while which has been nice. Getting lots of better colors from everything.

Also played with my radions spectrum a bit. turned up the whites, reds, and greens, a little more than AB+ just to make things less blue during most of the day. Still have an hour of AB+ for the 1st and last hour of the day.

Still been combating cyano with chemi clean every few months. And i've got some diatoms on the sandbed so i've been trying out mactobacter 7 and clean. Also had a decent bit of bubble algae popping up. added several emerald crabs to the DT and sump and there is much less visible.

and some photos. Been playing with using the pro settings on my phone instead of a clip on filter. Colors up close still aren't great but the wider shots are pretty close.

 

[zbryant91]

So I've had cyano rear it's head a few times over the last year and a chemiclean treatment has cut it back each time. Last week it looked different on the sand (more brown) but I went ahead and did another treatment just in case. nothing changed. Got a microscope and turns out it's dinos. phosphates were low so i'm guessing that was the issue. Mastertronic showed they were 0.013, they are now up to .082. Nitrates have been steady around 10-11. I started dosing microbacter7 a few weeks ago and my neophos ran out so I think that's why they dropped.

Hopped on the Macks facebook group and believe I have Prorocentrum. So current course of action, turned down my white, red, and greens on the lights, ordered more pods, dosing phyto, dosing peroxide, ordered silicates to dose and wait and see what happens. right now it's only on the sand and the rest of the tank seems okay. hoping to not tick anything off with all the changes. But figure if I up my phosphate and nitrate testing to every other day to make sure it stays up I should be okay.


Before this, I ordered a UV just because I wanted to add it as a preventative for disease in general. Also ordered a ozone generator. Hoping to get those both on this weekend. But this has little to no relevance to my species of dinos according what I've read. I'll likely stir up the sand bed daily and with the uv installed, hope to help get them in the water column. I'm not expecting this to be the fix but figure it can't hurt.

Also picked up a fiji foxface, regular foxface, and starry blenny last weekend. So far they're doing well. Would've waited on those if I had known this was dinos.

 

[zbryant91]

Tank looked good this morning so i took some photos. Dinos haven't really gotten worse/better. I stirred the sand a good but yesterday and lights just came on so they aren't out.

Also finally finished putting the panels on the stand. And have been running uv for about a month.

 

[JumboShrimp]

Beautiful!

How is that Pentair UV working out for you? Mine seems to want to randomly trip the gfi outlet. I have 2 (on two separate 150 gallon tanks), and they both pop off randomly.

 

[zbryant91]

So far so good. I Need to reach out to BRS because one of the gaskets came damaged and I'm getting some condensation in the top of the clear plastic. Not sure if that's normal or not. But no issues with it tripping my gfci.

 

[Zach B]

Looking great! I really like the zoa garden

 

[zbryant91]

Thanks! I'm surprised how quickly they've taken off. Got a few new ones to add but not sure where I want to start growing them out yet. AOI's being the favorite.

I'm a little annoyed by the dinos but they still aren't causing any issues other than an ugly sandbed as far as I can tell so i'm happy about that.

I tried dosing silicates a few weeks ago but I had a 24k torch and a trachy get pretty upset at the same time so I stopped. I did the KFC dip on both a few times and the torch seems to be getting better, trachy doesn't open up like it did when I got it, but it still looks okay. If the torch gets better, I'll probably try silicates again to beat the dinos, but I may start sucking out sand if the torch gets angry again.

 

[zbryant91]

Added a 4th xr30 last month when they were 40% off. Also my clearview lids came in.


Most of my SPS are showing good growth which is nice to see. My mastertronic wasn't reading nitrates correctly for a while and they got up around 50. started carbon dosing and they are down to 23. Phosphates have settled around .11-.15 and most everything seems happy so i'm not trying to force much.

After discovering the nitrates not reading correctly, my MT broke and BRS sent me a replacement so got that setup yesterday and all the tests seem to be reading well. and match my red sea kits.

Shook up my container with life source in it so the water is cloudy. I want to move the frags off the racks this weekend and practice taking pictures so should have another update pretty soon if I remember.

Also, started getting impatient with dinos. I've dosed more than 2 gallons of pods and phyto over the last 4-5 months. never tried silicates again as I didn't want to lose my trachy. So started pulling out sand last weekend. i'd say I got ~75% of it out and everything still seems okay. may try to get the rest out this weekend. The strain of dinos I have supposedly goes into the sand at night so removing the sand seems like the easy solution to me...