Recent content by Big_fish

Can you post pics? Not knowing your design makes it a difficult problem to diagnose, at best. I suspect that you are losing syphon on your u-tubes, but am not sure since your post was rather vague. Thanks! Scott

Get yourself a decent pair of hemostats. I bought mine at Menard's for about $8. Grab the Xenia at the base and pull it out. IME, this provides two benefits. 1. Some of the Xenia will come completely off the rock, and therefore not grow back. 2. The Xenia that just pulls off the base...

A wise, old, balding reefer once told me: "When you begin to question whether or not you are putting too much light over your tank, take your lights outside, plug them in, and stare at them for a couple of seconds. Then stare up at the sun, and you decide." :lol: Scott

I own one of those units and I have to wholeheartedly endorse it. Not only is it a quality product, the customer service is OUTSTANDING. I obtainted my float switch secondhand. It hadn't ever been used, but was previously owned. About 2 months after I put it into service, it burned out...

I believe there are alot more trace minerals contained in a decent salt mix. Shedd aquarium in Chicago used to mix their own salt and they use very large quantities. It wasn't economical in the long run and they now use a readily available salt mix. For the price, I wouldn't even attempt that...

I've always had good luck catching shrimp by using a 16oz plastic soda bottle. Take the bottle and cut the top off right where the neck reaches the top widest part of the bottle. Turn the neck inside out and put a couple of drops of superglue on the edge to hold it in. The neck should fit...

The tank has now been tenatively aquascaped. I never had any intentions of leaving everything strewn out on the sandbed. It's just really hard to 'scape when you've just added Southdown sand. I only have the weekends to really devote a couple of hours at a time to the tank. The valves are...

Well, I've been working on this sucker since I got it last April. It is finally running, even though there are still a couple of items to be tweaked. I started yesterday around 8:30am and finished last night (everything cleaned up) around 2am. I knew it was going to be a long day and a tough...

IME, this is the only problem with the TF1000 skimmer. I have one and every once in awhile it will just stop skimming. I have never been able to nail down the cause of it. At first I figured I had done something to alter the surface tension of my water (hand in tank, feeding,etc..) but after...

While I no longer own, or would recommend, a Berlin skimmer there are a few things I learned in my experience that I can share. 1. In order to eliminate any problem with the outlets making noise, thread in 3/4" pipe nipples and put tees on them. Insert a pipe in the bottom of the tee so that...

Did any of you use Mylar as a reflective surface for MH's? I have bought aluminum to bend into parabolic reflectors and have been slowly (and painfully) polishing it into a mirror finish. Covering it with mylar would be an awesome alternative. My only concern is how well it would stand up to...

I just bought a 1/4" NPT tap at Ace Hardware yesterday. The price was $5.99 for just the tap, no handle. It's not a bad price if you consider that I didn't have to pay shipping. HTH, Scott

If your baffles are going to span the entire width of your sump (and I can't see why they wouldn't) then you don't need any bracing on the top. Truth is, for that size you probably wouldn't need any bracing even without the baffles. I wouldn't even put the triangles in the corner. It would...

Bill, I beg to differ. When dealing with the 400W bulbs such as Ushio the bulbs run better on an HQI ballast than a typical core and coil. I believe the 10000K Ushio bulbs are actually designed for an HQI ballast. You can see a big difference when you fire them up with the HQI ballast...

Dave, I wouldn't go more than 1" of Tang per gallon. So, if you have a 10gal nano, you should be able to put in 3 yellow tangs since they don't get more than 3" in captivity according to my LFS. That should keep your algae problem down!!! Scott Disclaimer: For anybody who is new to the...