My New 75 Gallon Reef Journal

[Reefarchitect]

I'm actually in West Palm Beach, but my family is all down in Miami. Let me get your take on this, I have all of the equipment mentioned before plus a Via Aqua chiller. I still though, do not have the tank. What do you think would be a better tank to set up, an all-glass 75 megaflow or an Oceanic reef-ready 58. The only difference I guess is the extra 12 inches of tank with, and the lack of center brace on the 58. If I set up the 58, I will be at 9.48 WPG, with an additional 175w MH, the 75 would be at 10.53 wpg. I'm not even sure that teh little giant could handle the 75. I've been gathering equipment for a couple of months and now it's go time and I can't decide.

I sure would appreciate your take.

Thanks again.

 

[garagebrian]

Hum...good question. Personally I would go with the 75. I faced the same decision you did. I looked at the 58 for a long time and decided just wanted the extra space. I'm glad I did and I would guess most reefers would agree. I will admit the lack of center brace in the 58 is nice as my center brace annoys me on the 75. I've heard the 58 RR overflow is hard to aquascape around. On the plus side the center brace on the 75 is a great place to set stuff when working in the tank

You don't specifically say, but I would make sure any tank you get is reef ready!! MUCH easier to take care of and less worries about losing siphon and flooding.

Of course buying another 175 is not cheap! so depends on your budget. I'm not sure if one MH would cover a 58, but definitely better than one on a 75.

As far as the return pump, depends on what you want to keep in your tank? If you are going SPS or other things that require a lot of flow, then I would probably say your little giant would not be enough unless you are adding a closed loop or a lot of powerheads.

But I've never used the little giants, so maybe someone else might be able to help better. All I know is that I have an Ehiem 1060 as my return pump and supposedly puts out about 400 gph with my head pressure. I would say it is adequate, but I would like more flow. I'm not planning on keeping a lot of SPS, so for my tank it is fine. I have two powersweep powerheads in the tank and while they help, they are problematic with my fine sand. I think I'm going to remove the powersweep device and just attach a spray bar to one of them.

B.

 

[Anonymous]

If you can peel it try it...Im thinking you'll have to cut a piece of the rock off to frag it..either way you win...you have two rocks of zoos on them and can start another colony somewhere else..or you sell it or give it away..However you choose i suppose....are you going SPS also?? I cant wait to see the colonies if you do....

 

[garagebrian]

I will have some SPS, but you'll be waiting a LONG time I only have one spot in the tank with high flow(directly in front of my return) and I won't have that acquscaped and ready for SPS until end of April, but I need to replace my MH bulbs(they are near end of life) before I'll feel comfortable trying SPS, so probably May-July before I get one. Until then it will be zoas, shrooms and maybe an LPS or two.

 

[Bojangles]

You tank is sounding more and more like what I'm going to do with mine as well. Except I ADDED a mantis, spear version, to my refugium and I just got done upgrading my pumps last month

 

[Anonymous]

I ADDED a mantis, spear version, to my refugium and I just got done upgrading my pumps last month

Try to get pics of it eating a feeder guppy or something

 

[Bojangles]

I bought him his own 5g acrylic tank yesterday..soon as I get some sand, because spear version are sand instead of rock dwellers, and get him settled in I'll be pic happy!!

 

[Anonymous]

Youre lucky, cuz spears arent easy to come by..but also they arent as photogenic as smashers either...I believe they are far more reclusive...

 

[garagebrian]

03/16/2005 Update - Day 47

Parameters continue to test in the normal ranges. All my zoas are now in the main tank and QT is dry again. MHs are run for 4 hours a day now, VHO actinics for 7 hours. Until I find the time to install 2 computer fans that is where my lights will stay as the temp goes from 79 to 83 when the MHs have been on for a couple of hours.

All my corals are doing great except for the recently discovered fire coral, it doesn't look very good. I need to frag it and also increase my lights soon. I did increase the flow in my tank by adding a DIY spraybar(see my DIY thread ) and I also added my VHO actinics to the tanks and removed the PC lights. That switch lowered my upper temp from 85 to 83, so that is good. The colors in the tank are roughly the same, but much better coverage with the lights mounted up in the canopy instead of on the back of the tank as you can see in the attached pics:

I captured 5-6 cirolanid isopods and I just discovered 2 more gorilla crabs last night I'm starting to see TONS of pods and critters at night now and several good red mithrax crabs.

I also discovered that my refuge feather dusters are EXPLODING in population. I started with 5-10 of them from KarenB's cheato...I'm up to 100-150 in one month's time! Here is a picture of a small section of the sump cheato:

B.

 

[garagebrian]

And pics of the right side with the light change.

 

[Reefarchitect]

Tank is looking great. What pump are you using for return? I am trying to order an AGA 75 custom w/dual overflows and was thinking of using 3 LG pumps. 2 for water return and 1 on a closed loop with a SQWD for circulation. Keep posting the great pics.

Thanks.

 

[garagebrian]

LG pumps, is that a brand? Do you want the dual overflows for the increased flow? Two overflows in a 75 are going to take up a lot of realestate.

I am using an old Eheim 1060 for my return. It is rated at 400-500 gph at my head pressure, so not the biggest return pump, but very reliable and decent electricity usage. They are no longer available, replaced by the Eheim 1260 I think.

I would recommend staying away from the SCWD. I've heard they fail very quickly and then it is a PITA to remove them. Everyone around here is singing the praises of the Oceansmotions Squirt. Much more expensive, but supposedly a heck of a lot more durable. Personally I've never used either.

I think my overflow can only handle 600-700 gph return, so I'm not looking at upgrading, don't really need it anyway for mostly zoas and shrooms with only a few SPS.

B.

 

[garagebrian]

04/12/2005 Update - Day 74

Well the tank continues to progress.
All readings are in normal ranges. ph 8.0, tank temp 80-82, Ca 410, alk 8.0

I discovered that the MH bulb on the right side of the tank is beyond useful life, I moved some zoa frags under it(since my rock was closer to the lights) and they shrivelled up. I have since moved them back to the left side on the sand and they are somewhat recovered, but I think some won't make it.

I got my replacement MH bulbs today, I will be changing both bulbs out tonight after lights out. Current lighting cycle is 10 hours VHO, 10 hours MH, but I'll be switching that to 11 hours VHO 9 hours MH once I have my ranco temp controller. The tank temperature has been a steady 80 with lights off and 82 with lights on and newly installed fans running. To see pictures of my DIY fan setup, go here:

http://www.marshreef.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=4359&start=60

I discovered a new hitchhiker that I have yet to identify. It takes a single "arm" and swallows it in its mouth to clean it off, then it returns the arm to its position and the next arm goes in. It reminds me of sea apples, but I cannot see the body. Here is a pic:

One of my cup corals posed for a very clear picture:

I am continuing my cirolanid hunt with a ridiculous amount of babies captured. Next batch of LR should be here in about two weeks!!!

Brian

 

[Anonymous]

Your light cycle is pretty much like mine...from 10a to 11p are the PC actinics and from 11a to 10p is the MH...

 

[garagebrian]

Hey all,

This is a question for you skimmer experts out there:

I've been thinking about my sump/skimmer and I have a problem. I would like to increase the area of my refuge and the only way to do that would be a new sump OR to remove my skimmer pump from the sump.

As you can see in the above picture I have a section for just the skimmer pump that takes up about 1/4 of my refuge section(circled in red).

I have two ideas for removing the pump.

1. Getting another pump that can sit above my sump (in the area circled by yellow) that pulls water out of the sump and sends it to the skimmer. However, do they have pumps that can pull water up and don't need to be primed in the case of a power failure?

2. My second idea was to simply feed my drain pipe into my skimmer. My drain does approximately 450-550 gph and the skimmer is currently run by a Rio2500 rated at 700 gph, but I have its output trimmed back by at least half with a ball valve, getting it into the 350 gph range. I would probably have to T off the drain line to let some of it go into the sump to avoid it flooding the skimmer.

My skimmer is a TF110A(Top Fathom- out of business, but nice skimmer) with machined venturi injector and a counter-current design. Can this type of skimmer be run off the drain line or do they NEED a pump?

I thought it would be nice to remove a pump from the system to reduce maintenance and electrical cost and free up a little bit of space in the stand and running almost all my water through the skimmer before it hits the sump.

B.

 

[garagebrian]

05/10/2005 Update - Day 102

Almost a month since my last update, but not much as happened as the TBS rock is STILL not here. Tank has been very stable except for my alkalinity going down to about 5 one time. I have installed my Ranco temperature controller and the tank stays a constant 80-81 with my room temp being 76.

Here are the left and right side shots:

You'll notice in the right side shot I added a SEIO M1100. The flow from that thing is AMAZING.....I'm going to need to put some rock work in front of it so that it breaks up the flow and allows my lower left side of the tank to be lower flow. At least it doesn't disturb the sandbed, glad i have some coarser sand on top or it probably would be. I thought about buying two of them, but I think I wouldn't have been able to keep any low flow corals then.

Here is a picture of the only livestock I've added to the tank, some porcelin crabs and those white shrimp from the Texas City collecting trip. They have all been added to my sump so I don't squish them when my TBS comes in. One of porcelins survived going THROUGH my return pump and is happily feeding in the main tank now.

I have my FIRST set of growth pictures. I know it is not much, but I'm pretty excited about it

My zoas when I first got them(3 big and 2 babies):

Same zoas on 5/10/2005(8 big and 5 babies):

My orange/yellow and pink zoas have died off, nothing I could do to save them Boosted must have magic in his tank. A few of the orange/yellow have survived and hopefully they'll start reproducing. All my other corals have gotten a little bigger and the fire coral is VERY VERY healthy now, it has been been growing and has a healthy white edge now. I still need to frag a piece for Narkon. Changing those old bulbs out was a GREAT decision.

Everyone missed their chance to buy Cirolanid Isopods from me, at least I hope so. I stopped feeding the tank meaty foods and the population dropped way down. I'm down to catching 1 adult every few days now.

I did a few tests while I had a good supply of them and here is what I found:

1. In 4 days in their own QT tank they did not eat any live amphiopods supplied to them.

2. After those 4 days, I had just accidentally killed an amphiopod and so I threw it in their QT tank. Within 1 minute 2 baby cirolanids had found it and proceeded to tear it apart by burrowing right through it. So they apparently eat dead amphiopods.

3. I also threw some frozen shrimp in their QT tank and they ate that within a few minutes of it being put in.

So assuming these really are cirolanid isopods(Dr Ron thinks they are, good enough for me), goes to show you should not feed meaty foods to the tank as they will readily eat it.

B.

PS. I forgot to add, I came home 05/09/2005 and didn't hear my venturi skimmer. So I went over and found my Rio2500 pump had quit pushing water and was very HOT. So I unplugged it and replaced it with a Mag7 I had running my poor man's closed loop.

I watched the skimmer for an hour and it didn't appear to be overflowing at all. Just in case I hooked up my 2 liter overflow bottle and put that inside a 2 gallon bucket on top of a towel. My wife calls me 7 hours later while I'm at school and sure enough my new skimmer pump caused an overflow and we have our first wet carpet! DOH!

I replaced the 2-liter bottle with a 1 liter bottle and it is now sitting in my sump so that if it overflows the carpet won't get wet again.

Here is my new sump configuration:

 

[garagebrian]

Well, I'm STILL waiting on my TBS rock which is holding up most developments for my tank I did trade for some corals last night that are now in my QT tank.

Here are a couple of pics of my new colt, kenya tree and zoas. Thanks John!

I also have several green things growing on my rocks, anyone know what these are? Tunicates or sponges? I like my coralline algae in this shot, it is forming plates

For those photo experts out there, I keep getting a grainy feel to my pictures, I can never get a clear picture like what incysor gets. It seems to be less pronounced when I don't heavily crop an image, any ideas on how to improve this or is this a limititation of my 5.1MP camera? I took a series of pictures with my camera in macro mode last night, on a tripod with a 10 second delay so the camera should be perfectly still when it takes the picture. Yet I still get fuzziness. I did turn off the pumps and I cleaned the glass the night before.

This is the best I can do on my zoas:

 

[garagebrian]

Hey all,

I finally found the time to finish the skirt on my 75 gallon stand. Here is what it looked like before and the start of the project:

My wife is VERY happy the ugly stand is now covered with the skirt.

Here is the stand when I was setting up the tank:

Here I'm starting to cut the skirt with my high tech jigsaw and Sawdust Rapid Spin Removal Device(TM pending).

The large piece of wood cut to make into two doors:

The piece cut into two doors:

Continued in next post....

 

[garagebrian]

I had to trim the skirt a little to fit the stand properly, here I was testing the skirt fit:

Here it is with the doors on and open:

And finally....my pretty skirt all closed up hiding the ugliness underneath!

I learned a few things during this project I would like to share:

1. When drilling starter holes for cutting an interior hole in a piece of wood, drill them so the entire hole is inside the space you want to cut out, otherwise your corners had these little rounded holes.

2. When staining wood, do NOT believe the claim on the Elmer's wood glue that it can be painted or stained over. It probably can be painted over, but it will not adsorb stain. I did one door staining before glueing and one staining after glueing and the one staining after glueing looks terrible.

3. Jigsaw blades will bend to one side if side pressure is applied, resulting in a uneven cut. I'm guessing more experienced woodworkers knew this, but I would say a jigsaw is a bad tool for this job. Suggestions for an alternative?

4. Elmer's wood glue says to clamp your pieces of wood together for 30 minutes. In the Texas heat and humidity, I would say you need to clamp them together for a minimum of 3 hours, otherwise when the clamps are removed, your wood will pull apart. I left mine clamped overnight to be safe.

I did this so I could remove the skirt if I needed to do some stand maintenance and also so two sides of the stand would be open to the air to reduce heat issues.

Questions?

B.

 

[Anonymous]

Sawdust Rapid Spin Removal Device(TM pending).

:lol:
So how does that thing work? It looks like it has plates that rotate to move air... kinda like a powerhead. I'm never good with that DIY stuff.
The tank skirt looks great.
I started off with one small Kenya Tree frag that looked almost exactly like yours, now I have rocks covered in it. It really took off like a weed in my tank.