Brent's Cade 500 (38g)

LBCBJ · Aug 10, 2023

Some photos of the tank on the stand. The Opti-Clear glass is amazing and overall the quality of the tank is great. Clean, clear seams on the glass. The laser etched Cade logo is a cool touch

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The tank is bigger in person than I thought, the height of the cabinet really helps the tank sit up at eye level. I think it's perfectly sized for the space!
Since this is the first internet review of the Cade s2 500, I'll plan to write up a complete review in the next few weeks.

7of9 · Aug 10, 2023

LBCBJ said:
Busy 24 hours! Plumbing is complete and now attempting to make tidy a rats nest of cables.

Wasn’t without its problems. Mainly two things:

1. My Vectra 3/4” wouldnt connect to the 1” cade return, so had to scour Lowes for a reducer bard and vinyl pipe connector. Will need to order some plastic hose clamps as no one local has them.

2. The return plumbing was too long and had to be cut to a very specific height.

While Cade has a few videos of installation out there, they weren’t the easiest to follow.
With a bit of trial and error, figured things out and all looks good!

Cable management is a work in progress. My Hydros controller doesn’t fit so will need to get crafty.

Trying to draw some inspiration from @LukeyB and @d2mini setup. The built in controller cabinet is awesome for keeping a clean asthetic. Should have everything tidy in a few days.

Next up is RODI install. Hoping to get water in for a leak test over the weekend!

Wow...that cabinet is swoon worthy!

7of9 · Aug 10, 2023

I love your aquascaping options, particularly the left hand lagoon.

LBCBJ · Aug 11, 2023

7of9 said:
I love your aquascaping options, particularly the left hand lagoon.

Thanks! That's what I'm leaning to as well. Hoping to get some dry sand in the tank tonight so I can start setting the aquascape, then comes the water!

LBCBJ · Aug 13, 2023

Interesting weekend so far with leak test #2 under way

. Started my initial leak test yesterday, and the plumbing was no bueno, multiple leaks from union fitting and bulk heads, not fun. Drained the tank, applied some Oatey's great white pipe dope to all the male threads and now leak test #2 is underway. Hopefully not jinxing myself, but we're an hour in and so far so good. My main concern is there are two union fittings in my return line that sit inside the built in ATO resovoir that have been dripping, so I need those to be bullet proof before I can move on.

On the good news front, I was easily able to dial things in to near dead silence.

Feeling a bit over my skis at this point but fingers are crossed that we make it through the 24 hour mark with no leaks!

MDAquatics · Aug 13, 2023

Good luck! Its looking awesome!

LBCBJ · Aug 15, 2023

Alright, so after a 48 hour 2-part leak test, I'm hopeful any leaks have been resolved. So onto the next!

As for sand, added 20lbs of Caribsea Reef Grade. Sandbed is sitting around 3/4" which is definitely on the thinner side, but want to experiment with a shallow bed. I did strongly consider going BB here, but I do like the aesthetic of the sand.

For rock, went with ~18lbs of Caribsea Life Rock. Designed using the 'left hook' config (option #1 from an earlier post). To be specific, I used just 5 rocks: one cave, one arch, two nano original, and one nano arch. REALLY enjoy the look of the Life Rock, and it aquascapes itself. First time using dead rock, so will see how the tank cycles

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My goal was to keep plenty of open space on the back and sides to permit flow, while sticking to the 1/3's principle to create some depth to the scape. It's exactly 50% of the height of the tank. Ideally, I would have liked another 3-4" of height, but structurally couldn't get it to work without creating a 'glued-wall' effect.

Glued several contact points with Bob Smith Maxi-Cure and a spray of Insta-Set. Going to let this dry for the afternoon, do a final level of the tank, with plans to start adding RODI water later tonight (will be mixing salt in the tank).

If things go well, cycle should be starting within a few days!

Photos are going to be a challenge with so much glare in this room

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MDAquatics · Aug 15, 2023

LBCBJ said:
Alright, so after a 48 hour 2-part leak test, I'm hopeful any leaks have been resolved. So onto the next!

As for sand, added 20lbs of Caribsea Reef Grade. Sandbed is sitting around 3/4" which is definitely on the thinner side, but want to experiment with a shallow bed. I did strongly consider going BB here, but I do like the aesthetic of the sand.

For rock, went with ~18lbs of Caribsea Life Rock. Designed using the 'left hook' config (option #1 from an earlier post). To be specific, I used just 5 rocks: one cave, one arch, two nano original, and one nano arch. REALLY enjoy the look of the Life Rock, and it aquascapes itself. First time using dead rock, so will see how the tank cycles .

My goal was to keep plenty of open space on the back and sides to permit flow, while sticking to the 1/3's principle to create some depth to the scape. It's exactly 50% of the height of the tank. Ideally, I would have liked another 3-4" of height, but structurally couldn't get it to work without creating a 'glued-wall' effect.

Glued several contact points with Bob Smith Maxi-Cure and a spray of Insta-Set. Going to let this dry for the afternoon, do a final level of the tank, with plans to start adding RODI water later tonight (will be mixing salt in the tank).

If things go well, cycle should be starting within a few days!

Photos are going to be a challenge with so much glare in this room .

Buy a clip on filter for your phone, take care of that glare easily. Worked for me anyway

LBCBJ · Aug 17, 2023

So with a little heckling from my wife, I've decide to put the breaks on adding water until after Labor Day. We'll be traveling to UT for a week over the 4th, and with only 1-2 weeks into a hypothetical cycle, leaving the tank for a week without having a good feel for it yet probably isn't the best idea. Patience wins the game!

I'll be using the next couple weeks to get all my equipment setup and dial in the cable management. RODI will be ready to add water the week of the 4th!

This will also give me the chance to tighten up a couple pesky things that are annoying me, mainly my Vectra S2 connection for which Ecotech has been no help.

My Vectra has a 3/4" output, however the Cade plumbing is 1". So I've had to jerry rig a reducer barb with PVC and I just don't like what it's doing. I'm REALLY hoping there is a cleaner solution out there where I can just pop a 1" barb onto the S2. It's annoying me so much I'm considering selling it and getting a Sicce Syncra SDC which has a 1" barb included.

If anyone has a solution for this, you have my thanks

. Hope to share some nice tidy pics from the Cade controller cabinet later this weekend.

LBCBJ · Aug 24, 2023

It’s been a week, so quick update. I’m officially 2 weeks away from getting the tank wet and starting my cycle. Darn you Utah trip

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In the meantime, I’ve had the chance to get all the equipment setup, connected to my Hydros controller, and cable management nice and clean.

I've also tried my best to find a solution that would allow me to connect my Vectra S2 to the Cade plumbing, and after hours of research, emails and calls to Ecotech I gave up and sadly now have it listed for sale.

In comes Sicce Syncra SDC 6.0. Snagged it for 18% off at @TopShelfAquatics. Came included with a 1” screw-on barb, which took me about a minute to connect to my plumbing. Problem solved!

I am hopeful it will be a quiet and reliable pump for me.

And some pics of the tank. Its getting thirsty!

Dude how are there so many wires!?! Cable management is almost there. Grabbed some server rack channel from Amazon which is perfect for cable management (thanks @d2mini).

LBCBJ · Aug 26, 2023

With all my equipment setup, figured I'd run through a quick tour of how I have things setup, and address some of the questions that I personally had when considering buying this Cade 500.

Lighting

My Radion XR15 mounts directly onto the back glass of the center ATO chamber. So on this Cade, there are three chambers in the back, each with a lid. The center lid is fully removable, so I simply took it off. If I was super crafty, I'd use a dremmel to make a small cutout, but I'm not

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Wave Maker

I'll have a couple placements to experiment with once I have water in, but for now, I have my Nero 3 on the back panel. With the back center chamber being an ATO reservoir, it leaves just enough room to slip the external magnet back there if I want to go low profile. Alternatively, I may move this to the upper left side, and potentially even add a 2nd opposite side.

Sump

As for the sump, it's a pretty nifty if basic setup, but it all works quite well for such a small footprint. In the left-rear, are the downflow drains, which then spill over into a filter sock. This then spills over into the main chamber where I'll be housing my heater and Ultra Reef Borei UKB-120 skimmer.

From the skimmer chamber, the water flows into a series of three media baskets, which is a really great touch to help save on the need for reactors. Here I'm planning to use one basket for Sipromax bio media, one for activated carbon, and the final for GFO or even filter floss or pads if I want some additional mechanical filtration to polish the water.

Lastly, the water flows down through the baskets, up and over into the final return pump chamber. The chamber holds my Sicce Syncra SDC 6.0, built in ATO float, and potentially some sensors and dosing lines.

If I could change one thing about my equipment so far, it’d be the heaters. These 100W Eheims are 12” long and a very tight fit. The IM Helios are only 6” which would give me more mounting options.

LBCBJ · Sep 7, 2023

ANDDDDD WE'RE BACK! Utah trip went well, got back last night, lows in the 40's out there!

Of course, all I've been thinking about the last two weeks is getting the tank wet. Well, I didn't waste any time

. RODI's been hunming all day and the tank is now full and running. Final fill tally after rock and sand displacement is 27 gallons in the display, 9 gallons in the sump and overflow, and 2.5 gallons in the ATO.

Found one small drip from the ATO bulkhead, so to be extra cautious, I'm going to let things run overnight before adding salt and starting the cycle.

If all goes well (fingers crossed no more leaks), I'll add salt tomorrow, and then get my fishless cycle going either tomorrow night or Saturday morning.

Here's my cycle plan

I'll be using Fritz Turbostart 900 along with ammonia drops. LFS only had 1oz'ers, each of which handles 25g, so grabbed two of 'em. I'll be following Dr Tim's cycle chart as it just makes sense to me and is easy to follow. Essentially adding ammonia drops every other day, testing for ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate the following day, and running this for around 7-8 days. If that goes well, I'll try to add a fish or two next weekend.

Dr Tim's Cycle Chart

https://www.drtimsaquatics.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/FishlessCycling_prescription_recipe.pdf

I hope to be pretty active with this thread over the next few weeks as we get things going, so I hope you find this informative so far and will follow along with me.

Wet tank in all it's glory

LBCBJ · Sep 7, 2023

In other news, I was able to sell my Vectra S2 on R2R today so that's a nice relief. My first few hours with the Sicce Syncra SDC 6.0 are positive so far. It's quite, and quite enough that I can't hear it, but not AS quite as the Vectra.

More notable is the noticeable vibration that's it's producing, enough to slightly rattle my soft plumbing. The Vectra had zero vibration. Initial impression, it seems like a solid pump and will do the job, however it does feel like a step down from the Vectra (the controller also feels cheaper yet easier to use).

If I could name two things the Sicce does better, it would be:

Much easier to connect to soft plumbing out of the box.
Surprisingly, the app feels more intuitive to use. I was able to figure out how to turn on and adjust the pump without any thought. Maybe I'm dense, but trying to use the Vectra on the Mobius app made no sense to me.

LBCBJ · Sep 8, 2023

It's cycle day - let the games begin!

Here's what I've done over the last 24 hours

Tank ran overnight with RODI as part of a 3rd and final leak test
Fired up my Inkbird and two 100w heaters
Did a quick run of my skimmer to ensure it's working and see how it affects my sump water level
Added 500L of Sipromax bio-media to one of my three media baskets ahead of adding bacteria
Did quite a bit of fiddling with my water level and gate valve to get levels just right. It actually took a lot more time than I expected and turned into a math puzzle where I was trying to triangulate dialing in the overflow while maintaining the right water level in my return pump chamber to keep my ATO valve from draining.

So with all those checks complete, I've added 18 cups of Tropic Marin Pro Reef salt to get right at 35ppt @77F using a Hannah salinity checker. Since I used both dry rock and sand, I added the salt directly to the tank in small batches over the course of an hour with my Nero 3 running to help get things mixed.

Next Up

Later today, I'll be adding 2oz of Fritz Turbostart 900 along with 7ml of BA Quikcycle ammonia drops
As part of that, I'll be removing my filter sock and running no skimmer for a few days
Lights will be remaining off for at least the next week, and I need to determine how I want to handle that. I've read convincing arguments for leaving lights off for everything from a week to 2-3 months. My initial thoughts is that I'd actually like to get a couple hardy corals in the tank like Zoas and GSPs within the next couple weeks to start competing against algae and introduce coralline algae from the frag plugs into the tank. This will all be dependent upon how quickly I can dial in stability, so more to come.
Lastly, having spent a few hours with my powerhead, I can already tell a single Nero 3 isn't going to provide enough flow. Even cranked up to 100% I was a bit surprised at the amount of dead spots in the tank. While I was hoping to keep external wires to a minimum, I'll need to keep my eyes out for a rare AI sale to grab another Nero 3.

shadyraro · Sep 11, 2023

Tanks looking good! I had 2 Nero 3’s in my 600 and eventually upgraded to 2 Nero 5’s and I was amazed at the difference. The bigger footprint and flow just changed the whole dynamic of my tanks flow, the corals responded well and I only currently max them at 55% in my new 900.

LBCBJ · Sep 11, 2023

shadyraro said:
Tanks looking good! I had 2 Nero 3’s in my 600 and eventually upgraded to 2 Nero 5’s and I was amazed at the difference. The bigger footprint and flow just changed the whole dynamic of my tanks flow, the corals responded well and I only currently max them at 55% in my new 900.

Thanks Shady that’s great know! I’ll plan to add another 3 closer to the sandbed, but can definitley see why you’d want 5s in the 600 and 900.

Gumbies R Us · Sep 11, 2023

LBCBJ said:
It's cycle day - let the games begin!

Here's what I've done over the last 24 hours

Tank ran overnight with RODI as part of a 3rd and final leak test

Fired up my Inkbird and two 100w heaters

Did a quick run of my skimmer to ensure it's working and see how it affects my sump water level

Added 500L of Sipromax bio-media to one of my three media baskets ahead of adding bacteria

Did quite a bit of fiddling with my water level and gate valve to get levels just right. It actually took a lot more time than I expected and turned into a math puzzle where I was trying to triangulate dialing in the overflow while maintaining the right water level in my return pump chamber to keep my ATO valve from draining.

So with all those checks complete, I've added 18 cups of Tropic Marin Pro Reef salt to get right at 35ppt @77F using a Hannah salinity checker. Since I used both dry rock and sand, I added the salt directly to the tank in small batches over the course of an hour with my Nero 3 running to help get things mixed.

Next Up

Later today, I'll be adding 2oz of Fritz Turbostart 900 along with 7ml of BA Quikcycle ammonia drops

As part of that, I'll be removing my filter sock and running no skimmer for a few days

Lights will be remaining off for at least the next week, and I need to determine how I want to handle that. I've read convincing arguments for leaving lights off for everything from a week to 2-3 months. My initial thoughts is that I'd actually like to get a couple hardy corals in the tank like Zoas and GSPs within the next couple weeks to start competing against algae and introduce coralline algae from the frag plugs into the tank. This will all be dependent upon how quickly I can dial in stability, so more to come.

Lastly, having spent a few hours with my powerhead, I can already tell a single Nero 3 isn't going to provide enough flow. Even cranked up to 100% I was a bit surprised at the amount of dead spots in the tank. While I was hoping to keep external wires to a minimum, I'll need to keep my eyes out for a rare AI sale to grab another Nero 3.

Best of luck on the cycle!

LBCBJ · Sep 11, 2023

Gumbies R Us said:
Best of luck on the cycle!

Thanks! Since you mention it, here's an update on the cycle.

Cycle Log

9/8 - added 2oz Turbostart and 6ml of ammonia
9/9 - NH3 = 0.5ppm, NO2 = 2ppm
9/10 - added 6ml ammonia
9/11 - NH3 = 0.25ppm, NO2 = 2ppm
PH has dropped from 8.15 to 7.8 over the last 4 days (using a pinpoint probe on my Hydros controller). I'm going to get the skimmer going which should help push PH back up.

I'm using Salifert NH3 and NO2 kits, Hannah checker for NO3, and my oh my are the Salifert kits terrible to read. Honestly haven't seen any visible color difference on my ammonia test since I began the cycle, and it's possible my tests have been a 0 reading. Based on the N02 reading, certainly seems the tank is cycling.

Following Dr Tim's cycle chart, I should be adding a final round of ammonia on Wednesday and then if levels are 0 going into the weekend we are cycled.

Stocking Plans

Sharing stocking plans in my next post!

LBCBJ · Sep 11, 2023

So a bit about my stocking plans

Overall, I have a few goals for stocking my tank:

Only use captive-bred fish and corals
Maintain an Indo-Pacific theme in species selection
Be thoughtful about what I add! At only 38g, I plan to max out at 3-4 fish, and can only fit so many corals, so I need to be discerning about what I'm adding.

As far as the first lucky residents of my Cade 500, it was an easy decision, you can't go wrong with clowns! And I want a clown pair. The hardest decision was where to buy the fish, and here is my thought process.

Running a QT tank isn't a great fit for my setup, as I just don't have the room (like an air-conditioned garage or basement), and I don't want a QT tank sitting in my kitchen. So ideally I want pre-quarantined fish. I live in Charlotte, NC, and we're lucky to have quite a few LFS, one of which I really do like and want to support, Nemo's Reef, however they don't QT fish, and I just don't want to risk introducing a parasite into my tank.

Soooo how about mail order fish!

I can't say I envisioned buying fish over the internet, and the thought of shipping fish makes me a bit anxious, but I'm going to give it a try. So after a lot of research, I've decided to try out @tsmaquatics as they offer a full 30-day QT process before shipping fish.

@tsmaquatics had a pair of aquacultured ORA Oscellaris Clownfish available to ship so I grabbed 'em!

Given shipping rates, it made sense to add a couple corals to the order, so I grabbed a frag of GSP and frag of Rasta zoas. I didn't orginally plan to add corals and turn on the lights 2 weeks in, but I feel fairly confident that I can get these hardy corals going

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Shipment is scheduled to arrive 9/20, giving the tank a full two weeks to cycle and stabilize. Things are getting exciting!

LBCBJ · Sep 13, 2023

Day 5 Cycle Update

Now I remember all about this reefing thing being not so black and white! I honestly don't have a great idea where I stand with my cycle

. My Salifert test kits have 2 years left till expiration, but I'm convinced they're either bad or junk. Here's what's been going on:

Ammonia readings haven't budged off of some light cloudy color which appears to be 0-1ppm, so I ran a test adding 5 drops of pure ammonia into a sample...guess what, no color change. So either my ammonia drops are actually water or this kit is bad.
Same for nitrite, I've had a reading of around 2ppm everyday for 6 days. Definitely not right.
My water has had a very low cloud to it since around day 3, so I'm interpreting that as a bacterial bloom and am surprised it has lasted 4 days.
Turned the skimmer on yesterday to begin priming it, and I've already gotten it tuned to a point that it's creating a clear, dry skim. So that's good!
Per Dr Tim's I should be adding a last round of NO3 today, but at this rate, I feel like I'm flying blind with these test kits. Spending another $40 on test kits I will never use again kind of annoys me, but I may hit my LFS tonight for some Red Sea kits to see if I can get a better reading before I add more NH3.
As far as the rest of the tank, the only thing I haven't dialed in is the gravity-fed ATO, which runs off a float valve. I've been struggling to get the valve at just the right level, which thus far has lead to an over top-off which has lowered my salinity over several days from 35 to 33ppm. I lowered the valve yet again last night, and thus far I can't see that it's triggered yet. I'm watching for about a gallon of evaporation before it triggers and then I should be in a pretty good place.

I'm pretty amazed at how much dialing in these systems require. The tank overflow, sump, and ATO all need to run at very specific and tight ranges, yet are chained together, so a small tweak to one spills over the others. Fun stuff!

But this is all part of the journey and I'm trying to enjoy it. I'm glad that I'm taking it slow as it provides an opportunity to work through all these kinks which CAN take time, without having livestock at risk.

Cycle fingers are crossed...more to come!