Innovative Marine 200-gallon INT Build

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Looks like a great build. I think the QT will be fine in your office. Did you get that 40 gallon long shipped to you? If you did, do you mind saying from where?

I just went to a LFS called AquA AnimaniA Pet , seen it on sale for 229.00 and I told them I'd do 200 even, they agreed. I think LFS are desperate for business atm, so they are more than willing to negotiate. If I were you I'd do the same at your LFS. Also, thank you for the kind words!

Edit: I put 299.00 instead of 229

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Update 5.1​

Hey everyone,

Instead of buying a stand for the QT I put on my DIY gloves and got to work. I bought an old wood coffee table from the thrift store and reinforced it with 2x4’s. It took less than an hour to complete the stand and saved me more than a hundred dollars that could go towards the DT. There are some pictures below. However, I’m sorry I didn’t take a picture of the coffee table before reinforcing it (slipped my mind). I definitely went overboard on the bracing lol. This thing is really sturdy I have no doubt it will support the 40 gallon QT with ease.

Front

Top

Left Side

Right Side

Rear

Stand With the QT

Also, the DT is in my city, and they schedule it for a delivery tomorrow! For some reason, I’m not even excited. It’s going to be a while before I put any fish in the DT anyway. Currently, I’m more focused on culturing pods and getting my cheato fuge going before adding fish. For those following along sorry, this is probably going to be a boring thread. If I learned anything from my previous tank the key to success in this hobby is patience. Moving forward, after I complete the plumbing and the DIY sump I’ll cycle the aquarium with Fritz Turbo start. Then I’ll QT/Dip a ball of cheato before adding it to my fuge to feed off the post cycle nutrients. Afterward, I’ll seed my aquarium using an appropriately sized seed pack from Canada Copepods (copepods.ca or copepods.com). Next, I’ll dose the aquarium with a high concentration of phytoplankton for the next three months to support the copepods population and reproduction. The three months is an indicator of when I add fish, it does not imply I would stop dosing phyto at three months. In the meantime, I’ll QT my first fish. However, you all should probably know I made some adjustments to my fish list and invert list. My previous list was rushed, and pretty generic. So I decided to make some adjustments after doing a lot of research while reflecting on aesthetics, compatibility, space, and risk factors.



Fish:

1. Yellow tang
2. Blue hippo tang
3. Tomini tang
4. Clownfish (pair)
5. Bluethroat triggerfish (Male)
6. Diamond goby
7. Starry blenny
8. Neon goby (pair)
9. Black leopard wrasse
10. Regular leopard wrasse
11. Yellow wrasse
12. Radiant wrasse
13. Red-lined wrasse
14. Melanurus wrasse
15. Black-backed wrasse
16. McCosker's Flasher wrasse
17. Ruby long fin fairy wrasse

Inverts:

• Purple Short Spine Urchin
• 30 Nassarius Snails
• 3 fighting conch snails

**I also got some new gadgets, medications and other stuff (listed below):

• Milwaukee Seawater Digital Refractometer (MA887)
• Spectrapure Automatic Shut-Off Kit
• Hanna Checker High Range Copper Colorimeter
• Seachem Prime
• CoralRX Coral Dip 8 Oz
• Copper Power 32 Oz
• Malachite Green 4 Oz
• Prazipro 16 Oz
• MetroPlex 100 g
• KanaPlex 100 g
• API Furan-2 20 packs
• Focus 10 g
• RA Rally Pro 16 Oz

Side Notes​

While I was cleaning my old wavemakers for the QT I pulled out the impeller and realized that it was rusted on both of my old wavemakers. I was surprised since they are older Hydor Koralia’s, I don’t blame the brand I think I didn’t maintain them properly to be honest. Also, I went for a 40-gallon long instead of the 33-gallon long for the QT. I also made some adjustments to the QT process, but I’ll explain the adjustments when I QT my first fish. I'll post pictures of the tank when it comes in tomorrow. One more thing, a new list implies a new stocking order, so I'll update that later.

 

[Damion123]

Wow. Looks like you have a pretty comprehensive plan. I look forward to seeing your progress.

 

[southerntnreefer]

I'm geeky and techy so I loved the "boring Thread comment" loved every minute of it.

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Wow. Looks like you have a pretty comprehensive plan. I look forward to seeing your progress.

Thanks. The issue with a detailed plan is version 1.0 is always flawed. I've tweaked my plan so many times after reading articles on reef2reef, I worry I may confuse people. We're probably on version 1.9 now lol. I still haven't updated many changes, I need to get permission from a mod to edit my original post so I don't confuse anyone.

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

I'm geeky and techy so I loved the "boring Thread comment" loved every minute of it.

Ha! What's the point of a fish tank if I can't experiment a bit? Without the gear, it's not nearly as fun or efficient for people like us

 

[southerntnreefer]

Ha! What's the point of a fish tank if I can't experiment a bit? Without the gear, it's not nearly as fun or efficient for people like us

I could not agree more. I've spent the last year building out my new build. I went with reef angel tank control as I wanted something a bit more hands on. It's more gratifying. Sure apex is great, but I wanted to tinker. It gives me a ton of things to tinker with even when the tanks running...

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

I could not agree more. I've spent the last year building out my new build. I went with reef angel tank control as I wanted something a bit more hands on. It's more gratifying. Sure apex is great, but I wanted to tinker. It gives me a ton of things to tinker with even when the tanks running...

I just got back into the hobby and never checked out controllers since I have an old apex lite unit from my previous build, so I'm not familiar with the Reef Angel Controller. I need to check out your build, I've been so busy with reading articles and my build I barely had time to read other people's build threads. But I definitely understand the urge to tinker! We have to reach our personal versions of perfection somehow right?

 

[southerntnreefer]

I just got back into the hobby and never checked out controllers since I have an old apex lite unit from my previous build, so I'm not familiar with the Reef Angel Controller. I need to check out your build, I've been so busy with reading articles and my build I barely had time to read other people's build threads. But I definitely understand the urge to tinker! We have to reach our personal versions of perfection somehow right?

I do the same thing! That's how I found reef angel. I needed a controller this go, and I didn't want to be restricted etc. Reef angel is open source so it can do just about anything z and new things come all the time at little to no cost. I've been working on this tank for almost a year. Build thread too. Lately it's just been simple things, like finally getting return plumbing in etc.

 

[mattgsa]

This is looking like a great build

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Update 5.2 ​

Hey everyone,

So the shipping company has been taking me on a roller coaster ride, I gave them a call and let them have it after they made me wait 5 hours outside for the tank yesterday. I understand there are delays, but this company literally lied to me and wasted my time on multiple occasions. I honestly don't care when the tank comes, I just value punctuality and honesty. It seemed to have worked because they had the third party company call me to set up a guaranteed delivery tomorrow. They even promised to call me thirty minutes before it's delivered. So I'm pleased with them at the moment.

Also, the QT is officially wet and cycling. To cycle the QT, I threw a cocktail shrimp in the tank yesterday, once I see the ammonia creep I'll use the Fritz turbo start to get the cycle going. I have a salinity reading of 35 ppt (perfect). Apparently, Fritz Turbo start can complete a cycle within 30 hours, so we'll see how that goes (from their site). However, I have reached a dilemma; once the tank cycles I want to add chaetomorpha, but chaetomorpha needs nitrates and phosphates to feed off of, so I was wondering if any of you have some suggestions regarding that. I was thinking about ghost feeding, but I have no clue how much I would need to ghost feed. Or I could get a yellow wrasse to feed and throw it in the QT with the chaetomorpha so it demolishes potentially bad hitchhikers. However, this option is risky because either the wrasse can get infected by the chaetomorpha/hitchhikers or the wrasse will infect (or encrust) the hitchhikers/chaetomorpha.

Jebao SDW-16 Wavemaker Review​

Noise:

Initially, you want to throw this thing in the garbage, the ceramics grinding against each other is extremely annoying. However, after 24 hours the noise is unnoticeable unless someone really tries to focus their hearing in on it. Now It's so silent that I can't even hear it over the HOB filter.

Turbulence:

The Jebao SDW-16 packs a serious punch. I have the Jebao Wavemaker in my 40 gallon QT and I tested all the modes. Each mode works as advertised. To test the turbulence, I ramped up the power on the wavemaker with the shrimp inside to see what would happen. Basically, the shrimp got blasted all over the tank, I immediately lowered the power because I was worried it was going to break apart lol. To stop the shrimp from moving, I set the Wavemaker to its lowest setting and let the shrimp settle in a dead zone.

Build Quality:

The Jebao Wavemaker is solid, it's not flimsy, it easily comes apart and put together.

Controller:

At first I thought it was garbage, but after playing around with it for a bit I realized this thing is really easy to use. It has many modes (all work as described).

Instructions:

The instructions say “long press” this button instead of “hold the button down”, for those who are struggling to find the puzzling meaning behind “long press” lol. After reading that I put the instructions away and figured out how to use it myself. The instructions aren't clear, I'd say they're almost worthless to anyone who's picky about English.

Conclusion:

For those looking for a budget wavemaker that gets the job done the Jebao SDW-16 is a splendid choice. I'm aware this is a sloppy review, but it's the best I could do at the moment since I'm not well versed on wavemakers.

 

[VikS]

Good luck tomorrow!

 

[Billldg]

Thanks. The issue with a detailed plan is version 1.0 is always flawed. I've tweaked my plan so many times after reading articles on reef2reef, I worry I may confuse people. We're probably on version 1.9 now lol. I still haven't updated many changes, I need to get permission from a mod to edit my original post so I don't confuse anyone.

I have changed my plans on my upgrade so many times, and probably will continue to change and tweak it as time go’s on. It’s always better to tweak it before the tank gets wet, its a lot harder to change things once you have water in the tank. Tank is going to be great. I can’t wait to see it with water in it.

 

[revhtree]

Thanks for sharing your progress with us!

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

I have changed my plans on my upgrade so many times, and probably will continue to change and tweak it as time go’s on. It’s always better to tweak it before the tank gets wet, it's a lot harder to change things once you have water in the tank. Tank is going to be great. I can’t wait to see it with water in it.

Thanks for the compliment Bill. I totally agree, I just hate it when my stuff is unorganized lol. I'll post some pics as soon is it comes in. I just need to wait for an insured company (safety first) to move it from my garage into my house before I can do the plumbing and get it wet. In the meantime, I'll just finish the scape, get something into QT (still debating what to put in QT post #31), and complete the DIY sump.

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Update 5.3​

The tank is here, and It's huge! I took some sloppy pictures of it inside the wooden cargo box, and some pictures of other stuff that also got delivered today (pictures below).

75-gallon

LFS​

I went to my local fish store to see what they had to offer and I have to say I wasn't impressed. They had maroons with ocellaris clowns, a juvenile clown with a lionfish. As far as I can tell many fish were infected with velvet (white dots and a dusty appearance), they also had damaged fins, faded color, and they were attempting to sell a purple tang that had severe HLLE and velvet for 400 CAD to a customer in front of me. I then asked the customer how he felt about this place, he told me to steer clear every fish he's bought from there has met its demise shortly after purchasing them (no clue why he's still shopping there if that's the case). The worst part is, they have Niger triggers listed on their site for $70 CAD, but he offered the smallest one to that same customer for $100 CAD. However, I saw two juvenile clowns that looked okay. So, I tested the sales rep by asking if he's willing to hold the fish for me in a separate tank for a week, I even offered to pay for them (stole this trick from an article on the forum). Guess what he said? "No, I can't hold fish"! There are enough reasons to steer clear from this shop, unfortunately, it's the only one in my area. So I need an alternative for fish, do any of you have any online vendor suggestions in Canada?

Edit: Got rid of some pointless nonsense, fixed some grammar, and got down to the point

 

[JumboShrimp]

Any updated photos?

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Any updated photos?

Sorry, nothing to update really. I'm hiring a moving company to move the tank downstairs tomorrow (this doesn't imply they will do it the same day). Now that I got the 75-gallon tank I can build the DIY sump, I just need to go to the glass shop and get them to cut me baffles. I also need to figure out how to get some fish from a half-decent place in Canada, because my LFS is definitely not an option. If there's anything you'd like to know or see in particular, then just let me know and I'll do my best to tell you or show you.

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

If there's anything you'd like to know or see in particular, then just let me know and I'll do my best to tell you or show you.

I probably shouldn't have said anything lol.

 

[Mr. Fishy Fish]

Hey everyone, I have a question. I have the option of either getting live rock or Marco ReefSaver shelf rock. The liverock is cheaper than the shelf rock... so I don't know if it's even worth getting dry rock anymore. I would appreciate some suggestions thanks.