Current FTS (Jan 2023):
Intro
So this tank move occurred in May 2023, and took a few months to get everything in place and I am actually still finalizing a few things. Having a baby really slows down progress! So, I am going to update the basics in this initial post and will keep it up-to-date from here.
My Red Sea Reefer 450 was transferred successfully to my new tank, an Innovative Marine 170g EXT tank, which is 59" long, 21" tall and 30" front to back. The glass is 3/4" thick, so that really gives me a little over 150g of water volume in the tank. I transferred over everything to this tank, all the rock, all the livestock and all the equipment, but I changed the scape so it looks significantly different and I love it! I only added one smaller rock from my 20g cube that I held on to, otherwise the extra room in this newer tank is just to make it not feel so crowded.
This might be my last FTS of the Red Sea:
Some of the equipment changes from my last tank:
Here's the rundown on equipment:
As with my last tank, I don't really run mechanical or chemical filtration, so no filter floss, GAC or GFO. I have the ability to run these if I need to, but not something I run 24/7. Also, like my last tank, I am a firm believer in water changes, so I change about 15g per week using good old fashioned Instant Ocean salt.
My goal is to keep the following parameters:
Alk: 8-9
Calcium >400
Mag: whatever it lands at?
NO3: 5-10
PO4: 0.2 - 0.2
pH: try to keep it's lows above 7.9 and try to get it up to 8.3, but its been hard so far on this bigger tank.
I don't really test anything else.
I didn't have a lot of extra time to document the moving of the tank fully, but had 4 other locals help me move it.
Building the stand was extremely easy and I was able to fully assemble it my self in under an hour
The tank was really heavy, but there were five of us and 6 suction cups and 3 moving carts and we made it work! Thank god there were no stairs to deal with.
First Accupant:
Just Before Filling:
Side by side transfer made it so easy
I documented the actual transferring of my old tank to the new tank on video and uploaded to YouTube. They're longer form videos from actual transfer, scaping the tank, rescaping and pruning, etc. so quit a bit there in this playlist:
and here's the first one of actual transfer:
At about about 6 weeks and the tank was doing much better than I could have hoped for. I lost 2 frags, which were nice frags, and my pink lemonade colony. Not sure if it was one of three things or a mix of all: 1) the tank move was likely stressful, 2) found out my refractometer calibration solution was off, so I was keeping my salinity at 37% instead of 35% and my NO3 and PO4 dropped to zero while on vacation. Also doesn't help that I probably cranked the lights up too high. Once I finally got my PAR meter out, the third light really increased the intensity much more than I could have imagined. Other than those, I did have to trim some burnt tips, but otherwise, 95% of my acros have never looked better!
June 2023:
July 2023
Future Changes: not a lot, but I am going to start dosing Kalk at night to keep my pH up more and maybe get rid of the CO2 scrubber. Also, I have a Radion G5 XR15 that I will put over my frag sump area as the single noopsyche creates a lof of shading on some of the bigger SPS frags. I may eventually swap the Nero 3 for a gyre style pump as some point too.
I am fragging a piece of the milka stylo and then getting rid of the colony to a local reefer. Its gotten so big that it really crowds the space. Its probably 12" in diameter and about 9-10" tall. Grows so fast in my tank. I need to kill some encrusting SPS and a bunch of discosoma shrooms. Luckily, I can take out the rock that the shrooms are on so I can remove them much easier.
Intro
So this tank move occurred in May 2023, and took a few months to get everything in place and I am actually still finalizing a few things. Having a baby really slows down progress! So, I am going to update the basics in this initial post and will keep it up-to-date from here.
My Red Sea Reefer 450 was transferred successfully to my new tank, an Innovative Marine 170g EXT tank, which is 59" long, 21" tall and 30" front to back. The glass is 3/4" thick, so that really gives me a little over 150g of water volume in the tank. I transferred over everything to this tank, all the rock, all the livestock and all the equipment, but I changed the scape so it looks significantly different and I love it! I only added one smaller rock from my 20g cube that I held on to, otherwise the extra room in this newer tank is just to make it not feel so crowded.
This might be my last FTS of the Red Sea:
Some of the equipment changes from my last tank:
- I now am using 3 ATI Straton lights instead of 2
- I added a Tunze Stream 3 along the back wall and a Tunze 6105 for extra flow
- I got a bigger sump, but the setup is very similar - bigger frag section, yay!
Here's the rundown on equipment:
- Tank: Innovative Marine 170 EXT with white aluminum stand
- Sump: Turbo Aquatics 55g sump (meant for a turf scrubber, but provides a big open chamber for my frags)
- Lights: ATI Straton LED (x3)
- Flow: x2 Vortech MP40qd, Tunze Stream 3 and a Tunze Turbelle Stream 6105
- Heat: x2 150w Eheim Jager heaters
- Return: Current eFlux 3170gph DC pump
- Skimmer: Deltec 1000i with CO2 scrubber in line
- UV: AquaUX 57w
- In-Sump Frag 'Tank': Noopsyche K7 gen 2 for lights and AI Nero 3 for flow
- Controller: ApexEL, Trident tester, DoS for 2 part
- Dosing: ESV B-Ionic 2 part (switch from BRS)
As with my last tank, I don't really run mechanical or chemical filtration, so no filter floss, GAC or GFO. I have the ability to run these if I need to, but not something I run 24/7. Also, like my last tank, I am a firm believer in water changes, so I change about 15g per week using good old fashioned Instant Ocean salt.
My goal is to keep the following parameters:
Alk: 8-9
Calcium >400
Mag: whatever it lands at?
NO3: 5-10
PO4: 0.2 - 0.2
pH: try to keep it's lows above 7.9 and try to get it up to 8.3, but its been hard so far on this bigger tank.
I don't really test anything else.
I didn't have a lot of extra time to document the moving of the tank fully, but had 4 other locals help me move it.
Building the stand was extremely easy and I was able to fully assemble it my self in under an hour
The tank was really heavy, but there were five of us and 6 suction cups and 3 moving carts and we made it work! Thank god there were no stairs to deal with.
First Accupant:
Just Before Filling:
Side by side transfer made it so easy
I documented the actual transferring of my old tank to the new tank on video and uploaded to YouTube. They're longer form videos from actual transfer, scaping the tank, rescaping and pruning, etc. so quit a bit there in this playlist:
and here's the first one of actual transfer:
At about about 6 weeks and the tank was doing much better than I could have hoped for. I lost 2 frags, which were nice frags, and my pink lemonade colony. Not sure if it was one of three things or a mix of all: 1) the tank move was likely stressful, 2) found out my refractometer calibration solution was off, so I was keeping my salinity at 37% instead of 35% and my NO3 and PO4 dropped to zero while on vacation. Also doesn't help that I probably cranked the lights up too high. Once I finally got my PAR meter out, the third light really increased the intensity much more than I could have imagined. Other than those, I did have to trim some burnt tips, but otherwise, 95% of my acros have never looked better!
June 2023:
July 2023
Future Changes: not a lot, but I am going to start dosing Kalk at night to keep my pH up more and maybe get rid of the CO2 scrubber. Also, I have a Radion G5 XR15 that I will put over my frag sump area as the single noopsyche creates a lof of shading on some of the bigger SPS frags. I may eventually swap the Nero 3 for a gyre style pump as some point too.
I am fragging a piece of the milka stylo and then getting rid of the colony to a local reefer. Its gotten so big that it really crowds the space. Its probably 12" in diameter and about 9-10" tall. Grows so fast in my tank. I need to kill some encrusting SPS and a bunch of discosoma shrooms. Luckily, I can take out the rock that the shrooms are on so I can remove them much easier.