PolypPal's Ultra-Custom 68g Acrylic AIO

[TheWB]

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Some major updates to the tank... Had to move it to another location, so while I was at it, I did a major retrofit on the tank to fix some issues with filtration (and buff out a big scratch I put in the interior with a rock)

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I was using loose polyfil in the first chamber at the start, which worked horribly. So I built an acrylic chamber that will hold a filter sock (reef diapers). Also put some holes in the same piece to accommodate my primary and backup heaters.

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The holes in the back of the tank are for the 1/2" murlok lines of my reactors to feed through. After testing bio pellets over the last several months, I am a big fan now! Instead of 3 separate reactors under the tank, I rebuilt them into a 3-stage reactor that runs 1)Biopellets 2)Gfo 3)Carbon. So far so good...

The setup is working great thus far, and has also drastically reduced noise!

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What pump are you using to feed the reactors? I’d be interested to see a little more on how you set that up.

 

[polyppal]

What pump are you using to feed the reactors? I’d be interested to see a little more on how you set that up.

I just switched over to a DC pump so I can have control over the power, it was too hard trying to dial in a traditional AC pump while trying to turn the pellets (but not too hard)...

Its a Jaebo DC2500 that im running at about 30%

Yeah, im sure ill do a method write-up on it at some point, id like to give it a couple more months to prove the concept but its doing exactly what I want as of now!

 

[polyppal]

Also rebuilt the scape... Again...



The last scape was nice, but I had already ran out of coal room (was already overcrowded for growing gonis) and had a lot of real estate left in the tank. A really nice piece, but poor planning on the initial scape.

Still used Tropic Eden Rock - its fantastic (shout out @premiumaquatics)



This is 20# of med/large shelf rock, expertly packaged from Premium Aquatics. I attached it with diy concrete pillars made with PVC molds, then coated in Emarco 400. Here she is in the tank:



So, similar design with twice as much coral space now. Interestingly, Ive also noticed that with the pillars raising the rock work out of the sand, my murderous hermit crabs can no longer get out of the sand and onto the rocks. Maybe this will help keep my snails alive longer!

 

[polyppal]

 

[polyppal]

Some top down shots of my Inferno Anemone during the WC

 

[Projects with Sam]

We’ll, I know where you can find a nice female for the low low price of only $114 plus another $70 for shipping. Quite the deal lol. Actually I think that’s a pretty good price for that fish if the shipping wasn’t so much. I wish my fish followed me when I come into the room. Mine are all pretty skittish when you approach the tank. You’d think they’d be over that by now, I’ve had some of them for 2 1/2 years.

I've found the ones I've QT-d longer are more likely to come to the glass once in the DT.

 

[polyppal]

I've found the ones I've QT-d longer are more likely to come to the glass once in the DT.

I just picked one up from Dr Reef, excited to see if my male recovers his stripes, he’s been slowly loosing them without a female around

 

[polyppal]

We’ll, I know where you can find a nice female for the low low price of only $114 plus another $70 for shipping. Quite the deal lol. Actually I think that’s a pretty good price for that fish if the shipping wasn’t so much. I wish my fish followed me when I come into the room. Mine are all pretty skittish when you approach the tank. You’d think they’d be over that by now, I’ve had some of them for 2 1/2 years.

I finally picked him up a girlfriend from Dr Reef, should be here soon!

 

[n2585722]

Mounted to the 3030 T-Slot stand I built for this tank. It sits at 34" high, to be level with my desk. Underneath I mounted multiple reactors/dosing pumps and ATO/Dosing reservoirs. Note - my Zoa tank is right around the corner, its bio-pellet reactor and a couple of the dosing pumps for it are housed under this tank as well.

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Love the little helper. Is that a Lynx Point Siamese? I have one that looks very similar to yours. You cannot tell in the photo but she has baby blue eyes.

 

[polyppal]

Love the little helper. Is that a Lynx Point Siamese? I have one that looks very similar to yours. You cannot tell in the photo but she has baby blue eyes.

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No he’s actually an Egyptian Mau, though at least now he looks a lot like my bengal. Beautiful kitty you got there!

 

[n2585722]

No he’s actually an Egyptian Mau, though at least now he looks a lot like my bengal. Beautiful kitty you got there!

Both of your cats are beautiful also. They are defiantly fun to have around.

 

[polyppal]

Both of your cats are beautiful also. They are defiantly fun to have around.

Agreed. Better than fish!

 

[polyppal]

Tank update:

everything doing great. Finally installed the Hydros system and I am loving it compared to Apex. Easy to setup, and it just works well out of the box. Also impressed with the Hydros ATO which replaced my Tunze (and pretty much runs silent now)

at some point over the weekend I’ll probably tackle the cord management and clean things up

 

[polyppal]

All tidy’d up!

 

[JumboShrimp]

It's always nice to see a 'different' kind of a tank look. Nice job, and Best wishes!

 

[polyppal]

It's always nice to see a 'different' kind of a tank look. Nice job, and Best wishes!

Thanks!

 

[polyppal]

Tank update: Changed my goosenecks to the Kessil solid bar mounts for better front tank coverage. Started dosing minimal lanthanum chloride (about 3ml/day) to keep phosphates under control, since GFO wasn't getting the job done...

Everything seems to be healthy coral-wise. My anemone has been hiding under the rock work and peeking out through surface holes for about a week, but it looks like it might be splitting already so I'm leaving it alone.

I did get my female Japanese Swallowtail and Mystery Wrasse from Dr Reef. Overall happy with the order, although the website said the Mystery wrasse would be 2in and he is tiny. He seemed perfectly healthy, but disappeared in the rock work or sand a few days ago and haven't seen him - so hoping he's ok... I don't have the best luck with wrasses.



The female swallowtail introduction did not go well. My male beat her up very badly off the bat, after a night in the tank, she was swimming on the side at the top the next morning with nipped fins, missing scales, near death... Im pretty upset with myself for just introducing her without exercising more caution

I moved the male into another tank and let her stay in the display where she has been recovering nicely, though Im a bit worried about the wounds on her left side you might be able to make out in the pics. Ive been treating with antibiotic/selcon enriched frozen food, hopefully that will suffice. The plan is to let her recover and take charge of the tank, then reintroduce the male in a large breeder box for several more days until he (hopefully) calms down. If that doesn't work, ill probably rehome the female once she fully heals up...

 

[polyppal]

What pump are you using to feed the reactors? I’d be interested to see a little more on how you set that up.

So the filtration has been running long enough to say its a system that works well - here's the breakdown:



The water flows from the tank into the first chamber, where it meets the filter sock, under the filter sock is the first DC pump which plumbs it through a loc-line into the reactor.



Reactor is (1) Biopellets (2) GFO (3) Carbon. After the 3rd stage, it flows back into the tank via loc-line end pumps out right under the skimmer.

I will say that it is silent, and has been a very effective way to control nitrates and put bio media into play, but it isn't exactly as low-maintenance as id hoped for. And hasn't worked great for phosphate control - once I use up my GFO media, I am switching completely to LaCl3 that is dripped into my filter sock at about 3ml/day. This has been much more effective for PO3 control, especially since I feed heavy and dose AB+/Roids

Im not sure if I will completely remove one of the chambers, or possibly just set it up with something like filter floss. I change the carbon/gfo out on Sundays, and it can be a bit of a pain to rinse out/refill each chamber - but pretty much what you'd be doing with a normal reactor anyways.

 

[TheWB]

So the filtration has been running long enough to say its a system that works well - here's the breakdown:

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The water flows from the tank into the first chamber, where it meets the filter sock, under the filter sock is the first DC pump which plumbs it through a loc-line into the reactor.

View attachment 2666026 View attachment 2666027

Reactor is (1) Biopellets (2) GFO (3) Carbon. After the 3rd stage, it flows back into the tank via loc-line end pumps out right under the skimmer.

I will say that it is silent, and has been a very effective way to control nitrates and put bio media into play, but it isn't exactly as low-maintenance as id hoped for. And hasn't worked great for phosphate control - once I use up my GFO media, I am switching completely to LaCl3 that is dripped into my filter sock at about 3ml/day. This has been much more effective for PO3 control, especially since I feed heavy and dose AB+/Roids

Im not sure if I will completely remove one of the chambers, or possibly just set it up with something like filter floss. I change the carbon/gfo out on Sundays, and it can be a bit of a pain to rinse out/refill each chamber - but pretty much what you'd be doing with a normal reactor anyways.

Thanks for showing us how you did that. I’m in the planning stages of a larger AIO and I’m considering using an extra pump to feed a uv externally in a similar way. I may even have some bulkheads installed to avoid anything except the power cord for the pump going over the top of the tank.

 

[polyppal]

Thanks for showing us how you did that. I’m in the planning stages of a larger AIO and I’m considering using an extra pump to feed a uv externally in a similar way. I may even have some bulkheads installed to avoid anything except the power cord for the pump going over the top of the tank.

I mean I’ve only had it for a little over a month but I’m extremely happy with the Jaebo DC’s too. Just as quiet as any Vetra I’ve ever had