Raketemensch's Budget 55g First Build

[raketemensch]

Using it just for a filter really. It has brought nitrates down to really low levels, 1 instead of 25-50. It really does make a huge difference.

One thing to add on the API ammonia test, it will show .25 when there's really nothing there. I used it as a sanity check against the salifert test for the same thing. The Seachem badges work really well for ammonia detection. I use those for my QT setups and cycling the DT. Cheap and effective with no effort lol

I didn’t word that well... I meant to ask if it was your only filter?

It’s weird, because the API ammonia test went to a pure yellow for my RODI water *and* my tap water, so I’ve seen it show 0 twice now, but today it was a pale blue that matches *nothing* on the chart.

My tank makes up its own colors, it doesn’t play by some stupid chemical law!

 

[WiscoFishNut]

I didn’t word that well... I meant to ask if it was your only filter?

It’s weird, because the API ammonia test went to a pure yellow for my RODI water *and* my tap water, so I’ve seen it show 0 twice now, but today it was a pale blue that matches *nothing* on the chart.

My tank makes up its own colors, it doesn’t play by some stupid chemical law!

My bad! The tank I'm using that particular skimmer on is just a coral & invert QT, so it's the only filtration I need. On my DT there is mechanical filtration by way of 2 filter socks. I'm not sure having the filter socks are absolutely necessary, but surely it probably reduces the frequency that the skimmer's collection cup needs to be emptied. Someone with more experience than me could probably give you more sound advice on that one to be honest lol.

On the test kits you might just have a dud lol. Reading over the forums and reviews on BRS you'll find a lot of varying opinions. What's been working for me are Salifert tests for most everything, ammonia badges for initial cycle and QT's, API ammonia test for a second opinion, and Hanna checker for Copper during fish QT.

 

[raketemensch]

Well, during lunch today I started setting up my QT. I have a few smaller tanks around from various other projects and having 2 sons, so I picked a 20-gallon that has a lid and lights and spent my lunch break out in the backyard cleaning it out with vinegar and the hose. It's not in bad shape at all, really, although it was.... interesting to spend all that time out in the rain. Thank God it's warm out.

My 55 currently has 3 filters on it, simply because they came with the tank, which is probably overkill. There's the Cascade 1000 cartridge plus a Whisper 70ex and a Whisper 60 -- I think I'm going to pull the Whisper 60 for the QT.

I've got close to 30 gallons of RODI water in the Brute, so I'll start mixing the water after work, then leave the pump circulating it while I take the boys trick-or-treating. I have another heater in the basement from an earlier fermenting project, so I should be covered on that front, too.

I'm debating whether to pull some sand from the main tank or not, but I think I want to do a full, fresh-tank cycle this time, since I've never done it before and would like to see how the process works.

 

[raketemensch]

I've got my first algae! So excited. It's green and everything.

So it looks like the live rock cycling definitely jumpstarted things, and it's time to order up a CUC.

From what I've seen, reefcleaner.org's "combos" seem to be exceedingly large, so I think that despite having a 55g tank I'm going to order a 15-gallon package, since it comes with 34 little buggers, which sounds about right to my novice ears and learning. It comes with:

15 Dwarf Ceriths
5 Nassarius vibex
8 Florida Ceriths
6 Nerites

Since I've not really kept anything alive in a tank before, I also don't want to get into overkill land. There's also the fact that these guys are often used to clean up waste and unused food, and I don't have anything to feed, so I need to work out what to feed them, but still -- it feels like a good first step.

 

[raketemensch]

Well, today I got the QT fired up with a Whisper 60 filter, an old heater and its original lid-mounted light. Salinity is dead on, but there's still some undissolved salt in it, so the heater is cranking and I've got a maxjet 1200 and another older pump cranking away in it.

Tomorrow I'll do some final salinity balancing and kick off the cycle.

I'm also experimenting with an additive to try to control my hardness, which is crazy high. Having the second tank to experiment with is really nice.

I keep running into issues with the wastewater from the RODI, as the slow trickle fools the drain pump in the laundry sink, so it doesn't ever realize it needs to turn on. Incredibly frustrating, it means I can't just leave the brute filling all the time, even with a float switch. So today I ran the waste hose out the window into the back yard, but that will only work until it starts to freeze outside, which is any day now here in northwest CT.

I really want to order my CUC, but I'm on the road tomorrow through Wednesday and can't risk them arriving while I'm away and being stuck in their packaging.

Patience, right?

 

[raketemensch]

I'm in Rochester for a few days on business, and since I was in an "actual city" I figured I'd check out the local Facebook marketplace and see if I could find any bargains. I was mainly looking for a protein skimmer and maybe a sump, and talked to a few people who wanted good, reasonable money for their skimmers. Then I found a guy who had moved to a smaller apartment and just wanted to unload a bunch of gear to get the space back...

I just stuffed a 20g sump, 2 protein skimmers and a stack of pumps and other miscellaneous stuff into my car -- it cost me $40.

I can't wait to get home and inventory it all.

 

[raketemensch]

Here are some first pics of the haul. I'm trying to identify everything, especially the pumps, since I'm not sure how many gph they are. Everything is currently soaking in hot water and vinegar.

The big guy:

That's probably for a huge tank, which I won't be running for at least a year. It's too bad about the broken piece at the bottom, but that's probably hackable. I haven't dug too much into skimmers yet, but from what I understand you somewhat want to match their volume to your tank volume. I forget why now.

The one I'm planning to use (still unidentified):

Pump haul #1:

Those are mini-jet 606s, and a couple of Danner pumps of currently unknown size.

Pump haul #2:

I think this is a CPR HOB skimmer?

And this is an Eshopps something-or-other. ATO maybe?

And here's the homemade sump, which has mechanical and bio filter media in it. I was worried about it being watertight, but it tested out fine:

The baffles seem a little high to me? I thought you would want them lower so as to have more room for overflow water from the main tank in case of a power outage.

 

[raketemensch]

The Eshopps bit is a PF300 overflow box. The pieces not in the shot were in another box,

The CPR piece appears to be a Bak Pak 2.

 

[raketemensch]

Another day of hard work in the basement while I wait for the DT and QT cycles to complete.

I spent some time last night cleaning all of the pumps, scrubbing them by hand and then pumping hot water through each of them a few times to get any last bits of detritus and vinegar out of them, giving them each a few rinses. One was a Koralia Nano, so I dropped it into the DT to keep everything moving up high. I'm still not quite at 0 ammonia, although everything else looks to be in good shape, and algae continues to grow. When I topped it off the other night it stirred up a bunch of algae and flakes from feeding the cycle, so i figured more movement would be a good thing. I also thought that lights might be a good idea since I'm basically trying to get algae to grow to eat up the last of the ammonia, so I set up a timer on the light. It only has a single T5, but that should be enough to get me started.

The canister and supplementary HOB filters are doing a good job, but since I picked up all that equipment so cheaply I'm going to set up a sump. I'm not even going to mess with the Coralife 65, after reading lots of bad experiences with it. The Reef Octopus is apparently a 250-int or a 250-nwb, I can't really tell what the difference is between the two. The nwb seems to be an older model, which this one definitely is. It has all of the parts except the pump, and the mount tube for it has broken off. I'm going to clean up the edges there and try to epoxy some tubing into it, then plumb one of these other pinwheel pumps into it. I have a CPR Accela pump from the BakPak which has a venturi tube. I'm going to give that a shot, although I can't seem to find a GPH rating for it anywhere -- the original pump was 185gph, so it doesn't have to be super high. It may not work, but it's worth a shot. (found it, it's 266)

I also scrubbed the hell out of the Eshopps PF-300 overflow box. That'll feed the sump, and I think that one of these Danner pumps should be enough for return, but I haven't been able to identify these particular models yet. They make 4 pumps between 250 and 700gph that all look identical, and I'll need around 550 for this tank. I suppose I could just pump out a 5-gallon bucket and do some math...

The sump came with piles of bio balls and mechanical pads and ceramic bio bits between the baffles, which are all soaking in vinegar now.

I really miss those warm fall days when it was easy to drag a tank outside and hose it out properly. We're hitting a high of 34 degrees today, so I'm still not sure how I'm going to clean out this 25 long sump.

 

[raketemensch]

Another day of labor down, getting closer every day.

It got up to almost 50 today. which was great for cleaning out the sump. It got all scrubbed out with hot vinegar/water, then rinsed a dozen times. It was hard to clean between the baffles, but they came out squeaky clean.

Once it was clean and mostly dry I added the filter media -- the plastic bio balls went in first, then some coarse mechanical pads on top of them. After that, in the second baffle, went the ceramic bio rings.

The skimmer fits perfectly in the first chamber, and the second will be a chaeto/copepod refugium. The overflow box cleaned up beautifully, even though the tube in it is not the original and was made with PVC drilled with holes (which were nasty), as I was cleaning it out I discovered a round bristle brush the perfect size for scrubbing them out just sitting on the back of the sink! Just one of those bazillion things that I felt like I should throw out at some point, but decided to hang onto...

The overflow is just hanging there for lack of a better place to put it at the moment.

I was considering pulling the maxijet out of the QT (which I still will at some point, the 1200 might be a wee bit large for a 20-gallon tank, lol), when I started digging through the stack of pumps that I got in that bundle. I took a few pictures of the text on them and discovered that two of them were also maxijet 1200s! They didn't have all the extra bits, but I had hung onto all the plastic that came with the one I bought new, and set up a nice powerhead situation with a duckbill and air mixture, although I'm still not sure how much air I would want to mix in. Right now it's almost zero.

I did a ton of cleanup all around the basement and set up an old rolling workstation as an easy way to move buckets of water around, and did my first water change. I only swapped out 5 gallons, but it put me right back at 1.025:

Eventually that barrel will be right next to the tank with a float switch to fire a pump into the sump, as an ATO, but I need to run some tubing along the ceiling for the water feeds and set up the float switches too. Oh, and the sump!

I also finally spread the sand around properly in the tank, and did a better arrangement with the rocks, since the first life forms will be arriving this week. It stirred up the tank something fierce, but it looks better now, if not great:

I tried to create some nice caves/nooks/crannies for hiding in while moving stuff around. It's the first time I've done it, which was fun. It's weird how differently things look from the front/sides of the tank than from the top -- not just the blurriness, but also the front/back depth was always different from what I'd expected. This isn't intended to be a beautiful display tank, just a good place for growing coral, but it can't hurt to do a little arranging.

It's usually much clearer than that, but all of the movement stirred up a lot of stuff.

I also set up an old chromebook on a shelf next to the tank for recording chemistry stuff. I'd love to just fill in a single form with a list of each measurement and be done, but right now AquaticLog requires that you enter each measurement one at a time. I talked to the developer, who is working on making a simplified entry form. I wonder if there's an API?

In total, the haul from my $40 carload was:

Pumps:
Danner Supreme model 7 x2 (unknown size still)
Minijet 606 pump x2
koralia nano
Maxi-jet 1200 x2
Marineland Penguin 550

Modules:
Coralife super skimmer 65
CPR Aquatic BakPak 2 HOB skimmer
Reef Octopus 250-int skimmer
Eshopps pf-300 overflow box

Also the sump and various filter media, a bunch of buckets and storage bins, and various miscellaneous tubing, connectors, etc.

My refractometer arrived on Friday, too, so I can be way more exact with my salinity, and I have an ammonia badge in there now too.

All in all, I've spent a little under $400 so far, including the RO/DI filter. I wish I'd gotten a BRS one instead of the GE one to start, but hindsight and all...

 

[raketemensch]

Well, crap. My TDS meter arrived today, my water is at 20.

I'm afraid this means that I'm going to have to start my whole cycle over again with fresh water.

[edit] Actually, that was coming from storage, straight off of the tap it's at 2.

Which I know if pretty much everyone's upper threshold, but since the issue isn't necessarily the TDS level but what *makes up* the TDS, I'm going to give this a shot anyway.

Also, I've been digging around for larger tanks for farming, and stumbled onto these:

Botanicare 70 Gallon Reservoir – White – Simply Hydroponics

www.simplyhydro.com

83" x 34.25" x 15.625", for $178, and incredibly easy to drill!

 

[raketemensch]

My CuC arrives tomorrow, which is exciting -- finally adding some "life forms" to the tank! It's been pretty frigid here in New England, so it'll be interesting (and a little scary) to see how they do in a delivery truck.

I ordered up some chaeto and some copepods tonight. I figure I'll at least get the sump started with the refugium and some filter media, get it going for a bit until the pods and chaeto get going well, then remove the Cascade cartridge filter from the flow. There won't be much in the tank other than the CuC working on the algae, so it should be pretty safe. Once the snails have survived a few weeks I'll maybe order a diamond goby.

I'm going to hit Home Depot tomorrow and see what I can find for barbed fittings to epoxy into the cracked skimmer, as well as pick up some PVC to plumb the overflow box into the sump. Even if I can't get the skimmer up right away it'll still be worth it to get the thing plumbed up and cycling, I think. I've also seen debate in a few places about whether you need a skimmer when you're targeting just coral and no fish, since there won't be as many proteins produced, but I've got the thing, so I'm going to see if I can make it work.

I might be ordering a pair of 165w Mars Aquas tomorrow, as it's Payday.

So much exciting stuff going on, all at once!

 

[raketemensch]

I'm holding off on ordering the Mars Aquas for a month because I just ran to home depot and picked up everything I needed for the sump instead, since the refugium stuff is shipping out today. I picked up a valve and some 1" PVC for the overflow -> sump, and all the tubing I need, plus some plastic glue for attaching a 3/4" hose barb to the skimmer, which I think I've got a good plan for now. That's going to be fun to get working, I can't wait to get it going.

It's amazing how fast that stuff adds up. Between the chaeto, the pods and the plumbing bits, I went through $100.

 

[raketemensch]

I had planned on getting a lot of work done this weekend, but really wasn't feeling well yesterday, so instead my wife and I, with my oldest son, made a trip to Waterbury Aquarium, a great little aquarium shop about half an hour away. It was cool to see so many tanks running with loads of different styles of sumps and methods of filtration and combinations of tanks off of single sumps, etc. I also got to check out the goby and chromis that I'm eventually going to get -- but my favorite part was definitely the big coral tanks they have right at the entrance.

I've learned everything I've done so far online, and it's always really hard to judge the scale of things until you see them in person. I don't know about everyone else, but personally, I seem to assume things are bigger than they are. The frags I saw were a lot smaller than I'd expected.

To be completely honest, I think my favorite thing was really the porcupine puffer they had -- what an outrageously cool fish. I never plan to have a DT big enough for one, so I have no hopes or plans to own one, but dang, what a cool fish.

I still wasn't feeling great today, but I have chaeto and copepods coming this week, so I had to get the sump going. The downtube in my overflow didn't have a filter on it anymore, but when new it comes with a mechanical filter on it. So I took one of my fatter mech pads and gutted it and slid it down over the overflow inlet like so:

Not as polished-looking as the original, but it will do the job just as well.

Next up was to plumb up the downtube from the overflow. That didn't take very long, and seems to have worked out well. I can unscrew it from the downtube, which is nice, but a union would've been nicer. I'll redo it at some point once the list of things that HAVE TO GET DONE gets shorter. It's also only a single tube, and it looks like lots of people use more than one, so I'll figure out a solution for that later:

I spent a loooong time choosing pumps today from the big bin. The one I'd planned to use for the skimmer wouldn't work because I didn't have a good way to attach the 3/4" tubing to it. I tried a few things, and with a trip to the hardware store I could've come up with something, but in the end I just stole the pump from the Coralife skimmer. It has a solid attachment to its original skimmer, as did the one the octopus originally came with, but since that had snapped off before I bought it I decided to epoxy a 3/4" barbed fitting into it and just connect to it via hose:

Again, not super-polished, but more than functional. I had to get out the dremel and reduce some of it to fit nice and snug into the hole, and it took me a bit to find some safe epoxy to use, but it worked out well in the end.

Speaking of snug, I'm not sure that the original pump would've fit into the first chamber with the skimmer, and the Coralife one definitely wouldn't have, so it ended up being a good thing that I could use tubing -- the pump is behind the other side of the sump, and the hose loops around and back to connect to the barb. You can sort of see it in this shot:

It also took me a while to settle on what to use for a return pump. Right now I'm just using a Maxijet 1200, I'm looking for something better and preferably DC for the long haul.

That just left connecting the PVC I'd put together to the overflow box, and my plan worked out well in that case:

At the moment the sump is just filtering itself, I haven't connected it to the main tank yet. The bit that hangs over the side of the tank to return isn't quite long enough, and I wanted to give it all a 24-hour shakedown before running it in the main tank anyway. It's got 5 gallons from the main tank (from a water change that I also did earlier today), plus another 15 gallons of fresh water made with the reef crystals that I picked up at the store yesterday.

I guess it will take probably 4 or more days before I have proper foam in the skimmer, but so far it looks right:

My youngest called it "gross," so I'm definitely on the right track... I also added a heater to the refugium, although as you can see above, it's a wee bit too long :] I'll pull the shorter one from the main tank when I connect it all up.

So I'm going to let it continue to pump into itself overnight, and then during my lunch break tomorrow I'll see if I have the adapters/connectors I need to make the return hanger thingy (there must be a proper name for it) long enough to hang on the tank, and then I'll connect everything up. I'm very excited to see it all working.

Then, hopefully Tuesday, the chaeto and pods arrive. I've got a 6500k CFL bulb to hang over them, but I still need to pick up a clamping fixture to put it in and suspend over the refugium in the middle there. Those baffles start with mech filter, then there are some plastic bio balls, then a bunch of ceramic bio tubing bits (that hold the bio-balls in place, MAN do they like to pop out and float around) before it hits the refugium. I've got carbon in the canister right now, I'm not sure yet how I'm going to add that to the sump, I'll have to research that tonight.

This gives me another 20 gallons for more stability, and makes a good place to install an ATO to make water changes less frequent. I think I'm just going to build one with a float switch to kick on a pump in my RODI barrel.

Slowly getting there! Building the sump has been one of the most fun parts of this project so far. All of my plans for the skimmer seemed a little harebrained, so seeing it actually working was awesome.

 

[raketemensch]

I got some interesting work done this weekend -- the Cascade canister filter is out, and the 20g sump is all connected up and running. I also dropped some chaeto and pods into the refigium, but I don't really have a bioload yet due to the lack of... well, "life forms," so the chaeto won't grow and I'm not sure about the pods yet.

Sad little ball of chaeto, eh? Soon enough it'll have friends. I'm thinking I might want to switch the skimmer to the middle and the refugium to the left, before all of the filter materials?

I also did a 10-gallon water change, as my ammonia hasn't dropped for weeks now, despite the cycle being 4 weeks as of yesterday. Now I'm wondering if maybe I didn't keep the ammonia levels high enough early on to get the bacteria going? I was hoping the live rock would carry me through, but apparently not. I'm going to pick up some biospira locally tomorrow to get more bacteria going.

I also finally drained the RODI barrel, since I didn't have a tight lid on it for some of the time, and cleaned it all out, moved it across the basement to be closer to the tank, and connected the hose from the RODI to a tight hole in the lid.

I also ordered up a float valve for it to keep it from overflowing. It's nice to have it right there, especially since I ordered up the bits I need to connect it via pump as an ATO with a float switch in the return section of the sump, which is what empties out first via evaporation.

So that'll be nice to have, but the final step in automating the RODI has been a thorn in my side -- it drains into a laundry sink in the basement, which drains into a drain pump. The drain pump works great when you dump a lot of water into the sink, but when there's a slow trickle it fails to notice, and the sink will overflow. I've been getting by with a 3-hour timer on my watch, which sends me downstairs to manually trigger the thing.

Getting a new float valve for this pump is like $60, and there's no guarantee it won't just do the same thing. Then it hit me -- I could just mount a $20 piggyback float valve directly *in* the sink, and plug the drain pump into that! Those will be cheap enough to replace if need be, and it's a simple solution to a long-term, annoying problem.

At that point I'll be able to leave the RODI running into the barrel without worrying about it overflowing, and the RODI barrel running into the sump without worrying about it underflowing!

I also just ordered up a pair of Mars Aqua 165s and a Quiet One return pump, which arrives Tuesday and I can't wait.

 

[raketemensch]

The tank has restarted its cycle after I really didn't feed it enough ammonia at the beginning to really complete, so on Tuesday I checked and ammonia was at 4ppm, so I dumped in a bottle of Bio-spira to get things going again, and they're taking their sweet time. Again. Nitrites haven't gone down at all in the past 24 hours, so I'm back to the waiting game. Fortunately I have lots of other projects to keep me busy in the meantime.

The piggyback float valve works great. I'd rather not have to use it, as it's really hacky, but I would never be able to trust even a brand-new float valve in the sink drain pump, so this is how life goes now:

That red hose is the waste from my RODI. Cable ties, old vinyl trim and a $25 float valve solve a problem I've been facing for many months now.

I also got a float valve installed in my Brute barrel, which worked well once I remembered to put plumber's tape on the threads... Up to that point it leaked beautifully! But now, oh, the glory, I don't have to make 10 trips a day down to the basement to drain the sink while filling the RODI barrel. I'm happy about it, even if my apple watch isn't.

So that left one more daily chore to tackle, which was topping off the sump to deal with evaporation. I used an old plastic junction box in the basement to build a float switch in with a 12v relay like all of the youtube videos explain, which worked out really well, and fired up the pump in the RODI barrel, and turned off the pump perfectly once it was at the desired level.

It's at this moment, friends, that you need to think about siphons. Which I didn't. Fortunately I noticed it in time before the whole barrel pumped out and overflowed. After a few minutes of thought I moved the hose from the RODI barrel so that it goes into the HOB overflow, which is well above the water level in the barrel, so I'm good on that front, although I do need to come up with a better clamp/clip/something that I can truly trust to leave it there 24/7.

Please, friends, send some prayers/vibes/cash bribes to the nitrogen cycle gods so I can start doing something other than chemistry and plumbing experiments.

 

[raketemensch]

Siphons abound!

Like, when you move the hose for your ATO to your overflow box, and the float switch triggers the pump, it will fill the tank properly.

Then, when the ATO switch turns off, the pump will turn off, and if your ATO hose is still below the water level it will empty your tank into your ATO barrel!

...which will trigger your float switch, which will pump water back into your overflow until the tank is full!

Then it will switch off, and... Well, you get the idea. Repeat as unnecessary.

It took me far too long to figure out why the ATO was triggering constantly.

So, yesterday morning I took a 1' length of 1" PVC and cut some notches in one end, and sank it into my overflow box (with the notches on the bottom to let the water out). Then I hooked my ATO hose into the top of that, so that it would stay put, but also stay well above the water level in the overflow box itself, so as not to create any more dang siphons.

It's working beautifully now, plus it's really easy to just steal that hose to pump water out of the RODI barrel into anything else I need, like for water changes. It's like a gas pump hose, pretty handy.

I then completely emptied the RODI barrel, scrubbed it down with some bleach, then rinsed it a dozen times and let it refill overnight.

Today I:

1. Turned off the skimmer completely for a week (didn't realize that was a thing with bacteria additives, yes, I did this a week ago)
2. Filtered with carbon for the past week (carbon filtering is turned off now)
3. Pumped 15 gallons (20%) out of the tank
4. Carefully sifted about 15 dead snails out of the sand bed
5. Added 15 gallons of fresh RODI mixed saltwater, at the proper temp
6. Waited a couple of hours for everything to stabilize
7. Slowly poured a large (75 gallon size) bottle of BIO-Spira into the baffles in the sump, through the plastic bio balls and the ceramic rings

Ammonia has been hovering at around 4, which I'm assuming was coming from the dead snails. My fingers are now crossed that the bacteria will get a good foothold and start knocking it down.

In the meantime I've ordered some pure ammonia and a small bottle of bio-spira so I can do some experiments with proper fresh tank setup in the QT.

On the bright side, the ATO is working well!

 

[raketemensch]

Well, ammonia is down to .02 and falling, so I should have algae again soon, then I'll pick up a hermit and/or a cleaner shrimp to stay on top of that while things stabilize further.

My ATO from the RODI barrel is just barely pushing salinity downward, so today I picked up some acrylic and made a lid to cover most of the sump. I think the bulb above it is still bright enough to help the chaeto in the center of the sump.

I also extended the overflow drainpipe down to *just* above the waterline in the sump so that I'm not losing a ton of evaporating water from the gush. I'd like to think I can sort of "adjust" the evaporation to the point where the ATO keeps salinity at a stable level.

The pump is a 750gph, which seems about right for a 55g tank and 20g sump, but MAN that water was gushing out from the overflow, so I turned the pump down a little for the moment.

It took me forever to come up with a solution to adjust the 1" output on the Quiet One pump down to the 1/2" line that I currently have for the return -- I do realize that I should switch to a 1" return, but I need to do some research on that first, and dig up a thread I found a while ago where there was a nice "randomizer" attachment for the end of the return. That'll be a good project for Christmas week, I think. I'm fine with the plumbing, I just have to figure out how to transition to loc-line.

I am also completely done buying API test kits, and don't understand why they're even on the market anymore. Good lord, what a crapload of my time they have wasted.

Oh, and I'm getting a couple of Michael Lane's boards to control the Mars Aqua lights with a reef-pi for Christmas. I'd also pick up a ph module and a main board hat if they were in stock, but they're not at the moment. The lights will be a fun project in the meantime. I am setting up the pi itself this afternoon.

Well, apparently Loc-line is 1/2" NPT. Good to know.

 

[raketemensch]

Things have been fairly quiet over the holidays, as I continue to learn more about water chemistry and work on automation.

I've got the ATO working well now, and enough coverage for the moment to keep salinity at a very stable 1.026, which feels good.

Ammonia still has not dropped to 0. I did some testing, and alk is crazy high. In talking to a few people I realized a ridiculously stupid mistake -- sometimes you set things up early before you know better and make assumptions based on them. The RO unit I have is just RO -- no DI. I ordered a 6-stage kit from BRS last night, and it arrives Thursday. So it's been 2 months now, and I still have nothing alive in the water. That could be frustrating, but I had planned to spend a few months getting my chemistry and stability down, so I'm still on-plan.

I *do* have green algae again, a very thin film, which is heartening after seeing it all die off earlier. I've been doing weekly or bi-weekly water changes to get in practice at it and to try to get the water back in line, but I'm paused on that for now until the new RODI unit arrives, at which point I'm going to do at least 80%, if not higher a couple of times.

Meanwhile, I got a few boards for the reef-pi for Christmas, more stock arrived just in time to order for delivery on 12/14, and now it's wired up with 3 temp probes and a float switch, which will replace the really hacky one that I have working (very well) right now. I also picked up a couple of Mars Aqua controller boards (also built by @Michael Lane), but since there's nothing living in the tank right now I haven't gone down that road yet. I ordered some good wire to set that up this morning, and have the XLR plugs and JST plugs that I'll need for that.

Part of that will be working out a lid, especially since a few of the fish I want are jumpers. I love the idea of the mesh/screen lids, but I worry that they will allow too much evaporation and mess with my salinity. I like the idea of cutting my own acrylic lid, but apparently no matter how thick your acrylic is, they'll still bow, from what I've read. Bleh. I think I've worked out how I'm going to hang the lights, at least.

I've also been researching breeding RFAs, and am thinking about setting up a 14-16g nanocube to grow some. I'd like to have a smaller tank in the living room (the current tanks are in the basement and are out of sight unless I purposely go down there to hang out with them), as they're both pretty and pretty hardy. I've figured out how to route water from the RODI for an ATO to where I'd like to put a tank, and I've been keeping an eye on a couple of sites for a good deal.

It'd be easy to be frustrated at this point, but I'm honestly not. I'd like to get as many mistakes and lessons learned from them out of the way early as possible. I don't have a local mentor, so I'm just making this all up as I go based on what I can find online, and it turns out that reef-keeping is a lot like hiccup remedies -- there are a billion ideas, everyone has their own, and I have yet to find one thing that works.

 

[Michael Lane]

It sounds like things are moving along. It's tough to be patient, but it's so important with reef tanks. I'm looking forward to seeing your tank develop and mature.