Ryujin (210gal) and Wee Wetboy (15gal) builds

[ScottF]

Hi. Recently the pump in my swimming pool died without me noticing at first and before I knew it my pool turned into a pond. When I installed the new pump in the pool, I found that there were a bunch of tadpoles swimming in it. I thought it would be fun to raise the tadpoles into frogs with my son. So we went and bought a 15gal AIO Fluval flex.

I had a reef before for several years, but tore it down after a stress event wiped out most of my fish. Having this small tank full of tadpoles turning into tree frogs put the itch in me to get back into reefing.

Thus was born "Wee Wetboy" and "Ryujin".

Wee Wetboy:
15gal Fluval Flex AIO
Red Sea Reef LED 50
Vortech MP10
100 Watt Hygger Pinpoint heater/controller
ReefBreeders ATO
CaribSea Special Grade Arag-Alive sand
Marco Rock Reef Saver


Ryujin:
210gal Red Sea Reefer MAX S-1000 G2+ Aquarium (264 gallon total water volume)
4 x ReefLED 160 and Mounting Arm
Reefer DC Skimmer 900
2 x ReefWave 45 Gyre Powerhead
2 x ReefRun 7000 Return Pump
ReefMat 1200 Automatic Filter Roller
2 x Vortech MP40
2 x Ecotech Battery Backup
BRS Dual Jumbo CO2 scrubber
Poseidon 200 Ozone Generator
Neptune Apex Pro A3 Controller
2 x EB832
3 x Dos QD
Neptune MXM module
Neptune Breakout box
Neptune Trident
Neptune TridentNP
2 x Neptune Auto feeder
Kessil A360x Refugium light
Toplids custom two piece Acrylic netcover
CarabSea Special Grade Arag-Alive
Marco Rock Reef Saver

 

[ScottF]

Wee Wetboy

The plan for Wee Wetboy is to put a single ORA Frostbite Clownfish along with some softies (I'm thinking Xenia and a Toadstool Leather) and eventually a BTA.

I put a mangrove propagule in the back corner. I'm hoping it will grow into a tree. I've always had a brown thumb when it comes to plants though.

 

[ScottF]

Ryujin

The plan for Ryujin is mixed reef. I plan on putting higher light/flow SPS on the left half and have the right half be more LPS friendly.

 

[ScottF]

Ryujin's underbelly

 

[ScottF]

I wired up these buttons to the breakout box on the Apex. Right now I have the green one configured for feed mode. I push it and the return pumps and powerheads turn off for 10 minutes, The Skimmer automatically turns off any time the return pumps turn off.

The blue one is a toggle button. It stays pushed until you push it again. I was going to use it for maintenance mode. Have everything shutoff while it's activated, but I'm afraid that one of the cats or kids would accidentally push it and kill my tank. Right now it just turns my lights off.

I also have the magnetic switches on the doors wired to the breakout box to automatically turn the sump lights on when I open a door.

 

[SaltyWalty]

Very cool build! Excited to see how it comes along! Love the backstory

 

[ScottF]

Mixing station. Two 200 gallon holding tanks. RO/DI on the right. Salt on the left. I think I need to redo the plumbing. When I built this I based it off of someones brute trashcan water changing station and they used 3/4" PVC. I ordered the same unions and bulkhead that they used and therefor also used 3/4" PVC.

I think I'm going to redo it though with 1 1/2" PVC. It works as is, but I feel like it would mix better if I actually made use of what the pump is capable of instead of forcing it through 3/4" PVC. It also feels kind of delicate when I'm opening and closing valves.

I also want to add a spigot that doesn't go through the hose reel so I don't have to flush all of the water from 100 feet of hose when I switch from salt to RO or vice-versa in order to fill a bucket or cup.

 

[ScottF]

I had switched the lighting schedule over from 5% moonlights for 12 hours to full on blue/whites the other day to play with the par meter and get a general idea of what I wanted to set my lights to. I just noticed a light orange dusting starting to cover all of the rocks tonight. Time to switch it back to just moonlights I guess.

 

[ScottF]

Actually it seems like the orangish-brown dusting is less this morning. I wonder if the 5 jars of galaxy pods or the diversity from the microbacter7 or AF Life Source is consuming it.

I think I'll hold off on switching to my "Moonage Daydream" light schedule and see where this goes. I can always kill the light if it starts to really get worse.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Following along!

 

[ScottF]

Tinkering with my flow again... It's hard to gauge anything in a tank without fish and corals. I am trying to create more of a flushing current than random chaos. I have setup basically a 4 hour cycle.

For four hours, the gyre on the top left and the MP40 on the bottom-right turn on at constant flow. The gyres currently set to 80% and the MP40 75%.

After 2 hours and 45 minutes the Gyre turns off for 15 minutes leaving only one of the MP40s on and the return pumps. I did this to allow anything floating on the surface to go down the overflow if it was being pushed to the side by a gyre.

Then 15 minutes later (3 hours into the schedule) the gyre turns back on at it's constant speed and the opposing gyre and MP40 turn on running random and reef crest for an hour. My idea here was to create points of turbulence that shift back and forth randomly as flow from the opposing pumps collide.

At the 4 hour mark it switches. The gyre on the top right now runs at constant 80% and the MP40 on the left runs at constant 75% with the opposing pumps off. After 2 hours and 45 minutes the gyre turns off for 15 minutes. Then it turns back on and the opposing pumps turn on with random intensities,

This continues in 4 hour cycles.

I will eventually probably add some MP40s or gyres to the back of the tank on the left side once I have SPS over there. Who knows if it will be good for my future inhabitants. I came up with this scheme after watching various videos from BRStv, Tidal Gardens and WWC. All of which are frustratingly unspecific when it comes to flow techniques.

 

[ScottF]

The light dusting on my rocks. I really just noticed it yesterday and I think it was worse last night.

 

[ScottF]

Lighting... My plan is for high light/flow SPS on the left hand side. This is my initial configuration. I was aiming for around 300-350 par at the top of the two left rock formations and around 150-200 at the top of the two right rock formations.

I currently have them set to ramp up from 9am to 10am. Run from 10am to 7pm. Ramp down from 7pm to 8pm. Then moon lights ramp up to 10% and back down between 8pm and 11pm.

The blues run at a constant rate for that whole window from 10am to 7pm. The whites match the blues until 4:45pm and then ramp to half of what they were running at from 5pm until 7pm. Then they start ramping down.

So starting from left to right.

Light 1: Ramps to 80% blue, 80% white. Whites ramp down to 40% in the evening.
Light 2: Ramps to 75% blue, 75% white. Whites ramp down to 38% in the evening.
Light 3: Ramps to 35% blue, 35% white. Whites ramp down to 18% in the evening.
Light 4: Ramps to 50% blue, 50% white. Whites ramp down to 25% in the evening.

Edit:
I based this on a WWC video on lighting. It's possible that I'm getting it completely wrong, but it seemed like they were saying to blast it with blue and white. Then back off of the white for a few hours.

 

[ScottF]

I need to figure out what to do with this monstrosity. Adding the CO2 scrubber took my pH from 7.55 to 8.0, but I don't really have room for it under my tank and it's slightly too big to put behind the tank.

I was thinking maybe make a shelf slightly above it to put my Tridents on. They take up a ton of space under the tank. Then make a upside down U shaped cover out of MDF that is sanded, routed and painted black to cover all of it.

I'd need to do something that would allow easy access to change media and reagents.

Edit:
I do have to say that all of the wet area in the Red Sea sump is great, but the dry area sure does feel crowded for a seven foot long tank. Especially with all of my dosing pumps and controllers.

 

[ScottF]

My control panel. I have a Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra that I don't use that often. I mounted it on the wall next to the tank and use it to control my Apex and Red Sea Reefbeat. I find the Reefbeat name to be appropriate because that app is pretty beat in my opinion.

If I need to use the tablet for something I can just pop it out of it's holder, but usually it just stays on the wall.

 

[ScottF]

I swapped out my Apex controller last night. What a pain in the butt! The wifi didn't work in my original Apex and I didn't want to do a permanent network drop to that side of the room. So I've had some cat6 strung over the doors to the room for the past couple of weeks.

I accidentally plugged the wrong EB832 into it which still had a Trident, TridentNP, Dos and MXM modules plugged into it. The Apex really doesn't like it when you plugin more than one module at a time. I ended up having to delete the modules that it detected (it only detected half of them) and then re-add them one at a time.

It's all good now. The new Apex controller is up and running. Everything seems to be programmed correctly. No more network cable strung over the door. I will probably need to re-calibrate all of my probes today.

 

[ScottF]

For my aquascape I watched the BRStv NSA and HNSA videos a few times and followed their method. I ordered a bunch of Marco Rock Reef Saver rocks. I broke them up with a hammer and heavy duty chisel. I used superglue and the BRS quick set spray to hold everything in place while I used Two Little Fishes epoxy to strengthen the bonds.

Then I used thinner superglue and the dust from breaking up the rock to cover the epoxy. This was the worst part in my opinion. Making more Marco dust. Someone should sell bags of the stuff. I would have paid a premium for it.

I don't have the most natural looking scape. I tried to make it flow from one piece to the next. Like if you squeezed them all together it would fit into one piece. Except for the demon skull.

I thought it would be fun to try to make a demon skull out of marco rock. Making caves for the fish in the eyes and mouth. I think it turned out pretty good for something made out of a bunch of pieces of rock glued together. It's more of a goofy skull then a sinister skull. I could have made it more menacing by shaping the eyes and mouth, but I wanted to leave as much room as posible for fish to swim through.

I hope there isn't too much negative space for the fish. I figure I can always add to it if needed. I'll try to fill in some of the open space with Monti Caps as well.

 

[ScottF]

Biodiversity... I am trying very hard to add "clean" biodiversity to the tanks. My last reef tank was pretty successful for several years before a power outage caused my Powder Blue to break out in ich and wipe out most of the fish.

I did however spend years slowly losing a war against majano. It turns out that AptasiaX is just majano fertilizer and once you are overrun, a filefish isn't going to help much.

This time around I started with dry rock and Special Grade Arag-Alive sand. No media from established tanks. I am trying hard to keep as much of the bad out as I can for as long as I can.

In an attempt to add diversity I have added the following:
Fritz Turbo Start
Microbacter7
AF Lifesource reefmud
Algaebarn Galaxy Pods
Algaebarn Clean Chaeto

I've also ordered a bag of Carabsea Ocean Direct live sand that I plan on putting in my fuge.

 

[ScottF]

My nutrients have bottomed out and my fish haven't arrived yet. I ordered some fish from marinecollectors two weeks ago and they say it takes two to six weeks to source and quarantine the fish before shipping.

I'm a little worried about the chaeto that I added. I probably added it too soon, but at the time I was reading a lot of nutrients from the ammonium chloride that I used to cycle the tank.

I've started adding a pinch of small New Life Spectrum marine fish pellets directly to the ball of chaeto. The chaeto itself is about soccer ball sized. I am considering adding some of the Dr Tim's ammonium chloride that I used to cycle the tank, but I'm concerned that I will dose too much and find out the fish are on the way. Hopefully it makes it.

The fish I ordered are..

For Ryujin:
Foxface Rabbitfish
Tomini Tang
Aiptasia-Eating Filefish
Midas Blenny

For Wee Wetboy:
ORA Frostbite Clownfish

 

[ScottF]

I just ordered a Melanurus Wrasse and a Flame Hawkfish for Ryujin from Marine Collectors. So in theory these should arrive a couple of weeks after the other fish.

I need to start slowly building out the snail/crab crew. Maybe a small package from some place like Liveaquaria.