Hey Vince! I figured that actually,.. don't you have "Big Smelly Fish" in your Signature on TRT or something? Or maybe you used to?
Yeah, I love the idea. It's going to really reduce stress on moving day, and coral stress in the move.
Whiskey
Whiskey's 300 Gallon Glass Cages Dream Reef. It only took 22 years!
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Yeah, I love the idea. It's going to really reduce stress on moving day, and coral stress in the move.
Whiskey
Wow! 50W? Or did you mean 500?
I'm hoping the new sump retains heat better actually. My current sump is totally open, thin glass, and that tank room tends to hang around 65 degrees. All year that heater is running, and the 400W doesn't keep up, the Apex flips the 300W on and off too.
I am dosing Kalk, and I have a CA reactor to make up for what the Kalk can't do. Right now I'm dosing about 5,000 ML per day, which is about a gallon and a quarter. It's not all my topoff water, but it is the majority of it.
Whiskey
The coral move day got pushed back because of damage caused by the cold weather. This will now happen next weekend. In the meantime I have some tester corals in the tub, I'm sure it's fine but never hurts to test it out.
Since I don't have a ton of pictures to share of the build, I figure I'd share a few from the current tank!
Whiskey
Since I don't have a ton of pictures to share of the build, I figure I'd share a few from the current tank!
Whiskey
sneekapeek
Active Member
It’s a 50w
Acrylic tank and sump with lids! Makes it little evaporation and retains major heat! Can’t wait to see the development of your build!
Wow!! That's so little heat! My 25G with a 10G sump has 250W of heat to keep up with winter nights. Well! I love efficiency! So hopefully I don't need a bunch more heat for the new setup.
Whiskey
Gumbies R Us
Certified Noob
Coral looks great!The coral move day got pushed back because of damage caused by the cold weather. This will now happen next weekend. In the meantime I have some tester corals in the tub, I'm sure it's fine but never hurts to test it out.
Since I don't have a ton of pictures to share of the build, I figure I'd share a few from the current tank!
Whiskey
I got a little bit of work done this weekend, I prefer to have a Canopy on my tanks so I don't look directly into the light when I'm viewing them. My house is a great room style layout, and the tank is in the living room. I bought this house for optimal tank viewing, and it sits in the center of everything, it's the first thing you see coming in the door, it's right next to the TV when you are sitting on the couch, you can see it looking in the wall of windows from the porch, and my desk points toward it from in the office. For that reason I like all the cabinetry to match the kitchen since they are on opposing walls.
Here is the start of the canopy buildout. This will need 8 shaker style doors to finish it out, 4 across the front, and 2 on each of the sides. The back will be a door style panel glue up because I don't own a car large enough to transport full sheets of plywood, so I build without it.
You can see the cabinets I'm replicating as well in that photo. The finished result will look something like this image from my current tank's canopy build, this was before door hardware was installed:
Whiskey
Here is the start of the canopy buildout. This will need 8 shaker style doors to finish it out, 4 across the front, and 2 on each of the sides. The back will be a door style panel glue up because I don't own a car large enough to transport full sheets of plywood, so I build without it.
You can see the cabinets I'm replicating as well in that photo. The finished result will look something like this image from my current tank's canopy build, this was before door hardware was installed:
Whiskey
I have an update!! This really was a ton of work, even if it doesn't look like it.
As I said earlier, the biggest piece of plywood I can put in my car is 48x30, with that I need to duck when I'm driving, if I go with 48x24 I can use the passthrough and it's more comfortable. So I needed to get a little creative with the back panel. I think I ended up with a nicer look in the end, and it's super light, I decided to glue it up like the worlds largest shaker style door.
This was a test fit with one panel, where you can see the routing that it drops into, and the counter routed styles for strength.
Comet inspecting my work:
This is the panel glue-up. Once again, the size is the biggest challenge here. This panel is bigger than any work table I have so my only choice was to use the hardwood floor. If you choose to copy my method I have two tips:
1. Make sure to get divorced first.
2. Wax paper is the best thing to use to protect the floor. The glue doesn't really stick to it.
Finally, and this step was finished only a few minutes ago,... I have the holes for light wires, pump wires, and the two fans routed out, the pocket holes drilled, and the glue attaching it to the main box is drying now.
Comet seems proud of me:
Whiskey
As I said earlier, the biggest piece of plywood I can put in my car is 48x30, with that I need to duck when I'm driving, if I go with 48x24 I can use the passthrough and it's more comfortable. So I needed to get a little creative with the back panel. I think I ended up with a nicer look in the end, and it's super light, I decided to glue it up like the worlds largest shaker style door.
This was a test fit with one panel, where you can see the routing that it drops into, and the counter routed styles for strength.
Comet inspecting my work:
This is the panel glue-up. Once again, the size is the biggest challenge here. This panel is bigger than any work table I have so my only choice was to use the hardwood floor. If you choose to copy my method I have two tips:
1. Make sure to get divorced first.
2. Wax paper is the best thing to use to protect the floor. The glue doesn't really stick to it.
Finally, and this step was finished only a few minutes ago,... I have the holes for light wires, pump wires, and the two fans routed out, the pocket holes drilled, and the glue attaching it to the main box is drying now.
Comet seems proud of me:
Whiskey
Well, one thing is for sure, I'm not cramming it back in there for the picture! Lol. I will need to get more for the stand though, so stick around and I'll snap a picture then.I was really hoping for pictures of how you crammed this into your car.
Whiskey
On the canopy project, I really, really want to be working on doors for it to see the big parts coming together. In reality though, what I really need is a box that I can set on the tank and hold the lights. So I'm doing the immensely boring task of plaining and doing the ruff sanding on the box so that I can get ready for the inner pieces that will be the supports, and the light hanger. Then I have a very troubling piece of crown trim. I have trouble finding the part, but it's critical for making it match my kitchen, so it's a little sketchy, but I'll make it on the table saw.
Now to the exciting news!! I went over to Hydrored's house and picked up all the corals out of the 300 to bring them back ahead of the actual tank move. We decided on this because it would mean that the corals would ride in a heated car, and that I'd have more time to focus on making the coral happy ahead of getting the actual tank in place and all the work that will be involved in that. I was super nervous about moving this many amazing pieces, something like this never goes exactly as planned, but overall I think this was the right choice because the temp was perfect for the whole drive. I did end up getting a damage to the tips of things from riding around in the cooler, but that's not bad at all. Thank you for all the help Hydrored!!!! And of course all the amazing coral! I will be back with pictures later, but it's a challenge with the Stock Tank and getting any quality shots.
Now to the thing I'm struggling with right now. When I added the stock tank to my system I got a tiny bit of tip burn in my main display on the coral in the highest light spot. I have that coral also in lower light and that one was perfectly fine. I tested nutrients and found that they had dropped way down, I attribute that to adding 100 extra gallons of brand new water to a 150 gallon ish system. I fed extra to get my nutrients back, the burn has stopped, and no further corals were affected.
Then when I added all the new coral I triggered a Dino Outbreak. I have seen this once before, when I added my frag tank to the system. It stuck around for a little while, then disappeared. I suspect that all of this is simply related to the fact that I keep messing with things, but I don't love the Dino, that is for sure. I really want to keep these beautiful new corals as healthy as possible of course. The Dino is concentrated in the Stock tank, and the Frag tank. The main tank is almost completely unaffected. It seems to love the egg crate.
Here's what I'm doing to correct the issue:
-Basting the slime off regularly, with a filter sock on the tank drain, changing that filter sock regularly.
-Raised the temp from 77ish where I normally run, to 80ish. I hear Dino hates that.
-I have my nutrients back in a better range. Phosphate is 0.08 and Nitrate is about 6. I would like that Phosphate to be a little higher actually, but I'm just going to let it come around on it's own with Reef Roids.
-Finally I'm trying to keep things as stable as possible. I know that messing with everything is what caused this, hopefully I can get it back in it's rhythm again pretty quickly.
If you have any other advice I would love to hear it!
Whiskey
Now to the exciting news!! I went over to Hydrored's house and picked up all the corals out of the 300 to bring them back ahead of the actual tank move. We decided on this because it would mean that the corals would ride in a heated car, and that I'd have more time to focus on making the coral happy ahead of getting the actual tank in place and all the work that will be involved in that. I was super nervous about moving this many amazing pieces, something like this never goes exactly as planned, but overall I think this was the right choice because the temp was perfect for the whole drive. I did end up getting a damage to the tips of things from riding around in the cooler, but that's not bad at all. Thank you for all the help Hydrored!!!! And of course all the amazing coral! I will be back with pictures later, but it's a challenge with the Stock Tank and getting any quality shots.
Now to the thing I'm struggling with right now. When I added the stock tank to my system I got a tiny bit of tip burn in my main display on the coral in the highest light spot. I have that coral also in lower light and that one was perfectly fine. I tested nutrients and found that they had dropped way down, I attribute that to adding 100 extra gallons of brand new water to a 150 gallon ish system. I fed extra to get my nutrients back, the burn has stopped, and no further corals were affected.
Then when I added all the new coral I triggered a Dino Outbreak. I have seen this once before, when I added my frag tank to the system. It stuck around for a little while, then disappeared. I suspect that all of this is simply related to the fact that I keep messing with things, but I don't love the Dino, that is for sure. I really want to keep these beautiful new corals as healthy as possible of course. The Dino is concentrated in the Stock tank, and the Frag tank. The main tank is almost completely unaffected. It seems to love the egg crate.
Here's what I'm doing to correct the issue:
-Basting the slime off regularly, with a filter sock on the tank drain, changing that filter sock regularly.
-Raised the temp from 77ish where I normally run, to 80ish. I hear Dino hates that.
-I have my nutrients back in a better range. Phosphate is 0.08 and Nitrate is about 6. I would like that Phosphate to be a little higher actually, but I'm just going to let it come around on it's own with Reef Roids.
-Finally I'm trying to keep things as stable as possible. I know that messing with everything is what caused this, hopefully I can get it back in it's rhythm again pretty quickly.
If you have any other advice I would love to hear it!
Whiskey
Oh, good call. I forgot to mention that part. I have a UV but it’s a tiny one. 20 watt I think? I’m using that with something around 80gph going through it so that at least some of them get killed. That is being dumped into activated carbon to help remove toxins.
the new system will retain this UV, but I really think it’s a better fit for my 20 gallon tank. I may consider a big 40 watt one at some point, but I need to pay back my savings a bit first.
Whiskey
blaxsun
10K Club member
I would probably invest in a larger one - possibly one of the dual 40 watts - as you'll want to run a higher volume through it (upwards of 1,000Gph). I have a 57-watt on my 200-gallon system that runs @650-750Gph.
Yeah, good call. I'd have to do the math on the kill rating of the models/wattages for the flow rate that I'm looking to run in order to figure out exactly what size I need. You're probably right about landing on something much larger than 40 watts.
Whiskey
Okay,.. let's be honest. I really should be working on my canopy, but I really love the corals, and I keep looking at them anyway, so I decided to snap some quick pics for everyone.
The Dino's are loosing ground which is great to see! The battle isn't won yet, but we are on a great path. Many of these corals are very hard to photograph because of the stock tank, overhead light, flow, etc,.. so there are many that were not seeing here, but these are some I could get pictures of.
I really love these Goni's!! Ignore the glass, I'm working hard on my canopy lol.
More to come. I think there is a limit on number per post.
Whiskey
The Dino's are loosing ground which is great to see! The battle isn't won yet, but we are on a great path. Many of these corals are very hard to photograph because of the stock tank, overhead light, flow, etc,.. so there are many that were not seeing here, but these are some I could get pictures of.
I really love these Goni's!! Ignore the glass, I'm working hard on my canopy lol.
More to come. I think there is a limit on number per post.
Whiskey
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