Yoel's Red Sea Reefer P650

[TangoTang]

Hello, My name is Yoel

Im from Miami, FL & I've been in the hobby ever since 10 years old, I got my first saltwater tank when I was 16, a 35 gallon with a Marineland HOB & 4 T5's. I learned a lot with that tank and had it for about 2 years. I then was hit with ich over and over again and had not other choice but to take everything out and take that advantage and turn my freshwater 55 into saltwater. I really enjoyed that experience but didn't take me long before I got bit again by the reef bug and purchased a 100g with everything, as the guy that had it needed it gone. This is where this story starts, I had that tank for 3 years before I started to notice the front of the tank was bowing and was getting worse over time, I took the initiative and started looking for a new reef. It was a very painstakingly difficult process as I didn't want to lose my reef but knew it was the best choice not only for the livestock but for our pockets as the cleanup of such a mess is no joke.

Here we are now, A new reef! My first ever Red Sea!! I was in the market for a Red Sea Reefer 525XL but when I came across this tank I couldn't pass it up, the owner of the tank was the only owner and owned it for about 11 months, unfortunately he was selling it as he was losing interest and didn't have the time it deserved.

I filmed the whole process on my GoPro except the moving of the tank as this was very stressful!! I regret this now but im glad everything went very smoothly! (ill be posting these vids when I get around to get them out of my GoPro)

My goal for this thread is to maintain a journal of my reef as I really enjoy documenting my process and looking back at it all, and I can't think of a better place to post than such a great platform like this!

Hope you guys enjoy & feel free to chime in any ideas or anything really, all is very appreciated!

Yoel

 

[Ranjib]

Yay , congrats

 

[TangoTang]

This is the breakdown of the 100g

I began this breakdown at 8am and finished at around 1pm... this was very very stressful but was trying to stay positive!

 

[TangoTang]

I then had to head over the the tanks previous owner at 4pm finished up at around 10pm

The face of my father and I knowing what was to come haha

I must say the owners were very welcoming as I didn't feel comfortable making such a mess in someone else's home... they were very friendly and it honestly couldn't have gone better!

That was the condition in which I found the tank! beautiful reef tbh!


I will dig through my GoPro and the next post will be the time lapses of both breakdowns!!

Hope everyone is enjoying so far

 

[TangoTang]

Here they are!!

The Breakdown of my previous Reef

The Breakdown of the Red Sea in the previous owners home

Unfortunately like I mentioned before I didn't record the whole moving of the tank as I was stressed out of my mind!!! having both tanks taken down I feared the stand would be too tall to fit in the doorway as its place right next to our hallway but thankfully everything went very smoothly!

This is the placement of the corals and fragging of many colonies that didn't quite make the transfer

The last photo I took with my old Reef!

 

[SPR1968]

Beautiful Yoel, very nice indeed!

 

[TangoTang]

Beautiful Yoel, very nice indeed!

thank you ! hope you tag along

 

[TangoTang]

This is what the reef looks like.... I took this picture right now just so it can be the most updated photo so far.

I should also add that coral placement has changed a little as when adding things to the tank it was more about getting them in safely then placing and looking pretty that happen a couple days after.

This is the little switch that went on in the reef as far a coral placing goes

Let me better explain the photo above... I placed all of the euphyllia on the right hand side as I wanted a nice garden but later realized that there was WAY too much flow going into that side and although they were opening up, it wasn't the best for them. I also decided to move all of my acans and one favite on the bottom left to a bit more high flow since they tend to eat like crazy with their polyps out all day.
The big birdsnest's position bothered me since the moment I put it there but didn't want to keep on sticking my hands in the tank, took this opportunity to find it a nice new hole and I really like how things are looking now.

Here you can see the birdsnest in the middle, the acans and the favia on the right hand side, with the elegance as well and finally moved all the euphyllia over to the left side of the tank. the euphyllia seem a lot happier there. If you look closely you can see behind the massive hammer colony which came from the previous owner, that there are a gold hammer and a multicolor hammer, these I will be keeping there as it helps fill the back with the front hammer and they all just look happy!

Levels seem pretty ok now but ill be doing another post on equipment & Parameters

 

[TangoTang]

I know I should've put the equipment list in the beginning but didn't want to make the first post longer & just wanted to get the transition of the tanks out of the way first

So here is my equipment list & supplements that im using

Equipment:​

RETURN PUMP: JEBAO 15000

POWERHEAD: JEBAO RW-15

GYRE: MAXSPECT GYRE XF250

LIGHTING: 3 AI HYDRA & H80 FOR REFUGIUM

HEATER: AQUATOP 300W

CAMERA: WANSVIEW IP CAMERA 1080 K3

APEX:

• ENERGY BAR 4 & 8

• PM1 & PM2 MODULES

• HEAD DISPLAY

FILTRATION:

• 3 225 MICRON SOCKS

• REFUGIUM

• REEF OCTOPUS 200-INT & 110-INT

• ROWAPHOS IN MEDIA BAG

• CARBON IN FILTER CUP

Im trying to keep this build as simple as possible in order to avoid headaches and equipment problems ive had in the past. from my experience and I believe we all share this idea that the more you have the more can go wrong, I started with two 300 w heaters and figured just hooking one up to the apex and controlling it as so will be a lot easier and holy cow has it been! im at a steady 77 all the time! its awesome! I also must add that the tank did come with the apex energy bar 4 & 8, PM1 & PM2 modules as well as the display head unit. this is my first time owning an apex as before I used a wifi extension cord to control all of the outlets. All I can say is that will never have a tank without one from here on out!

 

[TangoTang]

As far as parameters go, the tank as been up for two weeks now & things are looking ok.

ALK: 7.8 TESTING WITH HANNA CHECKER

CAL: 460 API KIT

MAG: 1320 SALIFERT

N03: 10 SALIFERT

P04: 0.25 SALIFERT

PH: 8.1 PH PROBE

SG: 36PPT - 1.027 SALINITY PROBE & DOUBLE CHECK WITH REFRACTOMETER WEEKLY

 

[TangoTang]

My dosing schedule is pretty basic so far as I've been using red sea's ABC for over a year now and I've had good results, I do manually dose but im looking forward to getting things leveled out a hooking everything up to a doser

MAG: 23ml daily

ALK: 5ML daily

CAL: 3ml daily

Id like to ask my first question... ever since I began using the red sea's dosing methods I have dosed 1) Magnesium +10min 2) Alkalinity +10min 3) Calcium as this was stating in bold in the directions. I've never tried another method as its always worked for me but just curious to see if its all that important?

Thanks to anyone thats tagging along so far! feel free to ask about anything and chime in!

 

[TangoTang]

Id also like to add my livestock & feeding schedules:

1 BLUE TANG (LULU)

1 YELLOW TANG (BENJI)

1 FOXFACE (RANDY)

1 NASO TANG (TULA)

1 PAIR OF BANGAII'S (COCO & CUCA)

1 PAIR OF CLOWNS (LEILA & LASZLO)

1 LAWNMOWER BLENNY (RUFUS)

8 CHROMIS (TOO MANY TO NAME )

3 SANDSIFTING STARS (THESE MIGHT BE GETTING A NEW HOME AS THE TANK IS BAREBOTTOM & I FEEL BAD FOR THEM)

For feeding I prepare my own food as I find it highly entertaining and saves a lot of time and money in the long run.

Ignore the ice tray, that was a bit of some rode water I had laying around from another feed that I didnt like how it turned out
(as you can see I filmed this as well on the GoPro, if you'd like to see this time-lapse as well let me know)

pretty messy stuff!!!! but turned out great and the fish and corals seem to really enjoy it!

My feeding schedule goes as follows:

MORNING FEED: PREPARED FOOR & ADD ALGAE CLIP

AFTERNOON FEED: PROBIOTIX PELLETS FROM NEW LIFE SPECTRUM

NIGHT FEED: PREPARED FOOD

I like to have the food in the water column for about 10 minutes to let the refugium and everything take its part and them have the skimmers come on when its all done.

 

[HotRocks]

Nice work! Well put together build! I love the time lapse videos! So cool!

 

[TangoTang]

Nice work! Well put together build! I love the time lapse videos! So cool!

Thanks Kyle! Hope you tag along, can’t wait to document this journey

 

[TangoTang]

Here's a little update on the reef

Sorry I haven't posted anything, I've been messing around with dual skimmers and I've been trying to get them dialed together

I've also added a bit of carbon in a filter cup as the water has been getting pretty cloudy... My phosphates have gone up so I started to use rowaphos, it's been three days but no phosphate movement yet

I'm looking into phosphate rx, anyone have good results with it?

Here the cloudiness of the tank

Im pretty sure it's the phosphates creeping up as a week ago the reef looked like this

Tested this Sunday and results here are the results:
Alk: 7.8
Cal: 420
Mag: 1280!!!! Crazy low!!! Anyone might know why?
Nitrate: 5
Phosphate: 0.25 super high!

I'm really going to try to get my hands on phosphate rx this week

I also want to post a video on how the fish have gotten used to my hand during feeding! It's an awesome feeling!

I'll try to post photos & updates more frequently!!

Yoel

 

[TangoTang]

Here's an update!

I removed rowaphos from the sumo as it wasn't really doing anything for me

Purchased phosphate rx from VIP Reef, truly an awesome store with great people, also picked up some corals from them so I'll be posting photos of those and tomorrow I'll be picking up my first clam from them as well

I also took the smaller skimmer offline as I wanted to achieve the perfect mix one wet one dry but unfortunately I just ended up having both of the, skim dry on the top of the collection cup with no avail. Glad to say I was able to try it
Here's the 200 hard at work

Will do my first dose of phosphate rx tonight
I'll be underdosing a bit as its instructed 6 drops per 10 gallon, I'll be doing 3 drops per 10 gallon

I'll check in tomorrow morning on the results
These are tonight's results: 0.25ppm salifert

Also added some new Cheatomorphia to the sump as my older cheato eventually died off [emoji17]

I'll check back in to tomorrow morning to test phosphate and clarity of the water, sorry I couldn't post a picture of the cloudiness as the lights are turning off as I write this

It's Day 6 of cloudy water and I'm beginning to think it's a bacterial bloom

 

[TangoTang]

So this was on Thursday afternoon before dosing Phosphate Rx

This is Saturday morning, I let it sit for around 48 hours just to know it’s worked it’s magic!

It’s awesome and everything is still alive, I should add that the first dose of 3 drops/10 gallons did nothing... this is after following the instructions for 6 drops/10 gallons

 

[TangoTang]

Also switched out the 225 micron filter socks for the filter cups

Socks would clog in like three days and at least the cups can now be changed easily with some floss and things are good to go

Thanks to strictly fish for always having things in stock!!

 

[TangoTang]

Here are some tank shots since I’ve been posting about gear!

Left to right

 

[HollaAtChaReefBoy]

Nice work!!!! Red Sea Peninsula tank is an awesome tank. Got one myself. I just started a YouTube channel myself showcasing the P650. Check it out if you have time. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzlefafE-Tcd0RTbF85lxuQ