Enders Mid Life Crisis Build
- Thread starter enderg60
- Start date
Obviously it's the ex fitting.You know the one that needs a zip tie to keep the rubber hose on.
its been 3 months now, I think we're all due for an update.
Life has been kicking my ass lately. Between the drama of getting my pool permitted (HOA trouble from an HOA I dont even live in!), traveling, auto feeder issues, bully fish I cant catch and the fact my last round of fish in QT were all taken out by a combo of ich and flukes Ive just kind of been taking a step back and letting the tank run and try to stabilize the parameters.
Ill get a real update soon, but here are some bullet points.
- Reworked the flow nozzles in the frag tank to eliminate dead spots. Results, its low profile but I still have a poo pile.
- Autofeeder issues continue. First the smell annoyed my wife so I had to find a sealed container. Then the food I made clogged it up and made a nice big stinky mess.
- A-hole fish. My Melinarus wrasse and twin spot hog have become horrible. I watched the Melinarus dive bomb my diamond goby and kill it, and the hogfish is systematically killing off other wrasses and anthias and they are evading capture.
- Parameters. Im still tuning the Ca reactor, I got it keeping the alk stable but it was dosing too much calc and mag so I had to back off and turn the soda ask dosing back up. I also had to lower my Kalk drip since my evaporation went down. All this lead to a few swings that killed off some corals.
- Screen tops, the never ending project. The screen went totally brittle bring under the halides in under 3 months resulting in rips, and fish being able to jump through it and land on top.
- Messages
- 679
- Reaction score
- 279
That auto feeding is very tricky. Make them in a nice size cubes and drop them in as needed maybe the best option.
Your tank being a such large size, I knew you are going to have many hiccups and take forever for it to stabilize.
But didnt expect that your fishes are killing each other in a such a large tank. Big tank big problems. Sheese
Your tank being a such large size, I knew you are going to have many hiccups and take forever for it to stabilize.
But didnt expect that your fishes are killing each other in a such a large tank. Big tank big problems. Sheese
OMG...you are human after all...haha welcome to the suck
ALLLL right lets get this going again.
First up, changing the frag tank flow nozzles to eliminate detritus piles.
Here is what we started with. Some PVC and locline, the original plan was to have a nozzle above and below the frag racks. Unfortunately no matter how I positioned them I had multiple piles of crap.
So I started playing with fittings and ended up realizing just shoving a 90 in the hole was doing nearly as good as the whole contraption of fittings. But one 90 didnt have a wide enough sweep to really work. So I got some weird PCV fittings and started to play around.
This was working better, but still not quite doing the job. So whats a guy to do? Break out the heat gun and melt stuff!
How it started.
After a treatment.
Trimmed down and testing.
Alternate attempt. Wide sweep nozzle....using a coaster....
Not bad...
Testing.
So the wide sweep and dual bent nozzles performed wonderfully....BUT....I was still getting multiple piles. I just couldnt point water in enough directions to fully eliminate the crap piles. So what do I do now. COMBINE IDEAS! I took the dual bent nozzles and stretched them out. This worked out great and all I was missing was a little up kick to throw water/poo to the overflow. So more heat gun!
So we start with this contraption and we need to stretch and trim it down.
And we heat and mush..
And we remember watching glass blowing videos at 2am and use some tongs to help shape the hot stuff.
And a before and after.
Low profile nozzles installed and working.
Now I only have one pile of crap in the corner to suck out when I feel like it, and I can put racks over the nozzles!
So now I need to make some extra nozzles to swap in while cleaning, and I want to make a few for the closed loop in the display.....One day.
First up, changing the frag tank flow nozzles to eliminate detritus piles.
Here is what we started with. Some PVC and locline, the original plan was to have a nozzle above and below the frag racks. Unfortunately no matter how I positioned them I had multiple piles of crap.
So I started playing with fittings and ended up realizing just shoving a 90 in the hole was doing nearly as good as the whole contraption of fittings. But one 90 didnt have a wide enough sweep to really work. So I got some weird PCV fittings and started to play around.
This was working better, but still not quite doing the job. So whats a guy to do? Break out the heat gun and melt stuff!
How it started.
After a treatment.
Trimmed down and testing.
Alternate attempt. Wide sweep nozzle....using a coaster....
Not bad...
Testing.
So the wide sweep and dual bent nozzles performed wonderfully....BUT....I was still getting multiple piles. I just couldnt point water in enough directions to fully eliminate the crap piles. So what do I do now. COMBINE IDEAS! I took the dual bent nozzles and stretched them out. This worked out great and all I was missing was a little up kick to throw water/poo to the overflow. So more heat gun!
So we start with this contraption and we need to stretch and trim it down.
And we heat and mush..
And we remember watching glass blowing videos at 2am and use some tongs to help shape the hot stuff.
And a before and after.
Low profile nozzles installed and working.
Now I only have one pile of crap in the corner to suck out when I feel like it, and I can put racks over the nozzles!
So now I need to make some extra nozzles to swap in while cleaning, and I want to make a few for the closed loop in the display.....One day.
Next up, Screen tops.
The screen I used was the 1/8" hole stuff off BRS. Worked good, and fish didnt fit through it like the 1/4" screen. Well it worked good for a few months. Then the halides got to them. After about 3-4 months the screen started to get brittle. About 6 months later as I was "just getting around to" changing the screen out this happened.
So me, now angry, went looking for UV resistant screen. I couldnt find anything in 1/8" but I did find stuff with smaller holes. Cool, ordered and installed.
So I put them back on the tank and realized that pellet food no longer fit through the screen.
So I ordered a random $20 3d printed feed door thing and called it a day.
And if youre wondering how something 3d printed did under the halides...not well. Not well at all. The screen door part melted and curled up. It still holds in the fish buuuut yeah..... Ill have to redo the feed hole with something more heat resistant.
Next issue, The auto feeder. I shut the system down because the wife was complaining about the smell after 2 days. Go figure....
So I did two things. I got sealed containers rather than open beakers that should keep the smell in better. I also researched a bit and found that lowering the PH of the water with citric acid will greatly reduce bacterial growth, AKA a reef safe presrvative! I started adding about 1/16 tsp to 500ml of food water and along with the sealed containers I was able to keep food viable for 4 days. It may go longer but thats how long the food lasted at current dosing rates. I was starting testing phase two when a problem appeared.
The DIY food I made simply does not like my auto feeder. It clogged, popped a tube off inside the doser and back siphoned water into the feeder.....and into the fridge...and onto the floor.
That was a wonderful mess to clean up!
So autofeeding is back down again until I can makeup some feeder friendly food which will be all very small stuff. I hope to have it running again in a few months.
The screen I used was the 1/8" hole stuff off BRS. Worked good, and fish didnt fit through it like the 1/4" screen. Well it worked good for a few months. Then the halides got to them. After about 3-4 months the screen started to get brittle. About 6 months later as I was "just getting around to" changing the screen out this happened.
So me, now angry, went looking for UV resistant screen. I couldnt find anything in 1/8" but I did find stuff with smaller holes. Cool, ordered and installed.
So I put them back on the tank and realized that pellet food no longer fit through the screen.
So I ordered a random $20 3d printed feed door thing and called it a day.
And if youre wondering how something 3d printed did under the halides...not well. Not well at all. The screen door part melted and curled up. It still holds in the fish buuuut yeah..... Ill have to redo the feed hole with something more heat resistant.
Next issue, The auto feeder. I shut the system down because the wife was complaining about the smell after 2 days. Go figure....
So I did two things. I got sealed containers rather than open beakers that should keep the smell in better. I also researched a bit and found that lowering the PH of the water with citric acid will greatly reduce bacterial growth, AKA a reef safe presrvative! I started adding about 1/16 tsp to 500ml of food water and along with the sealed containers I was able to keep food viable for 4 days. It may go longer but thats how long the food lasted at current dosing rates. I was starting testing phase two when a problem appeared.
The DIY food I made simply does not like my auto feeder. It clogged, popped a tube off inside the doser and back siphoned water into the feeder.....and into the fridge...and onto the floor.
That was a wonderful mess to clean up!
So autofeeding is back down again until I can makeup some feeder friendly food which will be all very small stuff. I hope to have it running again in a few months.
Next up, Leak sensors. I wanted some leak sensors in the HVAC closet and one under the sink near the RO. So since I had to put an FMM there anyway I decided to put a solenoid to control the RO in there because why not....
Mounted Solenoid and bypass valve.
Leak sensor in place (and yes Ive changed filters since then)
And Mr FMM all wired up.
Now I finally have all the FMMs and leak sensors in place, I just need to program them....yeah Ill get to that...soon.
Mounted Solenoid and bypass valve.
Leak sensor in place (and yes Ive changed filters since then)
And Mr FMM all wired up.
Now I finally have all the FMMs and leak sensors in place, I just need to program them....yeah Ill get to that...soon.
Enough of that, here are some current (7 weeks ago) Pics of the good stuff. I have since moved a lot of coral to the display, and you know killed some....
The frag tank is nearly full....Guess its time to sell some stuff....
Yeah I have way to many plates, PM me if you want one on the cheap.
The frag tank is nearly full....Guess its time to sell some stuff....
Yeah I have way to many plates, PM me if you want one on the cheap.
Display shots!
Eggs! They are now laying them like clockwork.
Muh bush rock.
These guys are growing good! Also the chalk bass...also getting big fast.
Frags growing slowly in this area.
Something interesting is coming to this area soon.
The hammer hedges before the incident.
So yeah that was 6ish weeks ago. Since these pics I had some ups and downs getting the calcium reactor setup, lost a decent amount of LPS and Im not sure of the cause. And then of course I went on vacation.
Things were good at first. Then the LEDs decided they wanted to not connect to the wifi and were off for a day, and some odd flow change was noticed but waved off.
Then some STN started
and the hammer hedge blew up
Then while drunk on the beach I got these pictures. Fuuuuuuu
Damage control was done and thankfully that was about the extent of the damage from beach vacation 2024.
When I got home I realized what happened.
In one of my many hidden nozzles a snail and ventured inside while the closed loop was off. Lucky for me he just barely fit in there so when the pump turned on he got wedged, which redirected the flow. Now this wasnt so bad until, wouldnt you know it another snail went into another nozzle and did just exactly the same thing! The resulting change in flow blew sand all over that section of the tank for a few days.
Luckily the frag tang has spares for just this occasion, but still. UGGGG.
Now Im off to deal with a dead pump controller and some new finicky eaters.
Eggs! They are now laying them like clockwork.
Muh bush rock.
These guys are growing good! Also the chalk bass...also getting big fast.
Frags growing slowly in this area.
Something interesting is coming to this area soon.
The hammer hedges before the incident.
So yeah that was 6ish weeks ago. Since these pics I had some ups and downs getting the calcium reactor setup, lost a decent amount of LPS and Im not sure of the cause. And then of course I went on vacation.
Things were good at first. Then the LEDs decided they wanted to not connect to the wifi and were off for a day, and some odd flow change was noticed but waved off.
Then some STN started
and the hammer hedge blew up
Then while drunk on the beach I got these pictures. Fuuuuuuu
Damage control was done and thankfully that was about the extent of the damage from beach vacation 2024.
When I got home I realized what happened.
In one of my many hidden nozzles a snail and ventured inside while the closed loop was off. Lucky for me he just barely fit in there so when the pump turned on he got wedged, which redirected the flow. Now this wasnt so bad until, wouldnt you know it another snail went into another nozzle and did just exactly the same thing! The resulting change in flow blew sand all over that section of the tank for a few days.
Luckily the frag tang has spares for just this occasion, but still. UGGGG.
Now Im off to deal with a dead pump controller and some new finicky eaters.
- Messages
- 679
- Reaction score
- 279
Man, that’s a horrible thing to experience while on a vacation. Hope you get things back on track,
I wonder if you can somehow have liquid feeder on top of your tank and somehow just drop onto the tank when it exits the refrigerator. Using a one way valve?
I bet there are stronger 3D plastic for your application. But that’s good to know.
I wonder if you can somehow have liquid feeder on top of your tank and somehow just drop onto the tank when it exits the refrigerator. Using a one way valve?
I bet there are stronger 3D plastic for your application. But that’s good to know.
Something like that is bound to happen when you're not around.
Honestly the auto feeder works fine, I just tried to make it pump not so small stringy bits of octopus and it didn't like it. I just have to make up a new batch that will work better. Trial and error. Smelly errors.
And yes having the fridge right above the tank is ideal. But mines in the basement so I get extra steps for projects.
I will get it going soon because I have acquired the very critters I wanted the autofeeder for.
Oh and I found another snail in the nozzle again
Honestly the auto feeder works fine, I just tried to make it pump not so small stringy bits of octopus and it didn't like it. I just have to make up a new batch that will work better. Trial and error. Smelly errors.
And yes having the fridge right above the tank is ideal. But mines in the basement so I get extra steps for projects.
I will get it going soon because I have acquired the very critters I wanted the autofeeder for.
Oh and I found another snail in the nozzle again
Nemo's just got three more in, if you need more for the pack... I was tempted to get them, but I bought the baby goldback instead.
They are pretty neat. I got 8 figuring I'd end up with 4. So far only one has a swim bladder infection but the rest are all eating good.
On a side note I figured out why my Frag saw wasnt cutting well.
Let the fragging begin!
On a side note I figured out why my Frag saw wasnt cutting well.
Let the fragging begin!
