Outdrsyguy's 940 gallon DT Build

[outdrsyguy1]

So I've had this magnet I glued to some rock rubble for close to twenty years now. Crazy that I just today actually sat and thought about its species.

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Of course, realization came like a bat to the face as I started qt on a new fish lol.

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[outdrsyguy1]

Well I'm officially back in the acro game. Scared of pests but excited none the less!
Got a bunch of sweet frags from Atlorange!
Here they are in the qt.
Really excited about growing out some of these awesome frags. Got some of my longtime favorites!

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[outdrsyguy1]

Cipps don't do them justice. Need to learn my dslr!

 

[atlorange]

I hope the do well for you. If you need replacements of anything let me know.

 

[outdrsyguy1]

Well, spent 2 hours vacuuming cyano off the rocks. Only got about 2/3 of the tank done. Joys of a large tank! Rock looks great for now though. Tanks still cloudy though.
Gotta love new tank uglies!

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Close up

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[tcampbell23]

Would love to come check this out in person. I'm amazed at the sheer size of this thing. Great build so far!


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[outdrsyguy1]

I'll try to have a little open house sometime when I get closer to completion. Still have to get my alternating flow system finished, cabinets above and below, lighting for the back half of the tank (in hand, just not assembled), and the grand finale of the reef backdrop that's back lit for effect!
Probable is I stay so busy quarantining fish constantly and maintaining the tank that I don't make much progress!

 

[outdrsyguy1]

Here's a shot from the long direction I thought I'd share.

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[outdrsyguy1]

So I spent a bunch of time working on piping last weekend. Never thought this old couch would get yet another crazy memory attached to it but here it is lol. This is the flow that feeds from the right side of the tank.

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You can see the header, cross bar, and flex pvc to fit and reduce vibration.

Also figured out how to test the actuators and mount them. They seem to work well. Just need to secure them so they don't spin when I'm not holding them hehe. Saved about $700 between the two of them so I'm pretty happy about that.

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The problem I noticed was that the left side and right side have different head loss and since they run back to the sump it gives me trouble with the bean animal overflow. Since it's tuned for a specific flow it either starts sucking air or it doesn't siphon quite as fast and the level in the tank rises 1/4" and sucks 20 gallons out of my sump level. This makes the bean animal discharge into the sump a splashy noisy entry. Never occurred to me this might be a problem. I'll have to brainstorm on how to solve it. Maybe I'll lower the emergency line to make it operate like a second open channel. Or tweak the valve stroke so they both have similar head loss characteristics per side.

Tank is almost 6 months old and did a full test work up tonight which took FOREVER!
Alk 8.6 Hanna checker
Calc 410 Red Sea
Magnesium 1320 Red Sea.
Phosphate 0 Hanna ULR checker
Nitrates 0 both API and Red Sea low range.
Salinity 1.0255

I'll probably try to start feeding more to get some nutrients in the system. Some corals are having a hard time.

3 yellow diamond sand sifting gobies are cleaning greatly but it's a pretty continual sand storm between them and the flow.
2 paired off and it's fun to watch them build their home.

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Just left the valves in each side in mostly open position. Interestingly there's actually less flow in the tank since the penductors aren't being pushed hard.

The other thing I dodnt think about is that the water in the closed supply side will be stagnant. So if I'm switching flows every 10 minutes then I have stagnant water in one line for 10 minutes until the switchover. Another issue to solve at some point. Probably set the valves to stay a hair cracked instead of fully closing.

 

[outdrsyguy1]

Update shot while I'm sitting here!

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[bcavalli]

What an amazing tank. I cant wait for it to filled with huge SPS colonies!

 

[nolan71416]

Wow. What else can you say. Very nice looking tank and setup. Who needs a t.v. with a tank like that.


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[carey1465]

All I can say is I'm jealous. Lol


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[outdrsyguy1]

I decided to try the spectracide stump removed to add nutrients to my tank for now. The acros I've gotten are paling and not doing well (reduced pe and general unhappiness). My nitrate and phosphate always read dead zero even though I've been trying to feed a lot more lately. I think the new tank with dry rock start takes a while to load up on nutrients.
I prepared 1 gallon ro/di with 225g (3/4 cup) stump removed and dosed 100ml last night. Nitrates went from zero to .7ppm on the Red Sea pro low range test kit. I'll check it again tonight before I dose. Took some preliminary pics to try and track any changes. These are all iPhone pics with only white leds (blues off). My digis are doing okay but growth rate seems slow. Some looked a little better when I was feeding more but still slow growth imo.

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[a4goulet]

Rusty, I added spectracide to my tank about a month ago because my RS pro test kit was also showing me zero. I could see a response within a few days once I brought NO3 up to 1-3ppm. What's your P04 running at? And I'm excited to see the after pics!

 

[outdrsyguy1]

Po4 is dead zero on both Elos test kit and my Hanna ULR phosphorous tester. I've definitely got my fingers crossed.
I've also been living with a pretty big cyano outbreak but I'm chalking it up to new tank syndrome and if it doesn't clear up in a few months I'll go the chemiclean route to try and stamp it out.

 

[xilez]

outdrsyguy1;1112525 wrote: Po4 is dead zero on both Elos test kit and my Hanna ULR phosphorous tester. I've definitely got my fingers crossed.
I've also been living with a pretty big cyano outbreak but I'm chalking it up to new tank syndrome and if it doesn't clear up in a few months I'll go the chemiclean route to try and stamp it out.

The presence of cyano would indicate that NO3 and PO4 is present above zero levels wouldn't it? It's possible the cyano is sucking up the nutrients from the water column which is giving you a 0 PO4 reading..

are you dosing anything?

 

[outdrsyguy1]

I'm not an expert on cyano, it's always come and gone for me. maybe it's sucking up all the nutrients before the corals can get much. can't get much worse anyways so might as well see what happens imo. Corals need something and everything else seems in line.
8.0 dkh, 420 calc, 1350 mag, 8.35 ph, good amount of flow and light, 78.4 F...

 

[outdrsyguy1]

So tonight before dosing no3 was dead on .25 so I lost about .5 ppm no3 in a day. Went ahead and dosed the full 100 ml tonight. We'll see what changes.

 

[Adam]

Hey Rusty. What are you doing to get your Ph where it is? My system is in my basement as well with less people in the household. I'm running outside air to my skimmer and have and exhaust fan running in the fish room 24/7. I struggle to the the Ph above to 8.1 with a range of 8.02-8.11.

Here are my params: 9.75dkh, 426 Cal, 1440 Mag.
I'm running 2part and dripping Kalk. 2part dose was at 110ml/day just lowered to 66ml to get the Alk a little lower. The Kalk is dripping very close to a gallon a day. It's mixed with 50ml of vinegar and 2.5 teaspoons of Kalk per gallon and has only been running 9 days now.