What did you do to your tank today
- Thread starter myvwrock
- Start date
Well, after nearly two years of slow neglect(and I'm not talking about this thread), I decided last week I'm not having it any more.
Most of my chemicals, spare parts, fragging equipment, etc. has been residing in my garage in totes since I moved in May of 2015. When we moved, the wife graciously allowed me to takeover a closest as an equipment area. The closet adjoins the living room, so I cut a hole in the walls and stand, and ran my plumbing through there in the sump in the closet. The closet came with a single shelf and I've been making due with it, but because everything was such a hassle, I'd really lost interest. The only reason I kept the tank is because my one year old son loves watching it when I feed the tank. I've fought of dino, aiptasia, bubble algae, GHA, lost an Achilles tang due to a malfunctioning temp probe, and everything in between.
I've had it.
Last weekend I tore everything out of the closet and took it outside, then I disassembled all of my plumbing.
And then it began.
I cleaned every piece of equipment I had - everything in the DT had two years worth of moderate coralline growth on it. I scrubbed all the PVC out, cleaned my return pump, the check valve. Then I soaked and scrubbed the sump. Yup, I did a mighty fine job of breaking everything down.
Then the framing began. With just some 2x4s and some plywood I built three new shelves in the closet - each capable of holding at least 150 lbs (the bottom one way more). Then I consolidated and organized all of my totes. I threw away old Koralia powerheads that had rusted and bulging impeller assemblies, used plumbing assemblies I thought I might use again one day (unrealistically). I went from three overflowing totes to one tote of spare, useful equipment and one tote of fragging supplies. Then I neatly arranged the closet.
That was last weekend.
Today, though, I ordered an Aqualifter pump. Would any of you believe that after more than 6 years I'm still adding top off water manually? I also ordered new RODI filters since the ones I have are slowly creeping up to a steady 3 TDS and I seem to have a diatom bloom on the sand bed I can't get rid of.
Maybe tomorrow I'll do a water change and test the levels - I haven't tested in months.
But what did YOU do today?
Most of my chemicals, spare parts, fragging equipment, etc. has been residing in my garage in totes since I moved in May of 2015. When we moved, the wife graciously allowed me to takeover a closest as an equipment area. The closet adjoins the living room, so I cut a hole in the walls and stand, and ran my plumbing through there in the sump in the closet. The closet came with a single shelf and I've been making due with it, but because everything was such a hassle, I'd really lost interest. The only reason I kept the tank is because my one year old son loves watching it when I feed the tank. I've fought of dino, aiptasia, bubble algae, GHA, lost an Achilles tang due to a malfunctioning temp probe, and everything in between.
I've had it.
Last weekend I tore everything out of the closet and took it outside, then I disassembled all of my plumbing.
And then it began.
I cleaned every piece of equipment I had - everything in the DT had two years worth of moderate coralline growth on it. I scrubbed all the PVC out, cleaned my return pump, the check valve. Then I soaked and scrubbed the sump. Yup, I did a mighty fine job of breaking everything down.
Then the framing began. With just some 2x4s and some plywood I built three new shelves in the closet - each capable of holding at least 150 lbs (the bottom one way more). Then I consolidated and organized all of my totes. I threw away old Koralia powerheads that had rusted and bulging impeller assemblies, used plumbing assemblies I thought I might use again one day (unrealistically). I went from three overflowing totes to one tote of spare, useful equipment and one tote of fragging supplies. Then I neatly arranged the closet.
That was last weekend.
Today, though, I ordered an Aqualifter pump. Would any of you believe that after more than 6 years I'm still adding top off water manually? I also ordered new RODI filters since the ones I have are slowly creeping up to a steady 3 TDS and I seem to have a diatom bloom on the sand bed I can't get rid of.
Maybe tomorrow I'll do a water change and test the levels - I haven't tested in months.
But what did YOU do today?
Have the worst hair algae infestation ever. Called in Reeftechs.com to help me get a handle on it!
215 gallon system, 75 g refugium, 55 g sump! I am getting old, rather play golf so this was kind of embarrassing. David did a great job, with my help as assistant. Looks great, glad I decided to do something about my mess!
215 gallon system, 75 g refugium, 55 g sump! I am getting old, rather play golf so this was kind of embarrassing. David did a great job, with my help as assistant. Looks great, glad I decided to do something about my mess!
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I modified a joystick controller that I built for my black box LED back before I had an RKE, so that I can manually set the blue/white ratio independent of the reefkeeper ramp settings. I'm also building an ATO for my QT. I tried switching a little dc pump directly with a float switch but the current caused it to lock on, so right now I'm wiring in a relay.
Next in the queue:
* An automated brine shrimp hatchery/feeder based on this (http://www.saltwatersmarts.com/diy-target-feeder-mandarinfish-pipefish-2804/">http://www.saltwatersmarts.com/diy-target-feeder-mandarinfish-pipefish-2804/</a>) and other threads.
* modifying a PC4 module to drive four relays
* reverse engineer the RKE bus and try to build my own arduino 8 relay/switch port module.
Next in the queue:
* An automated brine shrimp hatchery/feeder based on this (http://www.saltwatersmarts.com/diy-target-feeder-mandarinfish-pipefish-2804/">http://www.saltwatersmarts.com/diy-target-feeder-mandarinfish-pipefish-2804/</a>) and other threads.
* modifying a PC4 module to drive four relays
* reverse engineer the RKE bus and try to build my own arduino 8 relay/switch port module.
(Nice resurrection of an old thread)
Busy weekend... upgraded sump and replumbed.
Today I added a Blue Flasher Wrasse... Female clown was all over it. Grabbed him by the tail and started shaking. He got away but haven't seen him in hours. Couldn't catch the clown for time out... but lights are off. Hope the wrasse found a good hiding place in the rock or sand.
Busy weekend... upgraded sump and replumbed.
Today I added a Blue Flasher Wrasse... Female clown was all over it. Grabbed him by the tail and started shaking. He got away but haven't seen him in hours. Couldn't catch the clown for time out... but lights are off. Hope the wrasse found a good hiding place in the rock or sand.
I replaced the mesh fir the three Sicce pumps on my skimmer, installed a Crossflow in the DT. Then I wrapped waterproof leds over the first chamber of a dual chamber Chaeto reactor I'm building.
Worked on a Tunze 6100 PH and installed a sump on my 40g Frag tank, removing the HOB filter that I was using.
I'm just using an old calcium reactor I was able to pickup from Mike Uffret. Thank you Mike! . I still need to wrap the second chamber and make a few adjustments. I may add larger input and output lines to increase flow.
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ill help keep it alive!
i swapped out GFO and carbon as well as made my yearly order of new T5 lamps
6x blue plus ; 2x Coral plus and 2x Actinic
i swapped out GFO and carbon as well as made my yearly order of new T5 lamps
6x blue plus ; 2x Coral plus and 2x Actinic Ugh. Thank goodness you found it.
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I built one of these and have been running it for several weeks. I filled it half way with chaeto when I started it up and it has shrunken down a lot, and all that seems to be growing is algae. I have the LEDs on for 13 hours/day in the offcycle from my main lights. Any thought on where I might be going wrong?.
Bcavalli;1109433 wrote: I'm just using an old calcium reactor I was able to pickup from Mike Uffret. Thank you Mike! . I still need to wrap the second chamber and make a few adjustments. I may add larger input and output lines to increase flow.
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