Durand tank build (1 Viewer)

[reef junkie]

Yea, I did similar reading. I think it sounded like 4 was the best bet for newbies. 3 dried faster, but in general 3/4 having the water consistency were best of edge gluing together etc.

Thanks so much for your offer. It definitely sounds like a little goes a LONG way. So for sure I'd be up for throwing you a few bucks and taking the leftovers when you're done. It sounds like the stuff needs to be sealed up super well or it goes bad anyway, so I was sort of reluctant to order a bottle, figuring 90% would go to waste. Let me know what your timing looks like!

Sounds good. I think im getting my cut acrylic tomorrow, I should have the adhesive mid week. So maybe by the following weekend. But I’ll update you as soon as I know when I’ll be done with it. I dont want anything for it. It’s all yours. I would eventually end up tossing it out for similar reason so glad It would go to good use.

 

[Varig]

Sounds fantastic. I'm working on building a cover for the AIO chamber out of black acrylic (sort of like the red sea tanks have to hide the sump stuff. I'm also working on building a DIY filter sock holder for my sump chamber, which I will then be installing a KLIR 4 filter roller into. It's going to be a bit of faffing about, but I'm super excited for the idea of the filter roller at least. We shall see. Always something else to spend cash on

 

[reef junkie]

Received my acrylic today and my Weldon. So I was able to empty the sump, fit my baffle and get it glued in. Waited about an hour and then filled it back up with new saltwater. So that counts as my water change for the week as well LOL. I also had a piece cut for my figi cube top off container. So now I have a shelf for my Hanna‘s.




I also grabbed these guys while at Reef co.



Last for sad news I need to remove my 3 stripped damsel. He is just to mean and now my school of chromis just hide in the back of the tank. I nominated my wife for that duty. and she thinks she’s a fish ninja so we will see how many new corals frags I end up with to give away

 

[reef junkie]

We are up and running. Got a half a bucket of cheto today from Ken (Thanks again!!!). I added back in my second pellet auto feeding just for earlier in the day and I’ll continue to add in 1 cube of mysis in the evening. See how that goes for a few days and check numbers.

 

[reef junkie]

Picked myself up a Hanna HR Nitrate checker yesterday. I was having a hard time reading the colors on ma Salifert test kit. Tested this morning and came up with .6 for a reading. Im not really sure what this means in terms of being o low or to high. Few google searches has me more confused. I feel like I shooting for 20-25 for nitrate‘s. Am I correctly reading that this is well below that. Im not suppose to convert this to PPM or some crazy other formula.

 

[Livestuff]

Am I correctly reading that this is well below that. Im not suppose to convert this to PPM or some crazy other formula.

This is reading at PPM so no conversion needed. Id say you could go up with your Nitrates some and I believe a 10 to 1 ( N03 to Phos) is the goal but what ever makes thing happy. Just don't do any quick changes. Glad things are coming around tank like good to me.

 

[reef junkie]

This is reading at PPM so no conversion needed. Id say you could go up with your Nitrates some and I believe a 10 to 1 ( N03 to Phos) is the goal but what ever makes thing happy. Just don't do any quick changes. Glad things are coming around tank like good to me.

Ok thanks. Glad Im reading it right. LOL.

Im chasing these numbers to see if I can find answers to a few things. Over the last 2-3 months I have lost 5-6 different new zoa frags with in a few days of putting in the tank. Ive tried them high and low and they just melt away. The ones I have in the tank seem to be fine and growing. Ive also added 2 chalices and in the first few days they have lots of die off before finally settling down and then a few months later take off. Id like to be able to fill in some dead spots with zoas but If I cant keep them alive I was thinking some cloves might be Something to try. I also have zero PE on any of my sps and acros except birdsnest and stylos. Plenty of growth, but no PE. I blamed the angel for this but if zoas are melting and no PE maybe im missing something.

 

[reef junkie]

Ive decided to slow my returun pump down a little to see if maybe this will allow a little more time for skimmer and Fuge to clean the water. Depending on the amount of restriction im getting on my return line i was around 20x turn over. Now im closer to 10x. I also increased my power heads to pick up some of the slack.

 

[reef junkie]

Phosphate still hovering around .22. I took one of the auto feeding times away to see if maybe it’s the pellets that are creating the increase phosphate. If that doesn’t show any decrease I plan to increase rowaphos this weekend since it will be time to change anyways. Only using 1/4 cup, figure I’ll increase to 1/2 and see what happens.

Nitrite have become undetectable since adding the fuge. Gonna do a Salifert test to see if I get any color changes. I’m sure they exist and the fuge is consuming. But I don’t think I want to be undetectable.

Was able to get a new backing out on yesterday morning. The mp10 I had on that side felt way more stable or felt like it had more grabbing power Tom the magnets. So hopefully that is all it needed.

I also this morning added some 1-1/4” flared locline nozzle ends and some locline check valves. Didn’t have good luck looking for 1/2” return lines check valves and these ones from locline seemed to be the path of least resistance. There was a horrible scream from the line after turning on for the first time. Hopefully that was a one time thing. 5am scream from the tank in the house usually scares my better half. Lol. I’ve not turned the return pump off yet to test. Figured I’d wait until this afternoon when the house is awake .

 

[reef junkie]

The locline check valves work great. Now now more splashing when return pump comes back on. So that’s pretty slick. The wide ends that I ordered also look and work much nicer for getting better ripples across the top of the water.

 

[reef junkie]

So I’ve been messing with my co2 scrubber for a few days. Playing with why im not seeing the big ph numbers like others have reported and why I keep getting moisture in the scrubber. Well today I decided to move the collection cup to about 8” lower than the lowest part in the co2 loop. After about 4 hours I was seeing all moisture collect in the cup and not in the scrubber finally. So since I decided I think my issue was the collection cup I was using to try and keep moisture out of the scrubber was just set to high I needed to move it and since I’m moving it I decided to upgrade the lines to something bigger. What a huge difference in bubbles on the skimmer. I have to keep turning it down because it keeps overflowing with bubbles. But now instead of 3/8” tubing I switched out the supplied air to the co2 scrubber with 1/2”. I left the 3/8 line that goes from scrubber back to skimmer for now. Hopefully the reason for the spiked po4 is a choked off skimmer .

Need to make some sort of screen on my fuge bagel to help keep the macro fro making its way over to the return. I was able to score a coral banded shrimp to add to the fuge today also. So now the sump will have some more life. If I can get it looking good I may even start to keep the doors off. Sort of like seeing all the equipment. Lol. I mean dang it cost enough might as well show it off right.

 

[reef junkie]

After a few days of only feeding one time a day with the auto feeder that has TDO pellets in it. And also feeding 2 times a day with PE Mysis my nitrates are as of this morning .2 Sand phosphates are at .12 Excited to see this. Going to give it another week and see what the numbers look like.

I also noticed that the Co2 scrubber does not have all the added moisture in the bottom of the reactor. So this is great news. Im a little nervous having my collection cup sitting on the bottom of the stand instead of hovering over the sump in case of an overflow, but my leak detector is right next to the collection cup and I set Apex up to turn off return pump and skimmer if any moisture is detected. Skimmer looks to be working much better on the larger line and dryer reactor, and my PH overnight didnt drop nearly as much ass it normally does. Not sure if this is from the Co2 or the macro settling in but either way it all seams to moving on the right direction.

 

[reef junkie]

Few things to share in my own person journal LOL

Cleaned out the Kalk stirrer yesterday and decided to try and 3rd brand of kalk powder. This one was recommended by avast. Big difference in ph boost. Was using brs at first but it didnt seem to want to mix well for long, then it tried Ms.wags. That worked ok but dropped off the charts fairly quickly. Now im trying ESV. Will report back with long term use And how it goes. But the PH boost has increases significantly. To the point I may need to back the co2 scrubber off a bit? Will see how it Goes for a few days before making any changes.

Ive been testing every few days since adding the Fuge and .13 is my most resent results for Po4 and Nitrates have been at 0 now. Not seeing much change in the corals so not sure if I need to do anything but I’d like to have a game plan if this tends to be the new trend. I think my options are maybe reduce the Fuge lighting but this might cause po4 to rise again or maybe I need to start dosing nitrates?? Any other suggestions??

 

[Varig]

Couple of things. First, really interesting if the different kalk powders result in different pH boosts. I’m not sure what chemically would be going on there, but interesting.

Regarding nitrate/phosphate:

1) Be really careful running nitrate at 0 for too long. Current wisdom (right or not I guess we don’t know), that seems to be one of the common threads for the beginning of a Dino outbreak.

2)I noticed my own tank that if nitrate gets low/0 then it is a limiter for chaeto growth and this a limiter for additional phosphate removal. When I started dosing nitrate to get it off 0, I noticed that my phosphate dropped more. I assumed that was the chaeto growing again because it had both nutrients, but I don’t have “proof.” Just my observation.

YMMV

 

[reef junkie]

Couple of things. First, really interesting if the different kalk powders result in different pH boosts. I’m not sure what chemically would be going on there, but interesting.

Regarding nitrate/phosphate:

1) Be really careful running nitrate at 0 for too long. Current wisdom (right or not I guess we don’t know), that seems to be one of the common threads for the beginning of a Dino outbreak.

2)I noticed my own tank that if nitrate gets low/0 then it is a limiter for chaeto growth and this a limiter for additional phosphate removal. When I started dosing nitrate to get it off 0, I noticed that my phosphate dropped more. I assumed that was the chaeto growing again because it had both nutrients, but I don’t have “proof.” Just my observation.

YMMV

I think the different kalk powder is actually dissolving like it’s suppose to. Where the other products would just sort of turning to mud. I tested alk this morning and it has not changed yet, but ph sure jumps up when dosed. Changed over about 6:30 last night.



If dosing nitrite is not the answer then what? I can try adding back in the second dose of pellets but seems to just make po4 so high. I can back the light schedule back a few hours and see if maybe that does anything. Any other ideas? 0 is defiantly not where i want to be. I like it when I was around 20 but not sure how to keep po4 down where its at now bit get nitrites back up???

 

[Varig]

Sorry if I was unclear. I would personally dose nitrates to get them up. As you stated, my guess is the pellet food will give you more phosphate than nitrate. I’m not sure if this is right, but I think more nitrate comes from more bio load (more ammonia from the fish = more nitrite = more nitrate). I’m guess some must also come from decaying frozen food, since letting shrimp rot is a method to cycle the tank.

So maybe either more frozen food or dose nitrates? Others with more experience than me will hopefully weigh in. This feels very much like blind leading the blind .

To your final point, dosing nitrate I guess is a sure fire way to raise nitrate without messing with your phosphate. And as I tried to say, I think if you dose nitrate you may actually help your phosphate problem, because the balance of those nutrients will allow your chaeto to grow better.

 

[reef junkie]

Think my plan will be to dial my fuge lighting period for 9hrs down to 6hrs of run time per night. I’ll add a little reefchili to my 1 cube a day and monitor for a few days.

I’ve also moved my dosing line further forward in the sump before it gets to the probe. I jumped from 8.2 yesterday to 8.4 today and my selanoid for the co2 scrubber keeps opening up after each dose of kalk. I was thinking of lowering the dose but alk is still at 8.4. Maybe a slower dosing pump might be needed. Dumping 70ml every hour might not be an option with this newer kalk powder? Oh so many questions. .

 

[Varig]

I don’t know for sure, but if reef chili is anything like reef roids, it’s like straight phosphate. I actually purposely feed the corals in my QT tank extra reef roids when the phosphates are low instead of dosing neophos. Perhaps part of your problem?

 

[reef junkie]

I don’t know for sure, but if reef chili is anything like reef roids, it’s like straight phosphate. I actually purposely feed the corals in my QT tank extra reef roids when the phosphates are low instead of dosing neophos. Perhaps part of your problem?

Ive not used it in awhile. Just looking for other option then dosing another additive. If I can find a food to increase no3 that would be my preferred.

 

[reef junkie]

Started dosing NeoNitro last night around 6pm. This morning I decided to test. Hanna still says zero. Salifert I do get some color and looking through the side at the color chart it looks to be around 10 On the high side of the chart. Not sure why Hanna shows zero If salifert definitely has some color.