Looking good David!
Grigor's 75g Soft Coral Dominate Tank Build (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter David Grigor
- Start date
Looks like it is coming along nicely. I wish I could remember who I purchased that tank from. I have had it for years always meant to do something with it, but never did. It sat up in that mezzanine for 11 years lol.
Good to see it finally full of water. My own weekend project is finally wrapping up. the shed looks a lot better than the mess you saw
.
Good to see it finally full of water. My own weekend project is finally wrapping up. the shed looks a lot better than the mess you saw
.
OP
OP
Larger Corals Added.
Lost some time today, had to rewire the LEDs. I had too many on the ballasts luckily I had an extra that I didn't even remember I had. So each color is now on it's own channel ( 14 4.5K whites, 14 blues, 14 U/V ). Still hooked up to pots and not controlled by the Apex yet. What to borrow the PAR meter from SWE soon and get some readings. I want at least 75 PAR at the bottom. If not I'll add some more LEDs.
Need to rebuild the return pump manifold, the tubing is pinched a bit too tight and pump not sitting flat on the bottom causing some vibration noise.
Tank is still a bit cloudy. Substrate is 40lb bag of the Seaflor special. I need more, likely will just reuse some crushed coral that I already have but will pick out the larger shells and chunks before adding it.
The larger softies have been moved, probably will take a few days for them to fully expand. May not be the final resting place will continue to tweak. Still a number of misc. zoanthids, mushrooms, etc. to fill in with. No fish yet. Need to add covers for the overflow and screen on the back side of canopy so fish can't jump out the back. Plan is to move some fish tomorrow and add some more of the smaller misc. corals.
Haven't added the powerheads yet right now just the return pump only. Will have one on each side near the overflows,
Only a couple places where the rods show and will touch that up tomorrow as well.
So without further ado........
Full tank shot,
From left angle:
From right angle:
From the ends so you can see that it's pretty open and plenty of swimming room and for flow.
Left End Shot:
Right End Shot:
PS: The pics look bluer than it really is.
Lost some time today, had to rewire the LEDs. I had too many on the ballasts luckily I had an extra that I didn't even remember I had. So each color is now on it's own channel ( 14 4.5K whites, 14 blues, 14 U/V ). Still hooked up to pots and not controlled by the Apex yet. What to borrow the PAR meter from SWE soon and get some readings. I want at least 75 PAR at the bottom. If not I'll add some more LEDs.
Need to rebuild the return pump manifold, the tubing is pinched a bit too tight and pump not sitting flat on the bottom causing some vibration noise.
Tank is still a bit cloudy. Substrate is 40lb bag of the Seaflor special. I need more, likely will just reuse some crushed coral that I already have but will pick out the larger shells and chunks before adding it.
The larger softies have been moved, probably will take a few days for them to fully expand. May not be the final resting place will continue to tweak. Still a number of misc. zoanthids, mushrooms, etc. to fill in with. No fish yet. Need to add covers for the overflow and screen on the back side of canopy so fish can't jump out the back. Plan is to move some fish tomorrow and add some more of the smaller misc. corals.
Haven't added the powerheads yet right now just the return pump only. Will have one on each side near the overflows,
Only a couple places where the rods show and will touch that up tomorrow as well.
So without further ado........
Full tank shot,
From left angle:
From right angle:
From the ends so you can see that it's pretty open and plenty of swimming room and for flow.
Left End Shot:
Right End Shot:
PS: The pics look bluer than it really is.
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I like the rock work. Acrylic rods?
OP
OP
Each of the 3 tiers are acrylic bases to keep stable and so can make off balance structure. I only use acrylic rods just for the first rock so I can glue the rod to the acrylic base. I don't like to use acrylic rods for the upper rocks because they do flex the longer/taller you go. For a 75g tank it probably wouldn't matter much but I just use the orange fiberclass driveway markers as they are more rigid than acrylic rods plus readily available.
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Very cool. I really need to redo my rock work. Thinking it will be a really big mess and difficult project at this point.
OP
OP
Ideally, best to do it with the tank empty so you don't get your armpits wet all the time and have to deal with cloudy water but I've done plenty of aquascape retrofit. Best to just work on 1 section at a time instead of trying to tackle it all at once. Let it settle, tweak then move on to other areas. Can easily do a section in a couple hours time and not be too messy.
LOL... I have a 180 also so I completely appreciate the wet armpits comment.
OP
OP
Fish Added
Powerheads are in, I located them under the overflows and when looking at the tank from the front are hidden by the aquascape.
I added 2 LPS for now, Frogspawn and a red goniopora frag. Goniopora is to see if it likes the lower flow. As I get more leathers I'll remove the frogspawn.
Used the fish trap in the 180g and caught all but 1 that I intend to start with in the 75g. Catching the fish are easy, the hard part is waiting until the fish you DON'T want to catch are out of the trap.
Fish are, 1 yellow tang, 1 Exquisite African Wrasse, 2 Kupang Damsels, 1 Bangaii Cardinal ( 1 Bangaii left to catch ).
Powerheads are in, I located them under the overflows and when looking at the tank from the front are hidden by the aquascape.
I added 2 LPS for now, Frogspawn and a red goniopora frag. Goniopora is to see if it likes the lower flow. As I get more leathers I'll remove the frogspawn.
Used the fish trap in the 180g and caught all but 1 that I intend to start with in the 75g. Catching the fish are easy, the hard part is waiting until the fish you DON'T want to catch are out of the trap.
Fish are, 1 yellow tang, 1 Exquisite African Wrasse, 2 Kupang Damsels, 1 Bangaii Cardinal ( 1 Bangaii left to catch ).
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Looks awesome David!
I'm very interested in your par numbers! Any reason you went so heavy on the UV?
This looks very nice! I wasn't able to hide my power heads when I did a similar project. I want the least amount of items either on or leaning on the glass sides. This is just my concept anyways. Once again, it does look nice though. Congratulations!
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OP
OP
I don't like coraline algae to grow on any sides including the back. So this is setup same as my 180g show. Nothing touches the glass. There are rods in the overflow boxes to prop up and suspend those two rocks but that it and doesn't look to obstruct being able to clean coraline.
Perhaps once I've cleaned things up and got things running well again, I'll post up some information on my 125g. It's been shuffled around with all the moving I've done over the years. Reading threads like yours David motivates me to "share".
OP
OP
PAR Readings
I borrowed SWE Par Meter and did some rough estimates.
Not what I hoped but could be worse. Will likely add more at some point. I'll just roll with what I have and see how things go. May tweak depending on how corals adjust.
These are just rough placement and both sides are same LED config so I didn't really spend a lot of time playing around.
At 100% on all 3 channels.
Upper zone 120
Upper middle about 100
Lower middle about 70
Bottom 45
Overall though I like the color. I don't care for heavy blue tanks so mostly white looking a bit of purple look. The 4.5K LEDs really help bring out the yellow Fiji leather as opposed to the cool whites in the Radions so I'm happy with that. The U/V brings out more of the green than just blue LED do.
I borrowed SWE Par Meter and did some rough estimates.
Not what I hoped but could be worse. Will likely add more at some point. I'll just roll with what I have and see how things go. May tweak depending on how corals adjust.
These are just rough placement and both sides are same LED config so I didn't really spend a lot of time playing around.
At 100% on all 3 channels.
Upper zone 120
Upper middle about 100
Lower middle about 70
Bottom 45
Overall though I like the color. I don't care for heavy blue tanks so mostly white looking a bit of purple look. The 4.5K LEDs really help bring out the yellow Fiji leather as opposed to the cool whites in the Radions so I'm happy with that. The U/V brings out more of the green than just blue LED do.
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jlanger
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Looking good!
I like the aquascaping and keeping it away from the glass.
I also am not a fan of any algae on the glass.
Why do other people's new builds make me want to start another?
Gets harder to say "NO!" all the time.
I like the aquascaping and keeping it away from the glass.
I also am not a fan of any algae on the glass.
Why do other people's new builds make me want to start another?
Gets harder to say "NO!" all the time.
I can't believe you did not want that treasure chest hood lol
OP
OP
About 12 hours later it had water in it.
Once the Lights were shingin, there are quite a bit of horizontal scratches that you can tell came from a magnet cleaner but I'm not picky and thankful for the offer.
If you would have made a gasket for it, that would probably have swayed me to take the treasure chest.
Once the Lights were shingin, there are quite a bit of horizontal scratches that you can tell came from a magnet cleaner but I'm not picky and thankful for the offer.
If you would have made a gasket for it, that would probably have swayed me to take the treasure chest.
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