Pyronus' SPS 20H

[Needreefunds]

Yea the weird part is I restarted almost 2 months ago. My new bleached dry rock must be leaching silicates into water and is causing a really delayed bloom. I'm not worried about it, they already going away this morning and the snails got a good snack.

Don't worry, be hoppy!

 

 

 

...sorry, wrong forum.

 

 

I'm trying hard to resist the urge to pick up a Pearlberry...

[pyronus]

Pick up 2 and hold one for me!

[divecj5]

Same thing here....started noticing some diatoms on the base rock and sand the other day. I'm of course behind you in tank age so it's expected. Reminds me of when I first started reefing and got super-excited the first time I saw them as I knew my tank was cycling

 

Any pics of the DIY water sensing ATO you created?

[pyronus]

Having some trouble with it actually. Its basically an object detection sensor. it sees through the glass and detects the water level just fine, but I had a banished hermit grazing on some algae set it off yesterday. I thought that might be an issue so I need to add another sensor for high level. I got the original sensor from work, out of the garbage bin so getting another will be a challenge since its an expensive sensor (Benefits of working at a research facility, they often throw away things that are in perfectly good working condition) I dont really want to use a float switch in the system because float switches are meh. I may scrap the entire thing and just get the Elos osmocontroller I found on Craigslist.

 

I do have a really nice 12v pump though so I could just use 2 float switches the way that a lot of people do to make aqua lifter ATO's but I wouldn't be exceding the switch ratings by using them to switch 120v AC.

[pyronus]

I also ordered the MP20 -> MP40w es upgrade kit. I'll be installing that as soon as I get it. What I really should do is sell the MP20 and downgrade to an MP10w es and buy a Radion. Ahhh dreams.

[Arkayology]

I also ordered the MP20 -> MP40w es upgrade kit. I'll be installing that as soon as I get it. What I really should do is sell the MP20 and downgrade to an MP10w es and buy a Radion. Ahhh dreams.

You should

[pyronus]

Red planet and new fish acclimating!

[pyronus]

I finally found a standard black and white clown that would satisfy the Misses. She kept telling me that all she really wanted to have in the tank was a standard pattern black clown. Surprisingly hard to find fish around here. I just happened to be in the Buffalo area where they have what has to be the greatest reef store in upstate. I made sure we got a small one, about 10 minutes after acclimation and the original normal occ. was swimming with the new little clown. They slept together and have been swimming like a pair all day long. It has to be the fastest match making I have ever seen.

 

Also if someone that is a better photographer than I am could help me figure out how to fix the purple highlighting that happens to the clowns middle strip because of the T5's that would be fantastic.

 

Luke and Lola

 

Show off

 

Some coral closeups:

 

This is the local version of red planet. It has more green in it that the ORA Red planet but it tables like crazy and the mother colony is really something to see.

 

Red Tabling Acro

 

Acropora Echinata

[got2envy]

Oooh Ahhh! nice!

Purdy clownfish <3

[pablom617]

Love the rockwork... Cant wait to see it filled in!

[divecj5]

Love the new clown....glad to see that it quickly paired up with your existing clown.

 

I really like the more delicate branches of that Red Planet. From my experience, the amount of green/red depends a lot on the amount of light it gets. Less light = more green .... More light = more red. At least that's what I noticed when I was still running T5s.

 

As far as getting rid of the hues when using T5s, my only suggestion would be to shoot in RAW and color balance during post process. I still haven't figured this out fully with LEDs...the spectrum just throws the sensor for a loop at times. I usually have to underexpose a good bit and then up the exposure and fill in photoshop.

[pyronus]

I've been doing post in aperture. I'm not as big of a fan as I am of PS but I wanted I give the software a shot. I always shoot in raw. The color balancing never really fixes it, I think it's the Fiji purple bulb that really throws everything into weird land. I'll toss up a few pictures after work to show what I'm talking about. There is some really bad artifacting as well that happens in that area. It doesn't look terrible but it bothers me. Its actually probably an ISO issue. I think I forgot to change it from 1600.

[divecj5]

I've been doing post in aperture. I'm not as big of a fan as I am of PS but I wanted I give the software a shot. I always shoot in raw. The color balancing never really fixes it, I think it's the Fiji purple bulb that really throws everything into weird land. I'll toss up a few pictures after work to show what I'm talking about. There is some really bad artifacting as well that happens in that area. It doesn't look terrible but it bothers me. Its actually probably an ISO issue. I think I forgot to change it from 1600.

 

Gotcha. I've had a similar experience with LEDs....I can adjust the hue/saturation as well as the color balance and at times there's still some pretty bad artifacts and it just can't capture the range of color at times. Sometimes it looks great on the camera screen and then looks whacky in the RAW editor.

 

Don't these camera manufacturers know that all we want are clean, crisp, color-balanced photos of our tanks

[Needreefunds]

[gena]

He gets out the pruning sheers, litteraly what you would use to prune a small tree and starts cutting. He filled up a small tupperware and just gave it to me.

This should happen more often!!!! Love stories like that They look fantastic in your tank!!!!!!! Following

[pyronus]

This should happen more often!!!! Love stories like that They look fantastic in your tank!!!!!!! Following

It was the best. It was hard not to do a happy dance in his kitchen

 

I'm actually probably going to run over to his house again soon for some more stuff. He's got a huge gorg he wants to frag and I really want some flowy corals on the left side of the tank. I've got to figure out what to do with my branching hammer. Its not the prettiest of corals but it is splitting like crazy, I'm going to have to frag it one of these days or its going to out grow my tank.

[Needreefunds]

You could bring some down to midnight madness....jussayin'

 

[gena]

It was the best. It was hard not to do a happy dance in his kitchen

 

I'm actually probably going to run over to his house again soon for some more stuff. He's got a huge gorg he wants to frag and I really want some flowy corals on the left side of the tank.

I bet!!!!!

 

Gorgonians have quickly become one of my favorite corals. I too love the flowing properties they add to a reef tank. Looking forward to seeing what yours looks like!!!!!

[pyronus]

You could bring some down to midnight madness....jussayin'

 

 

That's this weekend isn't it? Man time flies. I hope I can still make it.

[Needreefunds]

That's this weekend isn't it? Man time flies. I hope I can still make it.

It really does lol- yup this Friday. Would be cool if you could, but I know its not exactly around the corner for you.

 

Either way, I'll get you some paly's somehow, you know, for that softie tank you want.

 

C'mon, you know you want it

[pyronus]

I wouldn't mind some palys. J is always trying to get me to buy softies. She told me the other day she wanted her own tank. Talk about dangerous. We might have to start her a little 10g with an AC70 or something. I'd need to find some cheap equipment if I were to do that but she would just fill it with zoa's, GSP and euphyllia.

 

They have 10g cubes at one of the stores around here..........

[pyronus]

I started to see some cyano on the return loc-line again yesterday so I dumped a little Phosban in a bag and tossed it in the sump.

 

What are everyone's thoughts on bio-pellets or gfo+gac in a reactor. The TLF reactor is quite cheap and I already have a pump to drive it.

[divecj5]

I started to see some cyano on the return loc-line again yesterday so I dumped a little Phosban in a bag and tossed it in the sump.

 

What are everyone's thoughts on bio-pellets or gfo+gac in a reactor. The TLF reactor is quite cheap and I already have a pump to drive it.

 

I've never used bio-pellets so I can't be a ton of help there...curious to hear about them myself since they weren't widely used when I was dosing MB7/Vodka.

 

I can tell you that I've always been happy (the tank as well) when running some carbon and GFO in my TLF reactor. The only complaint that I have about the reactor was that it would occasionally leak until I got the seal/lid seated just right but other than that, it's really a solid product for a really reasonable price.

 

If you're looking for something more industrial/crazy looking, these looked pretty awesome when I saw them on ReefBuilders a week or so ago - AtomicReef.com

 

 

I've been contemplating setting it back up in my sump and running some Phosban. If you already have the pump, it's really not too expensive to give it a try. Just be careful not to overdue it with the Phosban/GFO as you can shock the crap out of your SPS.

 

-Adam

[pyronus]

The atomic reef reactor seems very well put together and you can get a clear one for about the same price as the TLF reactor. Choices, choices. I'll probably pull the trigger on this soon. I may just run GFO as I know how it works and do my research on the bio pellets in the meantime.

[pyronus]

So after a little research it seems like a lot of people run pellets gfo and carbon at the same time, and at the very least they run GFO with Biopellets, because pellets strip the water of nitrates really well but are not as amazing at removing phosphates. I think it would be crazy to run all 3 right now. Especially since I don't think I have a huge nutrients problem, just a minor one at the moment.

 

Maybe if I end up with 7 fish it might not be crazy. (I'm still debating wether or not to try 3 chromis with the 2 clowns, goby and blenny)

 

I think I'm going to grab one of the atomic reactors and run gfo/carbon in any case.

 

Also dosing. The tank is currently consuming about 15ppm of Calcium/day and about .2 dKh worth of Alk. So I have my dosing set up, half in the morning when I get up before the lights come on, half at night after the lights go out. Targets are 450ppm Ca and 9dKh.