ryhous Posted December 31, 2010 Share Posted December 31, 2010 Just set this tank up with 1 lb live rock and black sand last week. I plan to add softies, shrooms, polyps, shrimp, and snails.I don't plan on keeping a fish. Let me know what corals you guys think would work well for this setup. Thanks. Specs: almost 1/4'' thick PicoAquariums glass tank with top cover over display only. Total dimensions:9x6x8 (6x3x7.75'' refugium area). This tank is very high quality btw! Lighting: rapidled par 30 with 80 degree optics and 3 blue 2 white bulbs (kept in home depot clamp fixture.) heater: 25 watt theo (room temp kept at 68-74 year round). pump: rio 90 in return surface skimmer included on refugium Dymax iq3 robot led light for chateo and nightlightunderwater halogen 5 watt light for small refug filtration media: chateo, filter floss replaced weekly, 1/3 sack of chemipure elite, and purigen currently running. I plan to do 50% weekly water changes. Link to comment
brandon429 Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 that is high tech glad to be first post. Lights and setup are tight, 2011 really that is well planned, you w be able to support quite a bioload in that glass looks high quality, pristine no scratches you are lucky! are you going to dose it or just do changes> Link to comment
andrewkw Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 Looks like a nice tank, similar to my dymax iq3. I'm currently waiting for my rapid led bulb to come in so I can switch out my robot led's. Can you post a larger picture of your tank? without the robot fixture on too. I'd like to see how the colour looks. Can I ask why you add the robot for photos? Link to comment
thesmallerthebetter Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 Looks like a nice tank, similar to my dymax iq3. I'm currently waiting for my rapid led bulb to come in so I can switch out my robot led's. Can you post a larger picture of your tank? without the robot fixture on too. I'd like to see how the colour looks. Can I ask why you add the robot for photos? it likley has something to do with making pictures take-able at all. royal blue LEDS wreak havok on digi cam hahaha. like tanking a picture of a blue sun Link to comment
andrewkw Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 it likley has something to do with making pictures take-able at all. royal blue LEDS wreak havok on digi cam hahaha. like tanking a picture of a blue sun Why is that? That's a serious limitation if you can't photograph your tank using them. I'm a little worried since I will be installing my par30 next week, If I can't photograph my tank I'll have to find something else. Link to comment
thesmallerthebetter Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 Why is that? That's a serious limitation if you can't photograph your tank using them. I'm a little worried since I will be installing my par30 next week, If I can't photograph my tank I'll have to find something else. with your camera and your skills im sure you can figure something out (ive seen your pictures, theyre amazing). its all about white balance, and on my crappy point and shoot i cant get a picture that doesnt look like someone put blue cellophane over my lens. i wouldnt worry about it so much. but for the rest of us that have a piece-of-shrimp-poop camera leds make it tough Link to comment
ryhous Posted January 1, 2011 Author Share Posted January 1, 2011 that is high tech glad to be first post. Lights and setup are tight, 2011 really that is well planned, you w be able to support quite a bioload in that glass looks high quality, pristine no scratches you are lucky! are you going to dose it or just do changes> Thanks Brandon. I'll be using h20 from my lfs..so i will probably dose c balance and feed cyclopeeze as you have recommended in other posts. Looks like a nice tank, similar to my dymax iq3. I'm currently waiting for my rapid led bulb to come in so I can switch out my robot led's. Can you post a larger picture of your tank? without the robot fixture on too. I'd like to see how the colour looks. Can I ask why you add the robot for photos? I added a shot with the par 30 only. It is too bright to get a good picture with the par 30. Link to comment
will46r Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 I've heard and seen good things about the Picoaquariums tanks. I'm thinking about one if I move up in size. Love the look, can't wait to see what you're going to do with it. Link to comment
.Newman. Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 it is all about white balance. if you camera has a function to custom set the white balance according to a sample of w/e youre taking the pic of, do that to get the camera to see the real colors under the blue lights. maybe that way things will stop showing up as purple in the pictures. on my Nikon 4600 its called "white balance preset". it lets you take a "measure" sample of your target to dial in its real colors. you should take a sample of something thats supposed to be as close to white as possible in your tank while your lights are on. sand is my primary target, but if you dont have it find something else thats white-like in your tank. Link to comment
brandon429 Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 glad to see you trying that method you will really like the no water testing and the coralline that will start seeding the glass sometime in march or feb, bet Link to comment
ryhous Posted January 1, 2011 Author Share Posted January 1, 2011 glad to see you trying that method you will really like the no water testing and the coralline that will start seeding the glass sometime in march or feb, bet I checked my h20 parameters and all readings are good. I just ordered the following frags from TheReefGardner: Dragon Eye Zoanthids Pompom Xenia Aqua Blue Mushroom Blue Eyes Trumpet Fiery Orange Digitata African Blue Cespitularia Eagle Eye and Gorilla Nipple Zoanthids Green Zoanthids Peach People Eaters Palythoa Do you forsee any problems with these corals? Will 2x weekly dosing cal/alk/mag along with cyclopeeze and frozen plankton be appropriate? (with 25% percent water changes after both weekly feedings) How much should I use to dose and feed the above corals in approximately 1.25-1.5 gallons of water? Thanks. Link to comment
Mr. Microscope Posted January 1, 2011 Share Posted January 1, 2011 Taking images with LEDs can be a challenge, but there are lots of ways to get around the blue sun look. Try covering up one or two of your blue LEDs while imaging. Also, if you have any proficiency with Photoshop, you can tweak images to get the colors looking more true to life. Sometimes shooting up close can help. Good luck! Link to comment
andrewkw Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 Taking images with LEDs can be a challenge, but there are lots of ways to get around the blue sun look. Try covering up one or two of your blue LEDs while imaging. Also, if you have any proficiency with Photoshop, you can tweak images to get the colors looking more true to life. Sometimes shooting up close can help. Good luck! I really don't understand why this should be necessary. Of course I don't have these blue LED's yet. The colour spectrum of these bulbs are not drastically different then MH/T5/PC/whatever else so I can't see them being that much different. If you have trouble with white balance and can't get it manually with whatever is in your tank, a gray card may help which are available at most photo stores. I am really curious to see how much difficultly I will have taking pictures. Link to comment
brandon429 Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 the correct starting dosage so you dont have to test for calcium and alk in slightly over a gallon and a half (Ive used two or three different salt mixes, reef crystals moreso) is still 1/3 cap, as close as you can eyeball it, of each additive in the mornings strictly before lights on, each additive slowly dripped in and spaced 25 mins apart in a high flow area of the tank. you can do it 2 or 3 times a week spaced out either way doest matter. a very light dosing until the coralline starts to take hold. in about 7 or 9 mos increase to about half a cap or a little more if you pack in those corals. same dosage schedule. its exactly how I dose. doing some percentage of water change after a feeding is right when its new. when it ages six mos or so its better to change it all out to avoid as much waste compaction in the bed as you can prevent. that system of dose/feed will grow any coral you can fit in the space. Some spot feeding is required for acans, dendros etc when that time comes. what kind of salt mix you using?> Link to comment
ryhous Posted January 2, 2011 Author Share Posted January 2, 2011 the correct starting dosage so you dont have to test for calcium and alk in slightly over a gallon and a half (Ive used two or three different salt mixes, reef crystals moreso) is still 1/3 cap, as close as you can eyeball it, of each additive in the mornings strictly before lights on, each additive slowly dripped in and spaced 25 mins apart in a high flow area of the tank. you can do it 2 or 3 times a week spaced out either way doest matter. a very light dosing until the coralline starts to take hold. in about 7 or 9 mos increase to about half a cap or a little more if you pack in those corals. same dosage schedule. its exactly how I dose. doing some percentage of water change after a feeding is right when its new. when it ages six mos or so its better to change it all out to avoid as much waste compaction in the bed as you can prevent. that system of dose/feed will grow any coral you can fit in the space. Some spot feeding is required for acans, dendros etc when that time comes. what kind of salt mix you using?> I don't know, but im sure my lfs uses instant ocean, and i will be getting the water from them for now...I will eventually buy my own ro/di setup and probably use reefcrystals, DD's, or tropicmarin Thanks for the information! So 1/3 cap of each bottle of c balance 2-3 times wkly, spaced 25 minutes apart before lights. What about feeding? What foods and how much to begin with? Thanks Brandon Link to comment
brandon429 Posted January 2, 2011 Share Posted January 2, 2011 I do my tanks, the feeding and water changes on wed and sun. you can do just weekly for corals or twice weekly if you really want to drive them. the ideal food is marine bioplankton with cyclopeeze, I feed one pump into that much water and let it circulate for a couple hours before a full water change. Maybe even slightly less on the dosing on second thought, we were pushing newman's dkh to 11 with a similar scaling lets go to like a small quarter capfull just while the tank is new and has no demand. ramp it up just a little as the weeks go by okay I'll quit retracting dosages now lol. I dont think the type of feed matters as much as it does that its frozen and reef intended. I always recommend using some form of cyclopeeze because it doses iodine to the tank where no extra needs to be added. amounts, I put in enough that you can see a decent slurry in the water, after the tank ages it will make all the pods and brittle stars come out and run around, everything will go crazy. just guess the amount, dont flood it, but put more than you would if it were the standard feed once a day technique other frozen reef feeds may work just as well, but cyclopeeze has consistently worked so its easy to recommend. Link to comment
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