Well I am getting really really close to unveiling my new rock and full setup but i am waiting for my last key item My reef controller which should be here on May 12th I hate waiting.

Can anyone thing if i am forgetting any harware item i want this tank to be turn-key and dont want to change a whole bunch out when it gets up and going




I really hope that this tank build will live up to my last ( sorry bad pic didnt clean the glass but this is one of the last pics)

I have the TCF Patriot and it is pretty cool. It has started to grow really fast in my tank, unfortunately most of the growth has been in shaded areas and lacks color. The rest of it has awesome color though. I have been trying to get the red hot chili pepper for some time. Did TCF have some for sale? I need to contact him anyhow for a few other pieces even though my tank is getting maxed out.

Maybe sometime soon we can meet up and chat about dosing pumps. I'd like to get at least two for ca and alk, but might want a third for my mag. I'd like to check yours our and see how you set them up and everything too as I haven't ever set up a system like that.

that sounds great its a no go this weekend I'm going to Disneyland for the wifes Brithday on saturday and i wont be back until tuesday. but yeah i got a few dosing pumps lying a around that i can let go for pretty cheap.you can come over one of these days too bad that broke down the 180g that was a tank with all the bells and whistles

Well i am a little Pissed Off . I put my new Neptune System Aqua Controller III today and i got the cables tied back but when i took my reef salt out of my storage unit i noticed that my semi New 5 gallon bucket of D-D H2Ocean Magnesium Pro plus salt mix is hard as a rock. So I am not sure if i should use some seltzer water to help dissolve the hardend salt by using carbonic acid that carbonates it or should i just go and buy some pre mixed salt and get more salt later

What do you guys think? I really want to get this tank up and going but i dont want to make a mistaake and rush it

Put it in a glad force flex and crack it like a bag of ice. Then disolve the peices.

with just plan RO water? Well its a lot of salt about 40lbs or so and i beveilve if i just use plan RO water some of the salt will not dissolve. I think i am just for now going to get some saltwater from yourreef (which is my LFS lucky me) Anyone else have any opinion on the matter of hardened reef salt

My new aquascape do you like really tried to make it Semi Bonsi looking but with out a central piece and a lot of real estate I had to make it more linear. I build there tree like structures and on central pagoda and i build a large lenge with two small tonga branches holding it up. I am putting in water right now but i have to get the water pH up a bit before i do that


Do you Like?




sorry about the picture quailty and the dirty glass

I dig the aquascape really top notch! Is that just the blue LEDs on the sunpod?

no its the MH light it's 21k giesemann megachrome sorry about it being too tidy bowl blue the light was still waring up

looks sweet FILL IT

She up and running with water but now my mp20 isnt working so if its not one thing its another. anyway the eshopps skimmer is making a white bubble avalanche ( actully making to many bubbles i am getting them into my display) the ACIII is going and controlling my tank all i need now is some new chiller tubing because i want the inlet size larger than the outlet size because of head loss.

the pic is still really merkey from all the bubbles and grit in the tank. Anyway i am running filter floss to help clear it up and after i get a hold of Ecotech i can start with the sps since my rock is fully cycled

Yeahy it looks good, it will look better covered in SPS.

That will be very soon I hope. I might have to get by on a couple mod'd Mj1200's on a wave maker so as i can get my MP20 fixed. i do have a Lot planned for this tank more strict on the colors and spieces of fish and coral than i ever had.
I am really going to shy away from wild caught colonies to do my part for the name of aquaculture. In my +10 years of doing this i have lost a lot of wild fish and coral that were not adapted to live in a simulated reef environment.
I have for now lost interest in the coral of the moment (ie Acans, Echino,Scolymias and others) I just can't bring my self to buy something that is the size of my fingernail for +$200. I am not saying that i am unwilling to pay for nice corals because i paln to buy at least a few show pieces to be the highlight of my tank. So thank you too all how have tagged along over the last year with this tank with its ups and downs

wll i have one verdict on the Eshopps PSK-75H it a good enough skimmer but it is not a great choice on a nano tank under 30g. first off the skimmer footprint is fine but it length is way to long for my CADlights tank. It produces a great amount of bubbles with it combination of needle wheel and bubble plate but it produce too many mirco buuble in to my display. I tried everthing that i could think of to stop the but at no avail. No internal pump but if looses its prime your screwed it just sits there so bad for long term power outages. Its a good skimmer but i think it lacks the nano versatilty of the tunze which is its replacement.

I took off the mp20 and put on one mod'd mj1200 with a sureflow mod on a random wave cycle on my ACIII. I am hoping to get that guy fixed or replace so i can carry on building my wonderful reef tank

Im also building some new frag racks tommarrow so i am trying to figure out the design so it looks professional

Does anyone know that the "UNK" on a ACIII means that i need more of a load on the output? A little back story i put a two head fan on the "COL" ouput of my Aquacontroller III since i still have to buy some chiller tubing for my tank and since it was over 100 degrees F here In Cali and i wantd some assurance that my tank won't get to hot. So sometimes when the fan is running i get a "UNK" stauts I know that it mean Unknown but i am not sure if it needs more of a load on the circuit.

My first hitcher it looks to be a little zoa......Is it possible for zia to comeback from the dead? I say this because this rock can from a really old system of mine about ( i broke it down over a year ago) i packed all the rock up with wet newspaper and stored it with about 120lbs of other rock in a rubbermaid trash can for quite a while in my garage. Its just really strange the only thing that is remotly alive is the cheato in the fuge.. maybe it came on that who knows

Well i have been searching around for some black egg crate for a while and a friend on RC told me to go here and for a sheet of .375"X2'X4' Black Egg Crate Diffuser was 13.95 plus 7.95 shipping for one sheet but between me and two other friends we ordered 6 sheets for 12.15 X 6+ 72.90 plus 19.95 shipping so if anyone else whats any heres the linky enjoy

http://www.eplastics.com/Plastic/Lighting_...s/B-EGG-375X2X4

they also carry plastic rods and black plexiglas sheets for the othere people who like diy'n

scotty, that looks like a majano nem. They can survive almost anything! The scape looks awesome, good job!

Are the megachromes really that blue? I mean, I saw the colors you got out of one so it really made me interested in it (I'm in the process of buying a 250W aquamedic and thought about a megachrome 21K), but I don't know if I can deal with tidy bowl blue...

well maybe to me it looks like injured zoa but how know if it turn out to be a majano nem i will throw the whole pieace of LR in the bin. But it very very small and i will give it a week to figure out what it is.

NOTICE to ALL pests you will have no home or safe harbor here I you are found you will be shoot on site.....That is all LOL

I wil shoot you a fresh pic of my tank with the megachromes on to give you a better idea. they have been on for over a hour so it all warmed up. Give me a sec

well the color of the megachrome after it warms up and gets settled it produces a nice crisp light blue. I not a overpowering or too dark MH color like some 20k bulbs i have seen. but here is a new pic and by no means i am great photographer but here you go

Well I had a little visit from my friend cameron and he brought me some stuff. I really didn't want to put sps right now but the rock is fully cycled and all of my parameters are stable well anyway too the corals


organisms palys (really bad pic i know but they are down low and hard to get a good pic of)


Green lantern Montipora 3"


Not sure if these guys have an name but i like anyway


PokerStar Montipora 1 1/4"

Amazing stuff right there!!!

Thanks there partner there is a whole lot more to come trust me stay tuned

the list from a previous page
Copps Reverse Sunset Monti
LE Red Hot Chili Pepper Monti
LE Montipora Setosa
TCF Patriot monti
The True Orenji monti
TCF Bluegrass Montipora Danae(similar to pokerstar)
LE Sunset Montipora Danae
TCF Radioactive Acropora Tenuis
TCF Rainbow Acropora Millipora
LE Steve Ellias Acropora Staghorn
LE Lime N Sky Acro staghorn
LE Rouge Milli
ORA Pearlberry acro
Karl's Candlelight Acro
Yellow Acropora Millipora
TCF Crazy Blue Acropora Prostrata
White Polyp Acropora Chesterfieldnes
Blue Gomenzi Acro
Rising Sunset Monti

I have a very speical coral coming into to my tank on saturday drum roll please.............A Tubs' Lavendar and Green Polyp Montipora stellata. I know of only about 6-8 people who have this and it was very tough form me to get. I might be wrong there might be a whole bunch of people who have it.

Anyway heres is a sample pic that came from exoticfrags.us but i got mine from john at yourreef. the only reason i got is because i went down there today and he was stocking his new 600g and i seen this frag on the bottom of his show tank ( that he was cleaning out) and i asked him what it was and he said it was the Tubs' Lavendar and Green Polyp Montipora stellata I was completely floored this this is kick A$$ also this pic give no justice to this great coral..well ok updates tommarrow also john is not fragging it again for a while so sorry guys ( my frag is about 1 1/2" with two or three branchs i forget)

pics from exoticfrags.us

I was seaching the web and i found a great pic of the originating mother colony


I am really stoked

that piece is awesome! I am getting more and more into monti's and I think this one is killer! I am going to yourreef tomorrow to pic up some bulbs and will check out this piece. We will def have to do some trading in the future since I have a few of the pieces you are after. I think I have the first frag of the tcf patriot monti. I got it from him before he named it.

john took the rest of the colony home my frag is in the "ask" section by the cash register close to the back on the right. Also me a john are pretty tight he told me tonight since he is getting rid of a lot of his corals out of his show tank this weekend so for this weekend on he's having a sps coral sale (nothing really super rare but he showned me his prices and they are really good) I down with trading anytime

I noticed that you replaced your via aqua pump from your old setup with the MJ 1800. That's about 300gph less (thought you had the VA 2600). Any particular reason for stepping down? Just curious.

Justin

the viaaqua got clogged up twice and put off a lot more heat than the mj1800 but most of all its mort quiet the viaaqua would make a sort of humming nosie and the mj is dead silent. As for the 300gph stepdown i covered the flow decrease by useing the mp20 which provides more than enough

Think I might do the same as I've got the VA pump and MP20 as well. Do you run the random reef crest mode?

Thanks.

yes i do but unfoutenallty i had to send the mp20 bck to vortech to be repaired but i should get it back soon

Heres the new Tubs Lavendar and Green Polyp Monti and guess what i got two. I love this monti it totally beats any superman or pokerstar by far. also john sold me a old mother colony of Porites that he forgot the name of ) also in the pic they are still pissed and i hope they will color up into something nice) John also gave me 4 Lunar Eclipse Palys for freeeee (i dont have a pic they are also still Pissed)



Bad pic i know


Porites (what do you guys think?)

I'm going down to walnut creek tommarow to help a friend break down his 90g because he's moving to boston for a new job. I mention this because he said he set some corals aside to "hook me" up with so i am kind of stoked i wonder what i will get

Dude now that your back we totally need to arrange a trade when things get settled! Great pieces!

I have a whole SPS LFS at my disposal, lets talk!

What did ya get bro..

I got called into work today so its been rescheduled to tuesday. But i really dont think i a going to keep what he's giving me there mostly lps so he told me i can just sell them or give them away so we will see what i come out with



you got it I kind of bailed on the efflo so in a couple months definitely i would love to trade with you.

I found a great article on PAR vs Lux meters. I just bought a lux meter and i was searching the web for a conversion and i found there isn't really one but below is a equation with constants to give a ball park of what par you have. i thinking of buying a PAR meter if my new Lux meter doesnt work out

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/2/review#h2

Lux to PAR If you have a lux meter, it is possible to convert lux to PAR. Since spectral quality plays a part in these conversions, each light source (actinic lamp, 6,500K metal halide, etc.) will have a difference factor.
The equation is:
Lux ÷ Constant = µmol·m2·sec

Lux to PAR Conversion Factors Light Source Constant
Sunlight 54
Warm White Fluorescent 76
Cool White Fluorescent 74
URI (now UV) Actinic Fluorescent 18
URI (now UV) Daylight Fluorescent 54
Actinic/Daylight Combination 38
Philips 03 Actinic Fluorescent 40
Panasonic 6,700°K Power Compact 72
Panasonic 7,100°K / 6,700°K Combination 55
Osram Powerstar Metal Halide 57
Ushio 10,000°K Metal Halide 54
Coralife 10,000°K Metal Halide 30
Venture "Daylight" Metal Halide 46
Radium "Blue" Metal Halide 51
Fusion Sulfur Lamp 41
Westron Mercury Vapor Lamp 70
Iwasaki 6,500°K Metal Halide 57

Oddly enough I just got my mp20 back from them 3 weeks ago after having sent it in for repair also. Fortunately it was still under warranty. Turnaround is pretty quick though.

yeah mine is still under warranty as but it has been slower since the memorial day weekend.

Here are the palys that john gave me at yourreef I reallt dont know if they have some special name but he thought they might be Lunar Eclipse's for what ever thats worth i have about six of them scattered around a piece of live rock ( this is the only one i can get a really good picture of)

well i just to a Lux meter reading of my sunpod 150watt with a 21k Giesemann Megachrome. I got a Peak Lux of 61.9kLux right underneath ( taken at UV glass level) the bulb at the center most of the bulb at the water level is 17.86 kLux and on the outer most regions for the left is 1.27kLux and on the outer most right is 1.86kLux at water level.

Sooooooooooooooooo when can I come up and check the tank out?

you can come and check it out when there is more than about 12 small corals in the tank LOL. So anything time after that really but if any NR members want to check out the out CAD you guys are more than welcome maybe we can even trade some reef stuff. I am next to the galleria mall in roseville

word, I would be down to come up sometime... meet some of you crazy reefers like pismo haha.

I can bring frags also

also bring the beers Anyway theres a whole $hit load of great reefers up here make sure you hit up yourreef thats one of the greatest place around

Well I just got back from my friends house to help him finish up breaking down his tank and with his consent i sold the LPS corals that he gave and i went to another buddies house to trade them for some SPS and here they are for the most part ( i got some poieces that are not going in this tank)


Steve Tyree Montipora Aquituberculata LE (2 1/4" X 2")



I also got this and it my not look like much now but it is a WHOLE Colony of Steve Tyree 20,000 Leagues Lokani. the story is that this colony browned out 2 weeks back when my friend Sams frag tank light ballast broke it was left with no light for 5 days ( but luckly the pumps and heaters and chiller was still working)

I am going to make a photo blog of its recovery

Steve Tyree 20,000 Leagues Lokani ( 4' X 3")

Here is a much better pic of the Forgotten Name Porites I got last week its coloring up nicely

Sweet corals!