Just a parameter update, mainly for my records. Using Oceanic Salt mix of the 200 gal pal type.
This is the test results using API. This round of tests is 6 days after a water change.

SG= 1.026
Temp= 82.0F
PH= 8.3
Ammonia= 0 ppm
Nitrite= 0 ppm
Nitrate= 0 ppm
KH= 9
Phosphate= 0.0 ppm
Calcium= 440 ppm

Just a re-post for my tank log:

I am wondering if anyone has had premature bulb failure on ANY Hamilton made PC bulbs.

I have a total of 4 96w PC Actinic 03 bulbs. 2 of them have gone out within 2 weeks of each other.

More clearly 1 bulb refuses to light and severely black charged near the base inside the tubes. The other one is still in service right now but compared to the other 2 working bulbs is extremely dim and I can see the Hz cycling inside of it. Looks kind of like a knotted rope.

Any Ideas on whats going on? Things I should check?

Currently searching for a explosion diagram of my 834w 72" outer orbit to figure out which ballast lights what. I am fairly sure that the bulbs in question are on separate ballast.

Service life is 6 months right now. But they have only been on for 2 hours a day (sunrise/set cycle) So I consider these bulbs still well within lifespan.

( 2 days later) Well I opened the unit today and discovered each PC bulb is fired by its own ballast. So I left the unit run for 3 hours then came and did a thermal temperature reading on the ballast. Each one tested +- of 120F.

No humming, checked the wiring everything solid and sealed, My volt meter tested to the correct voltage labeled on the ballast, no grounding out or shorts in the system.

One thing I did notice though was the temperature of the PC bulbs themselves and the plastic guards.

All 3 actinic 03 PC bulb tested at 270F give a few degrees. That is tested 3 inches up from the base.

The spare 460 bulb tested In the mid 150's I can't remember exactly but it is drastically lower than the 03's

My conclusion, Bulb failure due to poor quality. I've found many posts on different sites complaining of the connection unit 4pin falls off, short lifespan and other odd failures.




I'll be ordering new bulbs after I get back from my trip to the Georgia Aquarium.

I have a slight issue with my phosphates being readable. I found my problem as the house RO unit filters are shot. I have ordered new filters and have decided to Tee off the output and pipe a line to the fish tank. Here will sit containers for salt water mixing and a new auto top off system that I am putting together. Also with the line Split I can finally add a DI canister to get 0 TDS and this will only be for the fish tank. So I should save a lot on the DI resin refills. The canisters will have float valves to shut down RO/DI process. A few manual turn valves will be in place also.

For the past 2 weeks I tried vodka dosing in my tank to make sure phosphates did not build up since I am topping off with not pure water at the moment. Let me tell you Vodka is a powerful tool. I only topped off at 2.5ml per day after slowly increasing dosage to bring levels down.

A half hour after dosing the corals would balloon up and more intense color was present. The SPS and Recordias loved it the most. I can say if anyone is going to sell coral, before taking a picture dose some vodka an hour or 2 before hand then take the photo.

They do not lie about skimmate increasing 10 fold when dosing vodka. My Urchin was pulling about 1 gallon of tanned skimmate out per 24 our period.

Water clarity, even with a UV running (totally helps keeping water clear) has improved. I have taking a few photos, Notice the dates on the photos.

Right before dosing initial dose of .4mL of Vodka


Here is dosing starting at 1.2mL Vodka


2.5mL Vodka This was my highest dose I needed.


Since the 16th I have stopped dosing. I want to see how the corals are doing now that vodka has stopped. The color has remained the same but the ballooning up has subsided. The sps still look like furballs but not stretching the polyps out as much.

Tank parameters have since zeroed out. Now my latest concern is improving growth rates. If running my 384watts of PC will help at all. Will be starting that test today.

GOOD NEWS!!!

ATO system is installed and works perfectly. And all done without adding another electrical equipment.

Reef tank now has a special line T'ed from the RO membrane before it hits the GAC!!! So now the house should never have flow problems nor will I burn through the GAC filter for no reason! ALSO the tank finally has DI!!! I'm so happy with that part.

... Pictures tomorrow. Busying planning my trip to the Georgia Aquarium all this weekend.

EDIT: Have a TDS meter now. I am on Private Well water. TDS coming in is 703 After RO its 30 and DI 000

Tank looks good but whats up with the room.

Hello N-R. Its been a long time. nothing changed, just grew! been wanting a good DSLR for a long time and finally bit the bullet. I have a Canon 1Ti now. Here's what I've managed so far.











I've been playing with HDR images and trying to learn how to take better photos. I took a year of photography in high school, but that was on a Nikkon N80. So far th is 1Ti has been fantastic. I especially love the sport mode to take quick photos of the fish swimming. Also taking photos in RAW is a huge difference than having the camera convert to JPEG on the fly.

I'll update once a month for a while. Christmas is coming and cash is not flying out of my ass right now.

Cheers,

Nice pictures man! Good to hear your tank is doing well.

Hey Rocket....your tank looks good as well as your photos! I'm in CT now and just bought a 75 gallon that I'm going to start up since selling the 90. So started with the 34 RSM then to the AGA 90 and now to a Perfecto 75.

I was just going thru all the large reef threads to get some ideas. This time I'm doing it right. Putting everything that I want in it from the beginning. Trying to decide if I'm going back to T5's or MH. We all come back to NR at some point....

Hazmat

March Picture Update:
It has been too long, been really busy. Here is some new photos. New addition is the Hippo Tang. I did not touch up the photos so color may be off a bit. For example the Hippo Tang is deep Blue. Next time I'll get better quality photos I just don't have the time at the moment. Enjoy!















Cheers,

Looks great!! That ric rock is sick.

Pushing to next page as page 8 takes forever to load picture intensive!

Well tonight was cool. I finally figured out what was clouding my take the past 2 days. My condy anemone is spawning. I managed to snap continuous photos with flash of it. Now I need to upload them but my flickr account is maxed for this month... maybe i'll upgrade.

Wow, big difference!

I do not want to come off wrong, but the difference between before your photo experiements and after is TREMENDOUS! Well done!

um... thanks..?? I'm a bit confused. Those last shots I took where un-edited basic JPEG straight from the camera. The shots you reposted where RAW images and extensively corrected to bring out the true color representation.

I'm basically calling my recent photos crap. I can do much better but recently switched to win7 and I have to load all my software again.

I managed to upload the photos. Enjoy!

SRO-2000 coming in 2 weeks from premium aquatics.


That is all.


Cheers

My first time playing with Canon's photostitch software. here is result: FTS!!!

very nice!

Found a great market to get very cheap Nori!!! I'm so happy I found this:

30 sheets for $3 bucks. I purchased 4 packs so 120 sheets for $12

Wow! That's really cheap. I was pretty proud of my 10 sheets for $2 at the grocery store...still better than the LFS.

That stitched photo looks great, your tank is looking good.

quick video

Woot College graduate! yay go me, now Mr. Economy, hire me!

and more importantly a tank update!

All is well! everything is growing!

1. Reduced light schedule from 12 hours to 8 hours: reduced algae build up on glass, corals are somewhat brighter in color. The monties did not like the reduction even at half an hour once a week.

2. The Hippo Tank is now larger than the yellow tang.

3. Been selling off the blue mushrooms, can't seem to keep them in check.

4. Most importantly I am now a proud owner of a SRO-2000. This upgrade was badly needed for a couple of months now. My old skimmer ( AquaC Urchin) just could not handle the bio-load. I'd clean it every day and by the end of the day the top cup would be CAKED with skim. Ran it as wet as it could go but no use.

The SRO-2000 was very easy to setup, a half hour vinegar bath with it running made break in last only a day. I'm in the process of fine tuning it now. My water (been 4 days) is more clear than I can ever remember. and algae buildup on the glass is almost non existent between cleanings.

Pictures soon.

Well as promised Picture update. I've been getting pretty good with my camera, even without a macro lens. That L series macro keeps me from spending on corals...




















This guy is impossible to take a photo of, I finally got a shot of it.

Trying out this HDR photo software I like so far.




If you want to see the rest of them and in original size, just click my flickr photostream

WoW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
your tank looks awsome!!!!!!!!!!
everything looks so healthy ans CLEAN!!!!!!!!
the pic quality is amazing!!!

Thank you,

The tank is so clean because of two things:

1. I spent maybe an hour with a Razor blade (with holder!!!) going carefully around the silicone and sand bed areas of the glass. You can see the scraped algae in some of the shots, especially the tube snail, and the Acan eating the algae.

2. This new skimmer "Reef Octopus SRO-2000" is spectacularly awesome. It was a very much needed upgrade to the tank. I used to have a thin film on the top of the water, that since is gone. The water column itself is sparkling clear now. I'm so impressed with the skimmer.

The skimmer is fully broken in now, and the micro-bubbles it produces are insanely small. I'll try to get an action shot of it. It looks like cotton candy in the chamber.

Looks great Rocket! I love the ric garden.

Thank you Fewskillz,

I've been debating for a long time now on which new lens to add to my arsenal of Canon equipment.

I'm using a Canon T1i 15mp CMOS DSLR

I have the kit f3.5-5.6 18-55mm
f4-5.6 17-85mm IS USM

I'm either wanting the excellent Canon Telephoto EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro Autofocus Lens
or
Delve into the crisp distortion free area of PRIME lenses...
Like the Canon Normal EF 50mm f/1.4 USM Autofocus Lens
or the more likely more useful indoor lens with good low light possibilities>
Canon Wide Angle EF 28mm f/1.8 USM Autofocus Lens

Yup, I got a Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L IS USM Macro Lens!

Teaser:

Well it has been incredibly too long since I have updated this thread. It is late and the upload just finished. Here is a sample, I'll have more coming this weekend. Shot with my new Canon 60D. 100mm f/2.8L macro

Picture Update as Promised:























As always, my flickr link has tons more pictures.

A mate dropped off some corals for holding/keeps. He's not sure if he is going to take them back. But needed a clean healthy tank to house them in for the time being.

I guess I am coral watching for a while, no problem I clearly have enough room.

The Yuma looks in good shape, its quite small about half the diameter of a dime.

A 4 head hammer coral I would classify as barely healthy. It has only been 24 hours and only a few tenticals have expanded 1-3mm. All 4 heads are bright neon green, very cool look.

The Tourch is the one I worry about, Looks like it fell or something. Has 2 heads. 1 head I don't believe will make it. I can see the skeleton and tissue in between. The other, larger head, is ok, the center mouth though is much larger than I suspect it should be. It has yet to expand or inflate.

On a side note, I have a first edition SRO-2000, with the Bubble blaster 2000 pump. Well couple weeks ago the pump went, just seized up. Called my supplier and they took care of the warranty. The new pump I have looks identical, but the sticker information is much different. Including the wattage rating! Woot 25w instead of 30w! I'm all for power savings. And seems the G.P.H. or air L.P.H amount has increased. I had to dial the gate valve more open. The reaction chamber has many more times the amount of micro air bubbles now, looks like cotton-candy!

Torch:


Yuma:


Hammer:

Death in the tank:

3.5 year old Emerald crab.

Story:

I got the crab way back 2007 when I started up my AP24. It was on of the few first purchases. Eating my bubble algae problem, and then later helping with a bryosis outbreak. Soon growing much larger than it should have.

Moved it to the 42 hex in 2009, was doing great. I bought a blue tang since I was moving to the 125 in a week. The 3rd day of having the tang I found it in the claws of the Emerald crab, gnawing huge chunks out of the side.

Since this incident Evil crab was banished to the sump of the 125.

Today I found the crab not in its usual hiding spot. Definitely dead.

Today I am conflicted. I'm happy its gone, but sad that I don't have a crab anymore.

But definitely will not be getting any crabs any time soon.

Water change: 30 gallons. 12 cups of D-D H2Ocean Magnesium Pro PLUS Salt Mix.

This is the second WC after depleting 3 buckets of Oceanic.

I really like the response my corals have with the D-D H2O. I don't have to boost alkalinity as much like I did with the Oceanic brand. I don't have much SPS corals so calcium levels stay with range during the WC's intervals.

The salt dissolves fast, but it does leave a small residue. I'll have to clean my mixing trash can once a year.

i really like the detail of that last shot

Thank you!

The 3 new corals are doing well and recovering. I'll have shots of then soon.

nice tang
what equipment do yuo shoot with ?

The recent photos are with my new 60D and 100L Macro. Sold off all of my various camera products to purchase that combo. I absolutely love them. I also have a 24-70L as my walk around, but for tank shots nothing compares to the 100L. Although my stitched tank photo below is shot with the 24-70L on a canon T1i. I'll have to redo that shot soon.

Fantastic! I just ordered my first ever coral online, from LiveAquaria.com (Wisconsin) Sunday. They are due to be delivered Today (Tuesday). and then I read this:

THIS HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK IS FOR NORTH CENTRAL ILLINOIS...
NORTHEAST ILLINOIS AND NORTHWEST INDIANA.

.DAY ONE...OVERNIGHT.

WEATHER HAZARDS EXPECTED:

THUNDERSTORMS:
DAMAGING WINDS IN EXCESS OF 70 MPH.
BRIEF TORRENTIAL DOWNPOURS.
OCCASIONAL CLOUD TO GROUND LIGHTNING.
AND POSSIBLY A TORNADO.

AREAS AFFECTED AND TIMING:

THE ENTIRE OUTLOOK AREA AFTER MIDNIGHT.

DISCUSSION:

THUNDERSTORMS ARE LIKELY TO DEVELOP ALONG AND AHEAD OF A COLD
FRONT OVER MISSOURI AND RACE RAPIDLY NORTHEASTWARD ACROSS
NORTHERN AND CENTRAL ILLINOIS LATE TONIGHT AND INTO EARLY
TUESDAY MORNING. GIVEN THE INTENSITY OF THE DEVELOPING STORM
SYSTEM...EXTREMELY POWERFUL WINDS ALOFT...AND UNSEASONABLY WARM
AIRMASS IN PLACE THE POTENTIAL EXISTS FOR THIS LINE OF STORMS TO
PRODUCE DAMAGING WINDS. WHILE NOT HIGH...THERE IS EVEN A THREAT
FOR A TORNADO OR TWO WITH THESE STORMS.

I took today off. 1. to receive the corals. 2. My head is about to explode with this pressure change stuff going on at the moment. *blah* Couldn't even sleep but a few hours.

New corals are doing great. opened/extended! The rescued corals are responding well to a clean water environment.


Next goal in the tank is to figure out a way to spread the ricordeas. The originals are glued (11) but the rest (30ish) are on the rock naturally. On top of that I cannot figure out the originals. I have a reference photo but they seemed to have shifted? I want to turn the entire right side base into a huge ricordea garden. I love these guys.

Tools I have: Bone cutters(7 inch) tweezer (8 inch) and scalpel. Do I just cut them at the base? or cut a section off them?

Nice tank. Have you went to mid west coral farms in Highland Park? It's a really nice store. And they have tons of coral. Two weeks ago I got a really nice red flower pot for $10.

http://midwestcoralfarms.com/index.php

Adam I never heard of them before, Read some reviews on RC after you posted that. Very nice. I will plan on visiting them next pay check.

This coral is the only one that came dislodged from the packaging. It is coming back and starting to green up.

Sneak peak. This coral was rather large for a frag:

And the whole coral frag!

Nice SPS.

Thanks adam!

Rescue/tank crash/gift hammer.

And the whole Hammer, 4 heads total.

I also got this coral as a rescue/gift. It is a Yuma I believe.



Then couple days later this little one shows up on the other side. Very small.



Enjoy!