No worries here. I know it just makes the system that much better.

As Steve already knows I am in the process of making a fuge pod for these little tanks. It will slip into the middle two chambers. This little gizmo is going to make the task of taking the rubble out and cleaning it much easier.. This pod will also hold a chaeto chamber and submersable grow lights. Thanks Steve! I am hoping that this addition will make regular tank maintenance ALOT easier.

Update time.

Well I finally got around to picking up the maxi jet 900 today. I am a little upset by it. I used it along with the Hydor Flo. Now I have a sand storm. All the sand in the front right side of the tank is getting blown away. Now I have a pretty clean pane of glass showing. Anyone have any ideas of how to stop this. Oh how did you attach the flo to the output on the false wall. I took the two adaptors that would slip inside of each other and hooked it up that way. But it pushed the flo out an additional 1/2 inch. Do you think that additional lenght is what is aiding the sandstorm?

Well I just couldnt take the sand blowing around. I added two sections of loc line to the flo. With this addition I was able to position the flow just so the sand wasnt getting kicked up. But....After the huge sandstorm the left side of the tank between the glass and rocks got a little diatom bloom as well as what looked like a little cayno. Do you think the sandstorm could have caused this? I know that the flow was not moving water in that area.

As if you though I was taking to much time introducing anything to this tank... I have been pushed back even further. My ph droped down to 7.4 and I had a fast outbreak of dinos in the tank. I quickly figured that it was probably due to the extreemly low ph. So I dosed bionic to raise the alk and the ph along with a 2 week black out period. I probably did that wrong due to not using towels to completly black out the tank. But the dinos appear to be gone. I turned the lights on today for the first time. The ph was still lower than I would like 7.9. So I flipped the top of the tank open, opened the windows and turned on the ceiling fan. 4 hours the ph was 8.3ish. So note to self. Buy a little bitty fan and retro in to circulate fresh air into the tank area. Or would you recomend drilling some vents into the clear light cover to allow circuliation via the stock fan.

Diff question. Where can I get a silent replacement fan for this tank?

Thanks

Maybe nanotuners.com?

hum. I forgot about them. I will deff look at their site.
Thanks

I'VE GOT CRITTERS NOW!

After the long drawn out wait I finally got some critters for my tank. I had a few corals and one clam that were being kept at a friends house for the past few months. Jeff was holding some rics, zoas, palys and my clam for me. He was kind enough to give me two small clowns, a orange Florida ric, Golden sea mat and a green frogspawn. Thanks bro.

I am gonna let the critters settle for a few days then I'll post some pics.

LOL your not the only one. Emma came running in the living room screaming IISSSSSHHH IIISHSIE DADDEEEE!

Well a few days turned into alot of days. In that time Tyrone sent me a few zoa frags. Thanks dude..Enjoy that underground overflow that I didnt build. So w/o further adue here are a few pics. Please remember acrylic and grass is my forte not photography.













Found this little guy chilling in the back chamber the other night. After many folks said he is the devils spawn he got put back into my other tank. THE OHIO RIVER!






The future plans for this tank are a few more frags from Weety. "Thanks Lisa" Probably 4-6 sexies. And possable a tail spot. I am not sure if both of the clowns are going to be able to stay. The larger one is starting to ger rather agressive towards the smaller one.

Cool thread! Thanks for the help on the lr!

sweet crab

are you running stock lights? or do you got a sunpod? ive been wanting one of these guys for a while....lfs back home had one w/ the sunpod for only 200+ bucks! yeah i passed it up at the time.....i still kick my self bout it....looks good so far

did you ever find your trailer?

I've stuck with the stock light. This tank is going into my 18 month olds room. So I wanted to keep it simple. But if you know were a stock hood is I want one. I've got a few 70 MH's sitting around that I want to stuff into it. That way I can have it and ALOT of time to do it right. Your so lucky that I am not around you. I would kick you for passing that up. The light is worth that.

Sadly I never found my trailer. I talked to the police today. She informed me that the video was useless. I have a hard time believing that BUT!!!

the video is worthless? thats a bummer dude.....

nanotuners has spare canopys for about 90 bucks...lights and all....kinda steep if you ask me...
im itching to get one of these tanks....if LFS here will let me make payemts, i could fly under my wife's radar and have one in a month!

if you have a bunch of 70watt retros just laying around and have one to spare, i could take one off your hands.....just a thought..

Yep they are a little to steep for my blood. I have two mh setups, but I am not willing to let one go yet. I would be scabbing it from my last setup. I am still planning on setting that back up when we move.

Ah chit yer gonna be in trouble. She will find out.

Little update. Well the office got tore down and the tank got moved. As alot suggested I removed 4 gallons of water. Maned up and carried it to the kitchen. No problems at all. All the corals were fine, fish were just fishing away.

Any one got any ideas how to get a bit of gha out of a few zoa frags. I have pulled it, brushed it off many times but w/in a week its 1.25" long and the zoas will not open. Gettin kinda desprate. I dont want to have to frag a few polyps and toss the mother.

IDK about coral, so don't go trying this unless someone says it is ok, but in fw tanks you could just get a little h2o2 in a syringe, turn the pumps off and spot treat the algae with the h2o2. It might hurt the zoas, so don't go trying it unless someone says it's ok lol.

I'ma getting some more critters on Tuesday or Wednesday. Thanks Lisa! If I am a good boy she may even throw in a few sexies for me as well.

All in all this little tank is turning out to be a nice little setup. My little girl loves sitting on the kitchen counter and watching the fish. Just this morning she found the little feeding door. In went the little fingers and out came the giggles. The clowns love to come up and pick at your fingers. No worries I made sure that she didnt have any soap, lotions... that could hurt them. I cannot wait to move it into her room. What could be better than a multi hundred dollar night light. Dangit it needs to be in my room.

Joshua, "HONEY WE NEED A NEW TANK FOR OUR ROOM."
Pregnant Steph, Hand on hip. "UH, NO WE DONT. DONT EVEN THINK ABOUT IT MISTER!"
Joshua, Sighs
Steph, when pregnant.

Got a bit of a problem. I've gotta little GHA outbreak. I am not sure what has caused this. I am thinking that the lack of a water change for the past three weeks is probably the root cause. Well that and the sponge and floss had not been changed/cleaned for the same amt of time. So I did a 2 gallon WC, washed the sponge and changed the floss. I will change the carbon in a few hours.

Now I have to decide if I wanna add a new type of snail that will help eat the GHA. I thought that I woulda had enough snails that would of taken care of it. Guess not.

snails will, but nitrate and phosphate reduction helps also. Like WC's, replacing carbon etc.

Yeah I am sure the wc's will do more than snails. But you know how busy I've been in the past few weeks. Heck it aint gonna get any better. Wifey is about to asplode!

WOOT WOOT for Lisa "aka weetabix7".

Okay so Lisa hooked me up. Thank you so much, your the best weet. I owe ya!

So today I got a warm fuzzy package and it contained Armageddon Zoa frag, a French Silk Pie Zoa frag, a Fire & Ice Zoa frag, a small 2 headed Pink Tipped Green Frogspawn, a piece of Blue Cloves, AND 3 SEXY SHRIMP.

Everything but the Armageddon Zoa have opened up. I am sure that it will open up tomorrow.

But once again many many thanks out to the bestest mod ever. Thanks L.

YAY!!!!!!!



I was just wondering how everything was doing when I saw this post.
How are the shrimpies doing?
You should get their food in the mail soon, mebbe tomorrow.
I give them 1 pellet each, every day.

Oh my your so nice. You didnt have to mail their food. But thats makes you an even better reefer. Makin sure your babies are well feed Thanks. I love them. I cant wait for Emma to get to see them. I can just hear her now. SHRIMPPPPPE.

Man its been a LONG time since I've updated this thread. Sorry. But its not like it has a huge following. Any way the tank is growing in nicely. Thanks to the many additions from above mentioned great people. As fate would have it I am now itching for a new fish or two depending on the size. The tank currently has one true and one false perc. Both in the 1.5-1.75" range of size. I am still undecided on if I am going to be able to keep both of the clowns and have any other fish. I am kicking around the idea of a tailspot blenny, pajama cardinal, or a few small neon gobies. Oh or a firefish "not sure on if I want a purple or regular painted one" So short story what would you guys recomend? Oh it has to be a fish that will not eat my sexies.

Thanks

I'll try to get some pics posted in the next few days.

What size tank is this again?
If it's a Biocube 8, don't put another fish in there!
If the tank can support it, my vote is for a Tailspot Blenny.

PICCCSS

A fire fish would be cool (purple would be my choice), or a red banded hi-fin goby would be cool.

Its a 12 gallon.
Kray I'll get some pics as soon as I getta chance.
I was told that a tailspot would have the best personality that would interact with the little ones. I may have to go that route due to it being setup with little ones in mind.

Get some barnacle blenny action.

LOL wouldnt be at home due to not having any barnacles to hang in.

small holes in rocks also work

Where are the pics? You can't cut grass or treat lawns it is dark outside. Post some pics of the tank or some fairy ring or some snow mold or something grass boy.

Brad

Oh okay lawnman. FYI I've been reading about the daunting task I have before me. The heater core blew in my 98 f150 today. 21 pages of how do do it.
Cant cut grass after dark. Come on dude what are you a rookie. I've got lights, and have so duct taped a mag light to our trimmers. You may laugh, but I've done it. Heck some of the commercial props are only treated after dark. Nothing like 150+ 1000 watt mh's around the grounds. That grass grows year round. But here is a pic just for you Brad.



Yep your eyes are not playin games. Thats an f-150 pushing a 8 footer and stackin 7+ feet high.

Tank pics to come.

Okay so I lied. Some place in this thread I said I was gonna keep this tank stock. I guess you all knew that was a farce. Sorry. As the need for more light "speed" is our quest I am on the verge of embarking on the LED star cross voyager. Deepdvnarq is willing to set me up with 12 LED for this tank. Now I have the daunting task of gathering all the necessary info, parts, powersupply "hopefully an old Dell pwr.sup..."

This is what I want/wish for. I want this to hopefully be all contained within the stock AP hood. But I am willing to have the pwr supply outside the hood. I want the setup to be completly dimmable, retain the stock hood look, use of switches, use of stock fan placement. I do have a 160mm icecap fan that I would be willing to cool this setup with if I had to. This is all hinging on if I can find a sleek looking guard/filter like Cjerome used on his 24 gallon.

Am I asking to have my cake and eat it as well? What do you all think? Is this doable or am I chasing a unicorn?

Oh Brad, that heater core took 13.5 hours to replace. The entire dash had to be removed to gain access to that booger.

very doable. i am retroing my ap24, and i am unsure just how much i can cram under the stock guard. look around at other threads for supplies, and make sure to do homework befor ebuying anything, just got my wiring done, but now comes the fun of fitting it in the hood

fyi, you may not be able to use stock switches. i would reccomend a power supply for the blue LEDs and one for the white LEDs, and two timers. dimmers are another story, and are very doable. look around here, ther is plenty of info to get you started.

I will see if I can dig out a pic of the silverado pushing a pile up like that. Nice snoway I use those to. No I am not a rookie just when it gets dark it is long past time to go home. Freakiing heater cores are the worst. If you didn't know I was just messing with you. You a member over at plowsite?


Brad

Get those pics man. A friend of mine and I email storm pics to the local news stations all the time. Its always good to get your equipment in the pics. Free adds if you catch the drift. So you like your Snoway? We have 6 that we run. Is yours the new controler style or the older rocker switch type. We have both. The newer type we are having huge issues with the crimps slipping off the valves under the cover. So much so that we have to silicone them to the spades. I am a member at the TPS.com. I dont hang there much except to buy spare parts.

I knew you were dulling my blade with the rookie comment. But sometimes you gotta do what cha gotta do. And yes your right about the heater core. I'll trade the truck b4 I do that again.

Well time has been the biggest problem with this build. With the small tidbits of time that I have here is what I have done.

I finally got the power supply housed and wired up.



Finished power supply housing.



Really shiny heatsink.


Heatsink with LED's sitting. Still gotta drill/tap. Oh yea and decide how I am gonna space them.



How would you guys go. First pic of 2 x 6 or the second pic 3 x 4? I am leaning toward the 2nd only witht the LED choked in off the edge of the heatsink around 1.5" or so.

Yeah, of the two, I would go with the second one.

+1 I would go with the second one

wow TCK, that a real shiny heatsink! i should have you come over my house so you can do that to my rims. lol.
i still like the first layout. it will give you a lot better color blending and covereage of the tank. i fear that you will get too much color banding on the second layout. if you go with the second one, i would go with a lot tighter spacing. something like the spacing that Waterproof has on his thread.

but the heatsink really looks RAD.

I would go with the second one. Seems like there would be more coverage

Deep thanks for the compliments. That took about 5 mins to bring out that shine. I should have edged it with a piece of glass and 900 grit crocus cloth. That would have made it crazyjuice shiny, But I didnt. LOL I am the first dude to pull out the bucket of water and soap, wet sand my rims with it. I find that if you use compounds used for Stainless Steel they tend to yield a little better face on softer metals like alum.

Can you link me to Waters build/pics please. If I do wind up doing the 2nd pic I will choke it way off the edges unlike pictured.

here ya go TCk.
http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=188085

Looking good. Keep up the good work

Thanks for the link. Now if I can find those friggin nylon screw in L-ville. I dont wanna wait any longer.

Well I have had no luck locating 4-40 nylon screws in the ville. I am gonna have to use stainless with nylon washers. Not my first choice, but they can always be changed out in the future. Now I have to figure out my final spacing on the leds. I have decided to go with the 3 X 4 setup. My heatsink is 12 x 7.25. How far apart do you think I should space the leds apard?