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Coral Vue Hydros

Chew's 30 gallon fun box --- OCCY HOSTING THE SEBAE!


Chew_Magna

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I think it's time to pull my tank out of the beginner's section and let it make a name for itself.

This started off as a 10 gallon beast with second hand parts and a lot of noob errors. Originally this tank was set up at my place of work (lps) so it could cycle before taking it home. Eventually I bought a 15 gallon and transferred everything. Its gone through a lot of revisions and moving livestock back and forth from my pico, but I've finally settled on a finished product. All the contents from my pico are here now due to maintenance and time issues.

Hardware: 15 gallon AG tank, two Koralia 240's, Fluval 150w heater, LEDTRIC full spectrum par38 with the optics removed, Oceanic BioCube skimmer, AC50. Around 19lbs or Hawaiian black sand, somewhere around 13-18lbs of rock. I have no idea really, I've added and subtracted so much.

Livestock: three bar damsel <1", domino damsel <1", black clown goby, peppermint shrimp, two emerald crabs (one baby, one adult), various nassarius/cerith/astrea snails, red and blue leg hermits.

You probably wonder about the fish. I don't have a lot of color going there for sure. I ended up with this idea in my head that I wanted all my fish to be black, white, or black and white. Now with my par38 over the tank and all the fish being primarily black, it gives the tank a very mysterious feel.

The emerald crabs and peppermint will eventually be removed. The peppermint served his purpose and I want to replace the emeralds with a red mithrax. I also want to get a pom pom and some sexies.

Coral (off the top of my head): red lobo, green/yellow lobo, cabbage leather, colt, pulsing xenia, blue xenia, various zoas and palys, two rock flower nems, ball nem, favia, possible acan?, orange shroom, green shroom, green yuma, gsp, neon green and teal candy cane, anthelia.

And now with the pics! These are all new after putting the contents of my pico into this tank today. I also put my par38 over the tank to replace my T5HO setup.

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Nice build!

 

Nice ball anemone .Most of the time you dont know you have them cause they hide under rocks and such.

 

Yeah I know. I happened to notice them in someone else's lr tank and bought this little piece just to have the nem. I think I paid 75 cents for it. I have two now, hoping to get them growing on that one rock. That'll be neat.

 

I'm yanking this damn emerald crab. I put the trap in place this morning. He keeps pulling up coral after I super glue them down. He's being given to a co-worker who has a 125.

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Cool news today. I was returning an actinic bulb to another LFS since I'm not using T5 anymore and I found out I had an old store credit with them from a year ago. They had some new stuff in and I snatched a violet basslet, actually a purple dottyback, and an orange ric for a grand total of $2. :D

 

I know I'm over stocked for fish... But they're all babies right now and my tank is stable as a rock.

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Nice find on the credit!

 

That emerald is going to wreak havoc in the 125 if its a reef tank. :D

Ha! It is a reef and the guy already has one. His tank is all softies and sponges I think. And a clam. I may be getting some clove polyps from him soon. Sure beats ordering them myself and getting manhandled on shipping.

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Do you like the light you have? I'm getting the ecoxotic par38 455nm for my 6gal and I was wondering if you would think it would work out good for me? Love the tank, looks beautiful! and did you buy that stand somewhere or did you have it laying around?

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My stand? Lololol... It's a Walmart cheap ass dresser. I wouldn't normally put a tank on something like this but it happens to line up pretty well with the vertical sides, so it holds the weight pretty well.

 

I absolutely love this light. The pics don't really do it justice, but it's flat out amazing. I'm actually shocked at how well it covers the entirety of the tank by itself. I've been thinking of getting another one but honestly it isn't needed at all. I get very good coverage with the single light. The only dark spot is behind the right pillar, and even there everything lights up. I'm thinking now of keeping the single light. That way, if I get any low light coral I can put them in the (slightly) darker area.

 

Remember though that I took the optics off. With them on it only lights around half the tank and has a severe spotlight directly under the bulb.

 

And thanks for the compliment!

 

A little treat... I caught the Basterd.

 

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I'll get pics of the new additions shortly.

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I didn't mean about the tank stand :P I meant the light stand :P or should it be called a lamp? But I was worried about the light not reaching the whole tank, seems like ti wouldn't :P When I get one could you show me how to take out the optics out? and I was going to get 2 for my 10gal but it doesn't seem like its needed now! :D Would 1 be over kill for a 6 gallon?



Congrats on the catch by the way :)

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If you are talking about the blue clove polyps dont do it lol.I did and im regretting it cause they will take over everything.I still havent found anything that will eat them.

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Omg, typing this out for the third time because opera is a douche.

 

Anyway. The lamp is a 'scientific' lamp from Walmart with three hinges and a swivel base. I have it zip tied to a shelf beside the tank.

 

The optics are very simple to remove from the light. I don't know if they're all made the same, but the ones from LEDTRIC are very easy to work with. The optics are held on by a plate that's held in by four screws. Remove screws, plate comes off, optics fall out. Simple as that. The difficult part would be getting them back in.

 

Sooo... pics? OK. Pics.

 

Ric! Purple base with orange knobs and green outer knobbies.

 

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Remember I paid a dollar each for these. :D

 

That ric was brown in their tank. Colored up quite nicely don't ya think?

 

Fisheh! He's... purple.

 

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SeahawkReefer

Looks good... I'll be doing a 15gal with led par38 light too... seems like a popular setup. Why did you remove the optics? Beam too wide or narrow? Other than that how do you like the par38?

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$20 before store credit. They were marked as "orange ricordea" and were dirt brown.

 

I took the optics off because they don't do a good job of spreading or blending the light. Like I said earlier, with 90° optics this lights maybe half the tank and it does it with intense spot lighting. Shine a flashlight on a wall and you'll see what I mean. With the optics off I get a nice, even spread and its blended well. Its kind of a T5HO look with led intensity.

 

The only thing I worried about was losing par intensity. The optics do a good job of focusing light and I thought after removing them that it would spread too much. I see no signed of that from my coral. Nothing is reaching aside from some palys in the shade that need to be moved.

 

What really surprised me is how well the light hits all areas of the tank. In person looking at the tank you can't tell any difference from the center or the sides of the tank. It's all illuminated evenly.

 

If you look at the pic above of the new dottyback you can see a circle shadow on the sand in the corner of the tank. That's from my skimmer. Note that the shadow is in the corner. DIRECTLY under the skimmer. There is no light source directly over the skimmer, instead its about 10" away. Yet somehow the shadow falls as if it were directly above. I'm not sure how that works, but its a good example of how well that light covers the entire tank.

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I'd make a net top like the netting from bulkreefsupply. Eggcrate cuts out a lot of light as that is what it is meant to ,diffuse and spread it out. Those pseudochromis I've had 3 of the same type and they certainly do jump as all mine have.

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I figured they were jumpers. I really can't stand having a top of any sort but I'll keep this on for a few days just in case.

 

You should see what a par38 does on this chrome egg crate stuff lol.

 

Ooh shiney...

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Yeah I've had that chrome stuff it reflects like mad but also reduces the effectiveness of the light. In a 15 gallon it isn't terribly important though. I'm about to set up a 15 too.

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Chew_Magna, why do you use opera?! Use google chrome! :D

My net right now is through mobile device only. I was just testing browsers. On my desktop I use chrome.

 

 

 

I'm toying with the idea of derimming this. Thoughts?

 

I have some frags at work reserved for myself. Birdsnest, acro, elegance, and a cool blue and red paly. I'm not 100% sold on the acro or elegance. I'm worried I'd kill the acro and that the elegance may be too aggressive for my small tank.

 

I'm going to see about getting a couple more rock flowers ordered too. ;)

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Fiesta_reef_time

rep that black substrate!!

 

I got the Hawaii Black substrate in my tank too. I chose it because it blended with the background. Gonna switch back to regular substrate though whenever I do my next build.

 

Don't you love how all your corals stand out though under night LEDS! I bet that lobos stands out pretty good in your tank.

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