Beware the Shallows

[jedimasterben]

That sounds like a sweet set up. Are you rocking massive 1080p frame rate or very playable 1440p?

2560x1440 Dell U2711

 

Anyway, I was more just having a chuckle at the fact you can get 400 PAR on the sandbed easy and you're designing your next light! That doesn't mean I'm not really excited to see what you do with your next build. Will it be based around bridgelux V10s?

 

Messing around with electronics is clearly a sickness, I really try to leave my custom comp builds alone til I deem they have been used long enough though, then I gut and redo as a fun little project. I havn't messed with any OC'ing though as most of what I play performs quite happily at stock.

I wouldn't call it a sickness, it's more of a... more of a... well, yeah, I guess sickness about covers it lol

[Alex B]

Heavy actinic tanks def are not for everyone. I used to be heavy into natural looking lighting. I think you misunderstood the direction I want to go in though. WWC display tank is chalices and sps up top. Super amazing tank, but obviously looks way better under blue led with all the chalices. I also want to start adding a ton of nice chalices and more lps.

 

I would run the following combo.

For led Im prob going with some 13 ups from the homie Fason.

For the 6 bulbs that are left I would have 2 actinics, 2 blue plus, and 2 coral plus.

 

I would run blue leds and the 2 actinics together for sun up/sun down (Wwc runs blue leds with ati actinics and it looks amazing)

I would then run all 6 bulbs and blue and white leds for my white period. However long it would be

 

If your into natural lit looking tanks, then a tank filled with chalices and popping sps prob doesnt appeal to you.

I do agree though that blue+ bulbs by themselves look dookie.

[jedimasterben]

Heavy actinic tanks def are not for everyone. I used to be heavy into natural looking lighting. I think you misunderstood the direction I want to go in though. WWC display tank is chalices and sps up top. Super amazing tank, but obviously looks way better under blue led with all the chalices. I also want to start adding a ton of nice chalices and more lps. I would run the following combo. For led Im prob going with some 13 ups from the homie Fason. For the 6 bulbs that are left I would have 2 actinics, 2 blue plus, and 2 coral plus. I would run blue leds and the 2 actinics together for sun up/sun down (Wwc runs blue leds with ati actinics and it looks amazing) I would then run all 6 bulbs and blue and white leds for my white period. However long it would be If your into natural lit looking tanks, then a tank filled with chalices and popping sps prob doesnt appeal to you. I do agree though that blue+ bulbs by themselves look dookie.

I see what you're saying now, I thought that you had an 8-bulb fixture for some reason and were planning on running six blue/actinic with blue LEDs lol. That would be SMURF CITY!

 

Keep in mind, though, that not all chalices and SPS have GFP or RFP and don't all look great under just blue light, the ones WWC has are cherry picked for that purpose

 

I do like mixing a lot of middle-violet with royal blue, it's a good looking combo with a touch of green to make it brighter to the eye. The soft glow from the violet is great.

[jedimasterben]

So the deal with the 8-bulb Sunpower I was hoping to buy (had the dinero ready for it and everything) fell through, so if anyone knows of a 6-8 bulb 39w Sunpower (dimmable is cool but not necessary), I'd appreciate a heads up

[jedimasterben]

Got my BrineShrimpDirect hatchery dish yesterday. Luckily it came with a bunch of artemia eggs because i forgot to order some lol. The dish is larger than I'd expected, but it certainly does what it says. I wasn't really sure how the artemia would be able to get from the outside to the inside, but after receiving it, it makes perfect sense, as it has a small plastic insert that they must swim under and over twice to get to the center section, which has a small little sieve that you just plop out and dump into the tank. I put the eggs in last night around 8PM, I had eggs that had already hatched around midnight when I went to bed, and after I woke up around 10AM I had quite a few that had hatched, so I fed the tank with it. With all the pumps on, it doesn't seem to elicit a reaction from anything, but I just fed again with the Gyre off (return pump still on, but low), and a couple of the gorgs had a feeding reaction and the chromis and springeri damsels were going nuts.

 

 

Sad thing, though, the pipe is nowhere to be found, one of the nems must have had an $18 snack last night :/

[jedimasterben]

Skimmer went batshit today. Luckily I hadn't topped off the tank or it would have spilled more water than it did (any time it overflows it pushes water over the side of the sump, I can't move it over any farther). Salinity is still ~36ppt, though, so it didn't spill much. Of course, I've been dosing 10mL per day of vinegar for the past couple of days, so the skimmer was probably almost full of thick, nasty skimmate. Even after dumping it and turning the output pipe completely open, it still was overflowing, so I just turned it off. This is why I have an algae scrubber, just for situations like this

 

 

I watched several recorded videos today of the MACNA presentations, and after hearing that Reef Gen and the bigass tank at the Long Island Aquarium run their potassium at 800-1200ppm (which is 2-3x seawater) with noticeable results, and with Nanotopia doing the final push, I've ordered a potassium test kit.

[Chris!]

Skimmer went batshit today. Luckily I hadn't topped off the tank or it would have spilled more water than it did (any time it overflows it pushes water over the side of the sump, I can't move it over any farther). Salinity is still ~36ppt, though, so it didn't spill much. Of course, I've been dosing 10mL per day of vinegar for the past couple of days, so the skimmer was probably almost full of thick, nasty skimmate. Even after dumping it and turning the output pipe completely open, it still was overflowing, so I just turned it off. This is why I have an algae scrubber, just for situations like this

 

What caused the overflow.... sounds like a regular thing???

 

I watched several recorded videos today of the MACNA presentations, and after hearing that Reef Gen and the bigass tank at the Long Island Aquarium run their potassium at 800-1200ppm (which is 2-3x seawater) with noticeable results, and with Nanotopia doing the final push, I've ordered a potassium test kit.

 

I have heard elevated potassium helps with a couple different colors(I wanna say red was the big one), don't recall which tho... or is there something different they are finding now as well?

[jedimasterben]

Dunno what caused it, but its done it two times before since I've had it, so its not something that's common or anything.

[metrokat]

Hi Benny

[jedimasterben]

Hi kitty

[itzju]

had the same tank not too long ago, love the dimensions on it.

 

your tank looks good, will be following along.

[jedimasterben]

[Polarcollision]

I watched several recorded videos today of the MACNA presentations, and after hearing that Reef Gen and the bigass tank at the Long Island Aquarium run their potassium at 800-1200ppm (which is 2-3x seawater) with noticeable results, and with Nanotopia doing the final push, I've ordered a potassium test kit.

 

Interesting - what caught your eye in their results?

[Mr. Microscope]

Cool! What's on those chips?

 

BTW, what's your verdict on the Deep Blue tank? Is the overflow noisey? Are there one or two pipes for overflow like a herbie(plus one for return)?

[metrokat]

that's a LOTTA light Benny. Is this a 150G upgrade?

[jedimasterben]

Interesting - what caught your eye in their results?

Mostly just something for me to tinker around with, as most of what applies to them won't apply to me (lots of corals, etc). They use logic in what potassium does and is necessary for and how it is depleted.

 

Cool! What's on those chips?

for now

 

BTW, what's your verdict on the Deep Blue tank? Is the overflow noisey? Are there one or two pipes for overflow like a herbie(plus one for return)?

One 1" drain, one 3/4" return, bottom corner drilled. Overflow is quiet so long as it is set up properly (not letting water fall into the overflow too far, having the hole in the Durso pipe the right size for the flow you have, etc).

 

that's a LOTTA light Benny. Is this a 150G upgrade?

No more light than I have now, just spread out across eight clusters instead of four.

[Mr. Microscope]

Gonna guess 2x NW, 4x RB, 2x Blue, 1x 420-430, 1x 415-420, 3x Lime

[jedimasterben]

Gonna guess 2x NW, 4x RB, 2x Blue, 1x 420-430, 1x 415-420, 3x Lime

Eh, you're on the right track

[metrokat]

Happy Anniversary Benny.

[jedimasterben]

Thanks kitty

 

Five years. Got her two very expensive well pumps as her 'main' gift lol. Got her a funny card, a mini rose bush, and a pint of Ben n Jerry's 'Half-Baked'.

 

'Sometimes marriage can be sweet. Sometimes, though, it can be prickly. Always worth it in the end, though.'

Also, yes, I got her an actual live rose bush, not cut roses. Cut flowers are possibly the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard. Plus, one of my cats eats flowers. Don't know what it is, but she can't stay away from them, so any flowers in the house quickly become not flowers lol.

[jedimasterben]

So I ordered the Salifert potassium test kit and Brightwell Potassion (wasn't interested in buying a kilogram each of KCl and K₂SO₄ lol). I ordered separately because I'm a dumb, but for some reason Aquacave still shipped them separately, despite receiving the orders within ~30 minutes of each other on Tuesday night. Go figure. Anyway, the Potassion is supposed to arrive today, but the test kit isn't going to show up until next week, still stuck in IL according to the tracking. lol

[jedimasterben]

Got the Brightwell Potassion in, no test kit of course, lol. I calculated how many grams were in a tablespoon, which is right at 17, so I added five in, so that should raise potassium by like 120ppm or so. Like I said earlier, I doubt I'll see the same results as Reef Gen, as I don't have the thousands of corals that they do, but it's something for me to tinker with, and I love to tinker.

[Jstn]

Let me know next time you want to make solutions, I have recipes for potassium. And I am a chemist by trade...

[jedimasterben]

Let me know next time you want to make solutions, I have recipes for potassium. And I am a chemist by trade...

Thanks for the offer

 

I just went with the Brightwell stuff because it is already a mix of KCL and K₂SO₄, and didn't feel like spending $40 for a giant amount of each supplement when I estimate that I don't nee that much, except just to raise the current amount. I am just going to dose this stuff dry for now, figure I'll add like 17g every few days, that should raise K by around 25ppm.

[Jstn]

Thanks for the offer

 

I just went with the Brightwell stuff because it is already a mix of KCL and K₂SO₄, and didn't feel like spending $40 for a giant amount of each supplement when I estimate that I don't nee that much, except just to raise the current amount. I am just going to dose this stuff dry for now, figure I'll add like 17g every few days, that should raise K by around 25ppm.

 

 

Did I mention I have chemicals...