New 20L Mixed Reef Build

[aparker]

The red alga is most likely a Gelidium species. G. pulchellum is a possibility, but there are 109 (!) recognized Gelidium species in algaebase.org (who knew), so I'll have to fire up some additional science-geek motivation to wade through them and figure out which I think it is.

 

It is cool to have something photosynthesizing in the tank, finally.

[NebraskaDocs]

Good to see you've got something in there after all of your hard work. How happy are you with the sump setup/fuge setup so far? Any changes that are needed as far as you can tell?

[aparker]

Good to see you've got something in there after all of your hard work. How happy are you with the sump setup/fuge setup so far? Any changes that are needed as far as you can tell?

Well, the most notable things about it so far are that:

 

1. the internal ballast in the Coralife 2x9W light gets HOT, which is a bit worrisome since it is sitting on top of a thin piece of acrylic.

 

2. The skimmer is LOUD (making any concerns about the closed loop pump being noisy irrelevant).

 

The other thing that is immediately obvious is that the tank is running too warm with it and the fuge all covered up. It is steady at 82F overnight, and goes up to 83F with the T5 light on. I think the pumps are actually the major source of heat. The bottom line, through, is that it is ~75F in my apt, so without a lot of evaporation, there isn't much of a heat sink available to it.

 

Since I intentionally went with an enclosed design to avoid dealing with fish jumping out and lots of topoff chores, I'm going to stick with that and get one of these little mini chillers for it. I'm feeling like that is a better solution in terms of "hands-off" stability for vacations etc.

[moe sizlack]

The new plumbing looks awesome!

[aparker]

The below link is for anyone who still thinks this is a "high tech" reef project(!)

 

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-06/totm/index.php

[aparker]

Tested water parameters this AM, just for fun/baseline purposes.

 

NH3 - ~0.02 mg/L (just barely detectable as color change on SeaChem kit.)

 

NO2 and NO3 - zero

 

Ca - 340 mg/L - apparently this is the Ca level of fresh IO at SG 1.025, as there's nothing in the tank to consume it just now. Will work on bumping this up with 2-part Ca/alk after the tank is fully cycled and water changes are down to maintenance level (I anticipate potentially doing fairly frequent large ones for the first couple of months, as needed to keep nutrient levels in check).

 

pH will be tested tonight or tomorrow, after I get my AC Jr set up and calibrated. What a cool device - it can control up to 32 power outlets with daisy-chained 8-plus units. One box could potentially operate lights, heat, cooling, dosing for 4-5 tanks....

[aparker]

And here is the second-to-last piece of the "how to make something simple really complicated" puzzle - a brain for the tank:

 

This turns out to be a really nice product that was easy to set up and program. It has many more features than I am using right now, but as I noted the other day, it has enough independent control channels to run at least 5 tanks...

 

I spent some time trying to tame the expanding cord mess, with partial success. Most everything is ziptied out of the way to one extent or another, but that's just a lot of wires to wedge into that small a space.

 

My live rock and sand order gets here TOMORROW! Pics of the (1st draft, at least) aquascape tomorrow night....

[moe sizlack]

Perhaps a wire loom is in order.

[aparker]

So first let me say that Reefer Madness is a great place to buy from, at least based on my one customer experience. I ordered 25 lbs of pre-cured LR from them (the only way they sell smaller than full-box lots), figuring it would at least have a head-start on the curing process. They called me immediately to let me know that the specific variety I had ordered (Fiji Buna Branch) was not yet cured to their standard, so did I want to wait a week to get that shipped, or substitute another variety? We ended up settling on some Indonesian rock they had that the guy I talked to (Kris Wray) said was very nice and very well cured. They shipped it immediately, for $6/lb *including* overnight delivery. Pretty amazing when you consider they already paid to hold it at least a month at their place. My local LFS charges $9/lb and I have to drive to get it!

 

Anyway, this was truly cured rock. Absolutely no smell after a day in a styrofoam box. None. No scum, no dying sponges, etc. Lots of coralline algae, albeit mostly bleached from being in a holding tank. But that will come back. And nice shapes, sized to look "big" but still fit in my 20L (I discussed tank size and piece selection with Kris and he did a great job picking rocks for me). I also got 10lbs of live sand in the shipment, and think I need some more. I put a couple cups in the fuge and the rest in the tank. Will probably get another 10 lbs of generic aragonite sand to fill it out.

 

So, here are some of the inevitable hazy shots of the new aquascape, with only the actinics on (ACjr had already cycled the daylight bulbs off). The water is already clearing (let's hear it for circulation) so I should have much better shots tomorrow.

 

Closeups:

 

 

 

And a FTS:

 

More tomorrow!

[NebraskaDocs]

Wow, that is a steal on LR. A few of my LFSs are up to like $11/pound for their nicest LR...that is crazy. Granted, I live about as far from an ocean as is possible (Nebraska), but that's still quite a racket. Anyway, even the hazy aquascape looks nice, and I'm jealous of that ACjr. The ACPros even have a feature where you can access your parameters from any computer with internet access...and...if your system gets out of whack you get a text message to your phone with whatever is going on. Crazy nice if you've got the cash. Well you've definitely gone first class with your equipment. Looking good.

[malla1ml]

Just curious... what do you think of the live sand you got from reefer maddness? I was thinking of ordering from there as well. Thanks

 

Matt-

[aparker]

Just curious... what do you think of the live sand you got from reefer maddness? I was thinking of ordering from there as well. Thanks

 

Matt-

 

Hey Matt,

 

Well, it was certainly clean, and a nice mix of diferent size grains from ~1mm up to small pieces of shell rubble. It did not have a lot of dust in it, so the tank cleared in <1 day. It does not seem to have tons of invertebrate life in it, at least based on what I've seen so far. I am in the process of getting an additional dose of sand/critters from IPSF as well. I'm going to continue to pursue sources of good microfauna until I feel that the tank has a really good, stable, diverse biota (to the extent it can in 20 gallons).

 

Hope that's helpful

[aparker]

Here are some cleared-up shots of the aquascape. Couldn't do it last night because the free internet in my apt was down again (get what you pay for, I suppose).

 

 

Starting to get a bit of tufty green algae (good) and purple-gray cyano (bad!) growing in my fuge. Time for a small snail or two. Don't want to add them too fast or they'll not have enough to eat. Also noticing some small copepods/amphipods (w/out a good microscope who knows which) and a few worms in the fuge. So live sand is doing its job.

 

Tested the water and saw 0 NH3, 0 NO2-, just a bit (under 0.5 mg/L) NO3-. So there's definitely a good pop'n of nitrifying bacteria on hand, thanks to well-aged rock. Will be interesting to see how this evolves.

 

Skimmer has been yielding very small amounts of stiff, fairly white foam. Not too much glop to skim out, but it seems to be getting what there is without excess water getting dumped out.

 

Tank is still running ~81F with the light fixture temporarily lifted up on a couple pieces of PVC tubing to allow evap. Mini-chiller should be here next week, then I can close it back up and not deal with topoff.

[seastar12]

Aack - more non-reef bandwidth!

 

But here goes:

 

56cm Soma Delancey frame (DB Tange Prestige)

Thompson stem

Nitto bar

Sugino track crank - 42T

Nitto pedals

Soma toe clips

Mavic Open Pros (32H) on Surly hubs (flip-flop 16T fixed/free)

Panaracer 700-25 touring tires

generic seatpost

Brooks leather saddle AND bar tape

Cane creek levers w/105 calipers (to be replaced with just-found-on-eBay NOS 70's Dia-compe non-areo levers and center-pull calipers for enhanced retro-cred).

 

It's a sweet way to get to work....

 

<end non-reef bandwidth consumption>

How much did everything cost you?

[aparker]

How much did everything cost you?

 

$1800 - half of that was the frame.

 

If you wanted to do a TIG welded Soma frame and were not so picky on components you could get one for <$1000.

[Matty1124]

this tank looks like its going to kick some balls... nice work all around... let me know what you think of that quite one pump im thinking of getting the same one for a closed loop my self... great start so far

[aparker]

this tank looks like its going to kick some balls... nice work all around... let me know what you think of that quite one pump im thinking of getting the same one for a closed loop my self... great start so far

 

Thanks - I'm spending WAAAY too much time planning livestock now...

 

The Quiet One is not terribly quiet, but you really can't hear it at all over the skimmer...

 

So far it is a lot of flow for not too many $$$. We'll see how long it lasts. It also adds a fair amount of heat to the system, but so do submerged powerheads. I don't really have any hard data to compare how much heat this pump versus another may be adding to the water.

 

Let us know which pump you get and how it works out.

[121a]

I'm not a fan of 20L but this is one of those setups that is just kick-@ss. Can't wait to see the whole system stocked. I have the same skimmer and mine takes out a bunch of crap on my 75g. It will go in my 20g soon though!

[aparker]

Yesterday I added another 20 lbs of substrate to the system (wet-shipped "live sand" from Florida). Sand bed is now 1" deep in display and 3-4" in the fuge. I should be getting some more spp. of macroalgae, 2 spp of snails, and various sand bed creatures (incl. teeny clams, teeny brittle stars, various worms) in the FedEx on Thursday. Also hits of sand and mud substrate from IPSF's tanks. Hopefully this will really kick the fuge into top gear - already there are a decent number of pods and some very small worms in the substrate, but probably 1% of what there could be.

 

The system will be much more stable, I think, when it is TEEMING with micro-life. Or so goes the theory.

[Mad Cow]

Really nice job and I noticed that skyline right away. For heat these lowered my 29 5 degrees with 150W Halide. Fans

 

They would fit nice over the fuge and you could set the AC Jr. to kick them on if the tank goes over 82. If you haven't already, check out bostonreefers.org. Most of the livestock in my tank is from BRS members.

[aparker]

If you haven't already, check out bostonreefers.org. Most of the livestock in my tank is from BRS members.

 

Thanks for the tip - is there any sort of regular meeting?

[Mad Cow]

Thanks for the tip - is there any sort of regular meeting?

 

Yes monthly and the next meeting is June 30th. There is also a marketplace where locals sell frags.

[aparker]

Brief H20 chemistry update; pics and story of IPSF critter infusion to come later...

 

pH:8.05

NH3: 0

NO2-: 0

NO3-: 0 (the obvious ~0.5mg/L that was readable last week is now gone)

Ca: 350 mg/L

dKH: 10 (equiv to 180 mg/L CaCO3)

 

Oh, and the temp probe for my ACJr died. They were very nice about agreeing to send a replacement.

[Diskusting]

Wow Im def taking notes off this setup.

[aparker]

So last Thursday I received a bunch of stuff from Indo Pacific Sea Farms (who were great about updating me with tracking numbers, ship date etc - very easy to do business with). I got one of the super combo specials, which basically allowed me to get a bunch of different "infrastructure" inverts and plants, including:

 

Both red and yellow Ogo, plus Sargassum macroalgae, all of which went into the fuge.

 

Strombus and Nassarius snails, of which maybe 80% went in the display tank, rest in the fuge.

 

Small black and white banded hermits (all in the display tank)

 

Small sand-dwelling clams, 80% in main tank. It was really interesting that most of these guys dug themselves into the sand instantly upon hitting it (literally within 2-3 min they were gone), while two didn't move. I thought for sure they were DOAs, but then after 5-6 hours both were gone. Just slow getting adjusted I suppose. I did acclimate everything to temp and then with a couple small additions of tank water over 30 min:

 

Also received large-ish "bristle" worms, although these guys were less spiny than what I've seen called bristle worms in the past, very small ophiuroid starfish, amphipods (2-4 mm in size), and hits of both coarse and fine, mudlike substrate, chock full o' life. Each of these items was split 50-50 between main tank and fuge. Here is a shot of the fuge now, to the extent it can be seen behind the new chiller (which is doing a great job keeping things at 78 degrees):

 

And the whole setup, which is rapidly taking over half of my very small kitchen:

 

In addition to all the above, I ordered a lime green leather coral and some Anthelia polyps from IPSF, because these were on their "pick 9 of the above" list. Here is the leather coral, which I think is a Sinularia, but let me know if you think differently:

 

And the polyps:

 

Seeing the polyps in the tank made it obvious that my fuge return was producing too linear a current in the tank, which was reducing the effectiveness of the SCWD-switched closed loop. So I replaced the Rio 800 that had been my fuge return with a much smaller Aqua Clear 20 PH. This has cut the flow through the fuge by ~70%, which is fine, it is still seeing several system volumes per hour. And the current in the main tank now goes back and forth, as planned. It is still quite strong, hopefully not too much so for these soft corals. The leather is spending much time expanded, but also closes down to a small clump 1-2 times a day. It is still adjusting, I'm sure, since this is just day 3 in its new home.

 

As freebies, IPSF also sent me a couple of red mushrooms on a small rock, which I placed under the cave ledge on the left side of the tank (there's no way these guys want to be in the full light from the T5s), and this nice Caulastrea, which I believe may be furcata based on the photos in Borneman, but again let me know if you think otherwise. It was very shrunken on arrival and it seemed like some of its shipping water had leaked, and it was unhappy about that. The below photo shows about as much as it has so far expanded:

 

I would be real interested to hear from anyone who has these about how you think this one looks. It has shed a bit of mucus since arriving, but not a lot. It is in a fairly high-flow region, but that's about the only kind of region this tank has.

 

So far I have been just doing 1-2 hours of daylight T5s per day, to avoid shocking things. The actinics are on 12 hrs a day.

 

Here also is a hermit crab, just for THOI: