My 3rd Reef Tank - Build Thread

[IMaNoob]

WOW, coolest nano I have ever seen!

[mathias999us]

Ancelot - Thanks. That was the state of the tank about 2 weeks ago. I've been giving it some TLC for the past couple weeks, and it's really looking a lot better already. Thanks for the encouragement.

 

IMaNoob - Thanks!

[mathias999us]

A number of people have suggested to me that my lighting is probably too much on this tank.

 

Any opinions on that?

[pismo_reefer]

dude!!! you are my freakin' hero! that tank is GD amazing.

[mathias999us]

I was doing a water change on Tuesday afternoon. When the water change was done and I went to turn the pumps back on, and the main pump would not start back up. System's been up for about 10 months, so I knew it was just buildup and it needed a cleaning.

 

The shutoff valves underneath the tank have been getting harder and harder to close for a while, due to buildup inside them as well I assume. So, they've required more and more force to close. I was shutting them off to remove the pump for a cleaning, and I noticed a steady drip started, originating above the shutoff valve on the left return line. Looking at it more closely, the short threaded pipe that connects the shutoff valve to the bulkhead for the return manifold had split at one of the threads. Then I attempted to snug the pipe up a but more, hoping to cover the bad part of the threads with the threads on the valve, and the bulkhead threads cracked.

 

This is bad... very bad. AFAIK, I had no choice but to drain the tank to repair this. All the water from the display comes back down through the return jets and manifold to this one point. With a tank steadily leaking onto my wood flooring, I quickly decided it needed to be drained. I just happened to set up a 55g FOWLR about 6 feet away from this tank about 2 weeks ago. Not ideal by any means, but it was bought used as an established tank and set up with established rock and bioballs, and I didn't have a cycle.

 

In the 55 everything went. Really unfortunate, made me very sad, my wrasse htich-hiked out on a piece of rock, and wound up on the floor for an unknown amount of time. I put him in a guppy breeder in the 55, but he died a few hours later. Damn me.

 

This is an inherent flaw in the design of this tank, there are certain points where if the plumbing underneath goes bad, you are completely screwed and have to drain the entire system. Since I NEVER want this to happen again, I capped all four bulkheads. I redid the plumbing in the rear sump chamber to use two maxijet 1200's with the wavemaker in the reefkeeper. I also added a Koralia Nano to each end of the display tank. This gives me more flow than the old closed loop, less wattage consumed, and 99% less probability of ever having a leak again. Plus I have a lot more space in the cabinet under the tank now, maybe for an automatic 2-part dosing system.

 

I put the corals and angel back in the long nano, but the 'scaping is quite different now, and I didn't put all the rock back in (I always thought there was too much rock in the tank). The system was down for about 24 hours total.

 

Ahhh, the risks of a DIYer I guess.

[debbeach13]

Sorry here about that. It must ahve been APITA! Some times this type of thing leads to some thing new and even better. I am sure it is all going to work out. I have always been a keep it as simple as possible in my tanks. Now you will not worry so much when you leave the house and you may even sleep better. No floods to worry about.

So how about a couple pictures of the new / used 55 and this tank.

[mathias999us]

debbeach - Thanks for the kind word. I hope you are right, I'd like to think that in the long-run I'll look back and view this as an event that moved things in a different and positive direction. Tough to keep that positive attitude right after in happened though.

 

I'll try to post some pics of my tanks soon.

[mathias999us]

OK, here are some updated pics I took tonight. I'll post before and after pics. Before is from 3/26/08. After is from tonight, 11/2/08.

 

Entryway to my house. You can see my new 55g FOWLR I recently set up:

 

Here's a FTS of the FOWLR. Just have a few Green Chromis and a yellow-tail damsel that came with the tank for now. This is where I put the contents of the long nano during the emergency situation:

 

Echino. I think it might make a comeback though, because there was hardly anything left of it a month ago:

Before

After:

 

Hammer. Not much bigger, but a lot of green color has come back since I cut the lights in half, and it is really splitty into two heads now:

Before:

After:

 

Yuma Ric.

Before:

After:

 

Caulastrea. You can see I lost a strip of heads along and over the top section. But the heads that are left seem to be doing great, and are really vibrant.

Before:

After:

 

Trachyphyllia. I think it's doing OK. It was doing REALLY bad about a month ago, and it has made quite a comeback. I actually think it almost looks better now than in the before pic. I attribute this to better flow in the tank with my new configuration.

Before:

After:

[mathias999us]

A heartbreaker - I lost a few polyps on my blasto wellsi, which was disappointing. But the polyps that are left seem happier and more colorful than ever, and there are new polyps popping up all over the place.

Before:

After:

 

Christmas Favia. This one has grown a fair bit, spreading onto the surrounding rock, and some obvious polyp divisions:

Before:

After:

 

I also have this little sprig of Rhodophyta that still seems to be hanging on.

 

This unknown (favia?) coral has definitely grown, spread on to the rock, and went from two mouths to 4, with a 5th one in progress.

Before:

After:

 

This other one has grown too, but still hard to take a pic of.

 

Here is some undeniable growth. My purple acro frag has nearly doubled in size.

Before:

After:

 

Little Merleti frag is about the same.

Before:

After:

 

Frogspawn isn't really what it used to be. It has been split to two different areas in the tank now as well.

Before:

After:

Another After:

[mathias999us]

The tiny acro frag that I had to perform surgery on has grown too.

Before:

After:

 

Here's some decent growth in my stylo.

Before:

After:

 

Here's a pretty drastic change too. The leng sy lost ALL of its green color, and is completely hot pink now. It's grown a bit too.

Before:

After (Sammy decided to hope in this pic too):

 

The hydno is doing well now.

Before:

After:

Another after:

 

My fungia has done fantastic.

Before:

After:

 

Couple of "after" FTSs:

 

MY purple and orange rics and rhodactis went into my other nano:

[mathias999us]

I'm going to try to post an update and new pics of my tank monthly.

 

The tank has been coming along well over the past month. Shortly after my last update, the Pygmy Angel died. It was really weird, I was watching it as it was happily eating cyclopeez, then all of a sudden it started freaking out, thrashing against the surface for about 30 seconds, then dropped stone-cold dead. I've certainly never seen a fish die like that before. One minute perfectly happy and eating as usual, and 60 seconds later, stone cold dead. I'm glad I actually witnessed it though, or I would have been wracking my brain trying to figure out what caused him to die (What's wrong with my water???, etc.).

 

Other than that, I have really been keeping on top of my maintenance, and I put a few additions into the tank. Last week I decided to do a 50% WC on the tank, and without doubt, the livestock visibly appreciated it. I've been doing 20% changes once per week on this tank, but I think I'm going to start doing a 50% change either every other week, or once per month.

 

Pics coming shortly - thanks for reading.

[mathias999us]

Ancora. Expansion isn't great, but color is better now - 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

Another angle from 12/1/2008:

 

Yuma Ric, looks roughly the same - 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

This thing is definitely headed downhill. My problem is that I don't really know what it is. Got it off the bottom of the bargain tank at the LFS - 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

I don't think I took a pic of my xenia in November, so here's a 12/1/2008 pic at least:

[mathias999us]

Caulastrea - the heads that were healthy last time have made some nice progress, and have really colored up. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

Another angle on 12/1/2008:

 

The Trachyphyllia brain has made GREAT progress. Very pleased with this. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

A new arrival, orange digitata. Still need to take it off the plug and mount it somewhere. 12/1/2008:

[mathias999us]

Some modest growth on my blasto wellsi. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Little rhodophyta sprout may have grown a bit. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Some noticeable growth in the christmas favia. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Wow, some real decent growth on green thing (still dunno, favia is best guess?). 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

[mathias999us]

My orange bam bams from my other nano had spread sufficiently onto the surrounding rocks that I decided to take this chunk out of the colony and put it in my long nano. Love these things, so bright. Feel free to hit me up alpine. 12/1/2008:

 

Too bad I shot it from a different angle, but WOW, this acro is growing like a weed! 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Another new addition to the tank, my first clam, a crocea. It has been in the tank for almost 3 weeks now, and it seems to be doing really well. I noticed an immediate increase in my calc/alk demand after adding this, and had to step up the 2-part regime accordingly. 12/1/2008:

 

There has been some slight growth on these frogspawn heads. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

[mathias999us]

The stylophophora pistillata is growing really fast too. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Another new addition to the tank, a frag of "superman" monti. 12/1/2008:

 

My other blasto has shown some modest growth, but it's definitely a slow grower for me. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

I threw these yellow zoas from my other nano in here too. 12/1/2008:

[mathias999us]

Some definite growth on my other acro frag. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

And WOW, the Leng Sy is growing really fast too, and reducing the lights brought some of the green color back to it too. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Hydnophora is growing and doing great also. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Again, some modest growth on my other frogspawn heads. Better than I had thought. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

[mathias999us]

Fungia, growing and eating like a pig as usual. 11/2/2008:

12/1/2008:

 

Some blue-legged hermit mountain climbing. 12/1/2008:

 

Got some cool feather duster coming up in the rockwork. 12/1/2008:

[debbeach13]

Looks like things have really turned around. Glad you are showing some growth. How many tanks are you running now?

[mathias999us]

And finally, I got a couple new fish. First is a purple firefish. Beautiful fish, but he's very shy, and hides most of the time. I was lucky to get a picture at all. He's been in the tank for almost 3 weeks now. 12/1/2008:

 

And also, I got a Yashia goby and Randall's pistol shrimp pair around the same time. Love these guys, they set up shop in the right end of the tank in a great viewing location. My wife is particularly fond of these too, so any of you who have wives that aren't in to your reef hobby, these guys might help a bit. The goby is out all the time, but I was fortunate enough to snag a shot of the shrimp. The shrimp is out a lot too, but when the goby sees me approach with the camera, he usually warns the shrimp to hide. 12/1/2008:

 

debbeach - Thanks! Yes, things are on the up-and-up now. I am currently running this tank, an 8 gallon AIO cube with zoanthids, and a 55g FOWLR. I am also collecting equipment for starting a 90 that I will probably make into an acropora tank.

[lakshwadeep]

I like the goby/pistol combo

[mathias999us]

Thanks lakshwadeep! They have been a big hit in my household as well.

[debbeach13]

Those are great new additions. The purple firefish is sweet and the goby/shrimp combo will prove to be a fasinating combo to watch. Just be warned the any coral on the sand bed that is small enough for the shrimp to move may be dragged under the rock scape so that his cave will be more decorated and cozy. At least that is what my shrimp/goby pair liked to do.

[mathias999us]

Thanks for the warning debbeach. Fortunately there's nothing small enough for him to move on his end of the tank, but I'll certainly keep that in mind when placing things. He was making trails and burrowing under my fungia, so I can see where that might be a concern with smaller corals.

 

Thanks again.

[GobyInPeace]

This is one of my favorite tanks! Your craftsmanship is top notch. Once the price of LED modules come down I just may set up something similar but more towards the 40-70G. range. If I do set it up I'll have to come back and thank you for the inspiration!