s'valereef Posted February 7, 2008 Share Posted February 7, 2008 So I was lounging around the house early Saturday morning, doing a little work on the computer. Turned around and looked at my pathetic looking 10 gallon FW tank. My wife walked in and I told her, "I'm going tank shopping, how about you drain that POS while I'm out". So after looking at a few places I could not find anything I liked. Came home and thought I would check Craigslist for a used system. Only found one I liked, called the guy.....just sold it.....damn! Back out to look at another LFS. Told the guy what I wanted and first thing he showed me was the BC29, and it happened to be on sale for $239! More than I had wanted to spend but oh well, just means no movies or eating out for a while. Got the tank set up that afternoon with live sand and Sunday got my live rock. So far so good. Yesterday morning I had diatom bloom (thats the nasty brown crap right?) and by the time I got home from work it was everywhere. Did my run through all the tests and here's what I've got: Temp - 81deg SG - 1.023 pH - 8.4 Ammonia - 0 Nitrite - .25 Nitrate - 20 Not too many mods yet on the tank. I dumped the bio balls and used rubble. Going to add chaeto eventually to the second chamber. Also got to knock the floor out of chamber one so I can fit my heater there. I also made the passage from 1 to 2 bigger. Link to comment
Pickle010 Posted February 7, 2008 Share Posted February 7, 2008 Great Tank - you should be happy with it for a long time. Looks like you got the mods down - and that is deffinately a diatom bloom. I would suggest a power head on the opposite side that your return is on. You can see the diatoms mostly forming on the sand and right side of the tank. The additional flow would help with problems that those dead spots will cause later. Something like a Koralia 1 or 2 would do the trick. I chose to go without LR rubble in my back chambers - I actually pulled it all out after a year. Lot of arguements here for pro's and con's but in the end I found the arguement that the benefits of the rubble where dwarfed by the downside of the crappage that builds up back there compelling enough to remove it all. Glad I did. Good luck! Link to comment
s'valereef Posted February 7, 2008 Author Share Posted February 7, 2008 Great Tank - you should be happy with it for a long time. Looks like you got the mods down - and that is deffinately a diatom bloom. I would suggest a power head on the opposite side that your return is on. You can see the diatoms mostly forming on the sand and right side of the tank. The additional flow would help with problems that those dead spots will cause later. Something like a Koralia 1 or 2 would do the trick. I chose to go without LR rubble in my back chambers - I actually pulled it all out after a year. Lot of arguements here for pro's and con's but in the end I found the arguement that the benefits of the rubble where dwarfed by the downside of the crappage that builds up back there compelling enough to remove it all. Glad I did. Good luck! Thanks for the advise Pickle. I actually looked at a Koralia yesterday at my LFS, but after the money I spend on this thing this week I decided to wait till the next payday! I'm starting to see a bad trend here....Payday + reef = No $$ Link to comment
zcatzmeow Posted February 7, 2008 Share Posted February 7, 2008 Congrats! I too am a brand new BC29 owner and some how spent more than I had intended. It started out with a gift from my bf of an older used 24 something or other, but as I started researching fish I realized I would want more room. Hundreds of dollars later I too have a tank with rock & water! I need to put a link in my sig, but you can check my early adventure in the Z's adventure thread. I'm going to have fun watching how your tank goes since we set up around the same time. Did you go with cured or un-cured live rock? Live sand? Good luck! z Link to comment
s'valereef Posted February 7, 2008 Author Share Posted February 7, 2008 Did you go with cured or un-cured live rock? Live sand? Well I initially bought 24lbs of curred then found out that it was supposed to be 1lb or more per gallon. This past Monday I bought 10 more pounds of un-cured. I started with live sand too. Link to comment
s'valereef Posted February 10, 2008 Author Share Posted February 10, 2008 Been a bit busy this weekend doing some DYI enhancements for the tank. I was up till 2:00AM Friday night and worked on it all day yesterday (exept four trips to HomeDepo, Orchard Supply and my LFS). Seems like you always forget something when doing projects like this. First project was an ATO. Got the float switch from my local Granger store and the relay from Radio Shack. Already had the pump. Here's the whole set up. The float switch assembly With the slosh/snail guard. (compliments of Kaiser) Pump and relay mounted in a pencil box. Switch mounted in chamber one. Next project was a Fuge light. I converted chamber 2 to a fuge. I also wired in a fan on a 12v transformer. I was amazed at the difference the fan made. After I first put the light together I turned in on for about an hour and it got pretty darn hot. After I installed the fan I did the same thing and it was just barely warm. ...and here is the fuge with the light on. I was also not happy with my original aquascaping so I redid that. All in all a good productive weekend of moding my tank. Link to comment
divecj5 Posted February 11, 2008 Share Posted February 11, 2008 Nice...definitely looks like you've had a busy weekend with all of the mods. Looks like they all turned out great. Love how you put the pump and relay in a pencil box Looking forward to seeing your tank come along. Seems like you have some great DIY skills which is always good with these "All" in ones. Link to comment
s'valereef Posted March 6, 2008 Author Share Posted March 6, 2008 Here's the latest pics of my tank. Everything is going very well with it. I added a sump this week but have not gotten around to taking pics yet. Maybe tonight. And a little video. Link to comment
MSU Fan Posted March 6, 2008 Share Posted March 6, 2008 Hey, is there a particular reason that the ATO sensor is in chamber 1? Isn't that the only chamber with a consistent water level? Chambers 2/3 are the ones where the evap will occur. I like your rockwork. Very nice! Also, keep an eye on the overall temp of the tank. Seems that you were running in the upper end (81 deg) before you added the fuge light. Would hate to see that go much higher and lose those corals (love the bubble too!). Good luck and keep us posted! Link to comment
s'valereef Posted March 6, 2008 Author Share Posted March 6, 2008 Hey, is there a particular reason that the ATO sensor is in chamber 1? Isn't that the only chamber with a consistent water level? Chambers 2/3 are the ones where the evap will occur. I like your rockwork. Very nice! Also, keep an eye on the overall temp of the tank. Seems that you were running in the upper end (81 deg) before you added the fuge light. Would hate to see that go much higher and lose those corals (love the bubble too!). Good luck and keep us posted! Actually the ATO sensor is outa commission right now. I moved to a sump and have not got that far with it yet. Going camping this weekend up near Point Reyes so I wont get to it till next week. My temp fluctuates between 78.5 and 79.5 lately and since I added the sump its always a steady 78.9. Link to comment
divecj5 Posted March 7, 2008 Share Posted March 7, 2008 Looking good....congrats on it running for a month!!! Link to comment
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