Sammy's 20G Cube

[schgr.cube]

*ahem* pictures, mr. bb.

[sammy113]

take it easy little rascal

Came home about an hour ago to find out I have lots of strings of chaeto in my tank. There's no sand or anything to stick to so its swimming all over pisses me off. I don't have a small fish net to get it all easily so its going to swim overnight. Hopefully it will be sucked to the filter sock. Chaeto is like falling apart.I think I will remove it cause it is just clogging up my pump, flare nozzles and flying around I hate it

[schgr.cube]

take it easy little rascal

Came home about an hour ago to find out I have lots of strings of chaeto in my tank. There's no sand or anything to stick to so its swimming all over pisses me off. I don't have a small fish net to get it all easily so its going to swim overnight. Hopefully it will be sucked to the filter sock. Chaeto is like falling apart.I think I will remove it cause it is just clogging up my pump, flare nozzles and flying around I hate it

 

Yeah I think I'm going to go chaetoless for a while too because I have the same problem. I need to create a little net under the ice probe to keep it from getting caught in the pump.

[sammy113]

Yup, I did the same while I decide what to do or getting a new ball that doesn't tar apart, I used canvas in the baffles from the fuge to the pump

[sammy113]

Got my dimming shield which fits right on top of the Arduino. This baby allows me to use a 12V wall wart and it has a regulator to a constant 10V source. Now just need to put it together with the RTC and do some testings.

 

In other note. I changed my main pump for a bigger one and I'm running everything with just one pump. Plumbing is now: Drain to sump -> Skimmer -> Fuge -> Return pump -> Chiller and Fluidized reactor (connected with a T and ball valve) ->Chiller water returns to tank -> Reactor water returns to sump.

 

I'm officially running 100ml of NP Bio Pellets. My sump was turned off while I worked on it. Had some plumbing problems and had to go out and buy more PVC so it was close to 14 hours off. Tank was running with the Vortech only. Now that I turn on everything back, my skimmer is putting a lot of microbubbles out to the tank. Its been running now for more than 10 hours but still...

 

Mounted on arduino

[sammy113]

` Cha cha chá

 

 

[sammy113]

New Fish! Also bough coral but will wait a little more to take pics

McCosker's Flasher Wrasse

[RENDOG]

Please fix your photobucket issue....I really want to see the pictures of your tank.

[sammy113]

Ah crap! Exceeded bandwith... It will reset my monthly bandwith on may 4 or if I Go Pro, unlimited bandwith is it really worth to pay for that? Also unlimited web space for pics.

[sammy113]

 

[schgr.cube]

Jealous!

[sammy113]

Here's a short video of the Phosphate Checker in action

 

Reef water test

 

I was a little skeptic with the result in my reef water. Tested twice and had the same results. So I went to test tap water

 

Tap Water test

[sammy113]

New lamp housing

[schgr.cube]

holy ish!

[Falcon_Punch]

That Adruino board looks like fun! I was expecting the LED to pop! Haha! I want one of those Hanna PO4 Testers! Tanks is look sweet as usual! Mine is overgrown with hair algea... What was that bag of what looked like Kix Cereal?

[sammy113]

Falcon_Punch said:

That Adruino board looks like fun! I was expecting the LED to pop! Haha! I want one of those Hanna PO4 Testers! Tanks is look sweet as usual! Mine is overgrown with hair algea... What was that bag of what looked like Kix Cereal?

 

Arduino is fun. I have everything set. Only need to play a little bit with the code to do what I want. The Hanna checker is very nice. Easy to use and affordable.

 

What bag are you talking about?

That one?

 

Those are the responsible of keeping those phosphates where they are (I hope so) Bio Pellets are called the "solid vodka" in case you've heard about dosing vodka to your tank

[nanoreef-R]

Great! Let us know exactly if you see any (or how many) changes in your tank!

 

 

I was going to go with the NP but they needed to "tumble" and I can't provide that right now. Instead I'm going with Brightwell Aquatics NeoZeo (basically Zeolite) with MB7, and the result is amazing! I had some cyano (not mine, came on a frag ) and it dissapeared in 2 days!

[Falcon_Punch]

Ya Ive heard of Vodka Dosing. Im gonna have to go with 3 media reactors now!

[sammy113]

Great! Let us know exactly if you see any (or how many) changes in your tank!

 

 

I was going to go with the NP but they needed to "tumble" and I can't provide that right now. Instead I'm going with Brightwell Aquatics NeoZeo (basically Zeolite) with MB7, and the result is amazing! I had some cyano (not mine, came on a frag ) and it dissapeared in 2 days!

 

Will do

 

I was going all in with zeolite but got a bit scared with all the dosing stuff and having to shake the rocks everyday and what not. People doing the Zeo method where actually dosing MB7 and Vodka in place of the other BW product so I decided to just give NP Bipellets a shot. I actually started Biopellets and dose MB7 just to increase bacteria to populate the media. Will cut later though. Then after everything is running smooth I plan to dose some more Brightwell products like Amino acids, Potassium and a few more to make the color pop

 

I gotta follow your thread to see how your come along with Zeo. You don't see much nanos in this

 

Ya Ive heard of Vodka Dosing. Im gonna have to go with 3 media reactors now!

Haha why 3 reactors? Watch out what your putting in there! If you plan to use one for carbon, I suggest you to have some kind of valve. You don't want strong flow in carbon or you could just bleach everything. Also is very important the amount of Carbon you put in there. Sometime is better to passively run it in a media bag in the sump.

 

I guess one is for the NP Biopellets and the other?

[Falcon_Punch]

Well maybe not three haha! I was thinking 2,1 for GFO and 1 for carbon. I was gonna use one pump(MJ600) to run both reactors. How would too much flow through carbon bleach everything? If your experience with these pellets I may just go with the pellets.

[sammy113]

Well maybe not three haha! I was thinking 2,1 for GFO and 1 for carbon. I was gonna use one pump(MJ600) to run both reactors. How would too much flow through carbon bleach everything? If your experience with these pellets I may just go with the pellets.

 

Well running Biopellets will not need to use GFO or anything. Just some carbon I'd say. They're suppose to remove Nitrates and Phosphates.

 

Carbon is very powerful. Sometimes we don't think about this but too much carbon can remove too much essential elements and eventually will become a pain keeping corals. Some people don't even run carbon 24/7

Same way happens if you don't have too much carbon, but you do have too much flow through it.

 

I've read about people that has changed or started to run carbon and water becomes so crystal clear that light penetrates more powerful and ends up burning tips in Acros and other SPS (but that is just stories, can't really tell you if its true)

 

Guess I just stick to what I have learned from others and run carbon in a reactor at a very low flow (75 GPH) and a specific quantity depending on how many gallons of water I have

 

Again, maybe this is all bullsh!t but kinda makes sense to me and so far its working. One thing I've learned in this hobby: What works for others might not work the same for you.

Hope it helps

[littlelacho]

Again....Wow. You have done an excellent job. Just incredible!

[sammy113]

Its been a while since I don't update here. Tank has been through though days. I ran out of skimmer for a couple of days... The impeller broke. Add to that that the tank started to leak where the bottom panel joins with the back wall ( I'm blaming the Vortech Wave Mode to that. Actually the manual says "not every tank is able to hold the extra stress")

 

So... I decided to just build a new one and then transfer everything and decided to make a few changes to the old tank. One of them, smaller overflow. I wanted a small overflow box just like glass-holes designs. Also wanted to have my plumbing drilling the back not the bottom (its easier to spot any leaks or problems)

 

 

Then I realized, wait!?!?! The plumbing is now visible from the back! Oh crap! thats why the other design was like that! Crap, so I had to paint the back. Not a fan of the black wall in a frameless cube like this but oh well... It will help to hide the Vortech as well.

Also made all new plumbing, new design for ease of maintenance. Added more universal unions and ball valves to control the water coming from the Mag 9.5 to the chiller and the bio pellets reactor. A lot more organized now and I love how I can close the ball valve to the return and still have the pump running through the bio pellets and skimmer so I just take out 3-4 gallons from the display and the water level in the sump remain the same. Takes less than 5 minutes to do it.

 

Also made a new lamp stand and a new lamp casing which turned out very nice

Also swapped the optics from 80 degree to 60 degree, raised the lamp to 10" above water level and I'm finally running Arduino on my lamp for sunrise/sunset. I love it!

 

After all that, also added the new rock work I did and now I'm basically re-stocking again cause I lost a few corals. Yeah a few not to say a lot New rock was cure for about a month and now I'm having a little brown over it but overall is doing good. I'm waiting a little to settle and buy a nice SPS frag pack. Also I'm getting a few zoa frags locally for free (See SCHG, I can also get free stuff! )

 

Yeah, I owe a FTS but will take it after I clean up the tank a little. Have some died SPS frags around the sandbed

[schgr.cube]

!!!! NICE! Need to see this thing filled.

And I think I'm running out of getting freebies, lol.

[pazhope]

Hi Samy, I have the same dilemma with the back, I think instead of black I will go with a frosted glass, have you consider that?

They sell some films at HD that you can attach to the glass and make it look as frosted. I will also use clear hose, an I think that will make the trick.

 

I have a question, how loud is that overflow? I am going to do one my self but I think I will add a 90 deg elbow in the intake, pointing down in order to avoid the gurgling noise, is that necessary?