Rio Grande Twins

[metrokat]

slow and steady with removing the bio balls.

[Deckoz2302]

SS how much is your total volume water, how many fish....how long has tank been set up? Either way you don't have a skimmer on, put your skimmer in some waterchange water to let it break in for a week, then pull it all out at once and install skimmer/replace carbon. If your skimmer is broken in before you pull and you do an imediate swap you shouldn't notice anything. Skimmer > bioballs & ceramic

[surgicalsense]

I'd take four of the bioballs out today, and yeah those white things also do the same job as the bioballs.

 

 

Will do! ... as soon as I get home!

 

slow and steady with removing the bio balls.

 

 

Will do!

 

SS how much is your total volume water, how many fish....how long has tank been set up? Either way you don't have a skimmer on, put your skimmer in some waterchange water to let it break in for a week, then pull it all out at once and install skimmer/replace carbon. If your skimmer is broken in before you pull and you do an imediate swap you shouldn't notice anything. Skimmer > bioballs & ceramic

 

IDK ... Water volume, whats that? 24G .. if that is what you mean.

3 Fish

Almost 5 months

[Deckoz2302]

I added 3 fish in 3 days - yea y'all will flame me for this. And tested every 2 hours for 2 days and every day the past week and didn't have any spike at all. If your skimmer is broken in before you pull you'll skim out the nasties quick, skip a day or two feeding after you pull. Do a water change, stir up some detritus to make the waterchange water as nasty as possible, toss a cube of frozen in the old water. Put skimmer in old water - break it in for a week, then adjust it for a couple days til you find its height, once it skims pull your balls and place the skimmer in. This way you avoid microbubbles in tank, don't worry about breaking in sweating bullets whether the params will spike or not because the skimmer is already broken in and skimming. Or you could mix what we have all said - prebreak in your skimmer and over that week pull out some bioballs, then when swap time comes pull the ceramic

[surgicalsense]

I added 3 fish in 3 days - yea y'all will flame me for this. And tested every 2 hours for 2 days and every day the past week. If your skimmer is broken in before you pull you'll skim out the nasties quick, skip a day or two feeding after you pull. Do a water change, stir up some detritus to make the waterchange water as nasty as possible, toss a cube of frozen in the old water. Put skimmer in old water - break it in for a week, then adjust it for a couple days til you find its height, once it skims pull your balls and place the skimmer in. This way you avoid microbubbles in tank, don't worry about breaking in sweating bullets whether the params will spike or not because the skimmer is already broken in and skimming

 

 

I think I compute this... LOL ... okay, I just got back in town yesterday and I pulled my sponges out of Ch.1 and the extra one in Ch. 2 (leaving the balls, etc) So I siphoned all that nasty crap out of Ch.1 only. Damn, if I would of known this sooner I would of kept that water and put the skimmer in it. My advised game plan now. I will removed what Joel told me to, my next water change will be this Sunday to get my tank back on schedule. I will keep some water as you advised and drop that skimmer in it. I will go from there, right. Even though I have read the manual about my Tunze, I do not know what you mean by, "finding it's height" what does this mean? please...

 

P.S ... Sorry Spiro, did not mean to turn this into skimmer advise, unless you want me request Eric to do Turd rock skits?

[Deckoz2302]

Yea sorry spiro. And pretty much all skimmers have a water height or venturi adjustment. Let it skim for a week without adjusting it, it will either skim very wet or not at all. After a week it should have a decent slime coat in the skimmer body, from there set either of the adjustments at the lowest level and wait a couple hours, if no skim turn it up a little and wait again, repeat until you get skimmate that will be close to your height. Once its installed in tank for a couple weeks you'll be able to fine tune it to get dark skimmate, it will start out yellow like dehydrated peepee once your close, if your wet it'll look like water with a drop of milk in it a little creamy lol

[JoelRHale]

We're not going to flame you deckoz other people, maybe in fact, I did something similar with my 20. A trick I learned is to bring a 5 gal bucket with you when you get lr and transport them in water. You have them fill up the bucket and zero scale to that weight. 2 benefits, you don't pay for any water weight and there's really zero die off. Then you just dump out enough water to prevent sloshing, cover it and drive carefully. My cuc was added day one and I think the results speak for themselves as 7 months later I've not lost one cuc member.

 

Once you have a handle on what you're doing there's a lot of wiggle room as long as you put careful thought into it.

 

Danielle, if you need dirtier water, chunk some fish food into the break in water. Mixing the two plans sounds like the best plan of attack to me

[Deckoz2302]

Yea see joel has the right idea....like I said also cube of frozen ...and yea joel my rock was suncured for 2 months in buckets, and I had precolonized denitrate, two established fuges and skimmer as precaution with 10g salt water premixed jic. Break in that skimmer! Haha

[surgicalsense]

Yea sorry spiro. And pretty much all skimmers have a water height or venturi adjustment. Let it skim for a week without adjusting it, it will either skim very wet or not at all. After a week it should have a decent slime coat in the skimmer body, from there set either of the adjustments at the lowest level and wait a couple hours, if no skim turn it up a little and wait again, repeat until you get skimmate that will be close to your height. Once its installed in tank for a couple weeks you'll be able to fine tune it to get dark skimmate, it will start out yellow like dehydrated peepee once your close, if your wet it'll look like water with a drop of milk in it a little creamy lol

 

 

Thank you! ... But, I still do not understand what you mean by, "height and skimmate" I will do my hw

[JoelRHale]

Gena had a skimmer on her old tank, worst case, she comes over and helps you which doesn't sound so bad

[surgicalsense]

Gena had a skimmer on her old tank, worst case, she comes over and helps you which doesn't sound so bad

 

 

I know, I know .... I can do this! Yay! Gena and I need to make our way to Vivid. My bf asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I was quite. Then within 30 seconds I said, "corals"!

 

 

My lights will have to wait a bit longer, I received a speeding ticket while driving back through Barstow, Ca. Damn this state, broke as it is and will now hitting us this way. My bf received one while we were leaving Flagstaff. Good grief!!!!

 

Least I have my fitration started and in the works.

[Spirofucci]

I couldn't give any better advice that what you got already. I haven't mentioned it but I'm having a hard time with my Tunze. Its hard to adjust and it been runnng for two weeks. Its either too wet or not enough bubbles are coming to the top of the cup. But I have read that it takes time to break in.

 

The only advice is be carful with your balls, there are quite delicate.

[Deckoz2302]

Spiro, you want it to look like no bubbles will ever make it to the top. Also how are you adjusting, via a knob or actually moving the entire skimmer body up or down out of the water. If by knob, try bringing the skimmer body out of the water some maybe 1/8th to 1/4 inch, reset the tunze adjustment knob to lowest setting and wait, if you have any foam in the collection cone after 2 or so hours it is gonna skim - you should only see foam in the bottom half of collection funnel after seveal hours, if its reached the top in under a few hours your skimming wet and need to lower the adjustment. I know it sounds silly but it should take about 5 -6 hours to build a nice frothly head when it starts to spew into the cup. Remember start low and only move adjustment up if your not getting anything after 6 or so hours. And when you adjust adjust in VERY small increments or you'll go from skimming nothing to skimming wet like wtf. PS if spiro and ss have the same skimmer - once spiro gets his adjusted as he seems further along, share your adjustment info - how fart out of waterskimmer body is , how much adjustment know is turned ect

 

 

Ps I know the head build time sounds like a long time but we want dry skimmate, once the head has matured after you clean the collection cup and your hours go by. As soon as that head is mature is like monkeys in a barrel the foam at the bottom hands the nasties to the next monkey and organics are pulled quickly, its just building a thick frothy organic head takes time, and once it has its on like donkey kong

[gena]

^ typo above is funny Don't edit it!

 

Spiro...you can get TOTM before 3 years...come on!!!!!

 

Danielle...break in the skimmer in a separate container for a week (like others have said) and in between that time start removing the bio-balls.

[Deckoz2302]

What typo lol

[gena]

What typo lol

Last sentence in first paragraph. yep...I can be immature too

[JoelRHale]

fart.

[gena]

fart.

 

I grew up the middle child, in between two brothers....we laughed about that a lot

[Deckoz2302]

You mean the "if your wet it'll look like water with a drop of milk in it, a little creamy" ? Haha oh yea its better that way

[iball1804]

[metrokat]

Yea sorry spiro. And pretty much all skimmers have a water height or venturi adjustment. Let it skim for a week without adjusting it, it will either skim very wet or not at all. After a week it should have a decent slime coat in the skimmer body, from there set either of the adjustments at the lowest level and wait a couple hours, if no skim turn it up a little and wait again, repeat until you get skimmate that will be close to your height. Once its installed in tank for a couple weeks you'll be able to fine tune it to get dark skimmate, it will start out yellow like dehydrated peepee once your close, if your wet it'll look like water with a drop of milk in it a little creamy lol

 

how do you know so much about everything and why dont you live in my building

[Spirofucci]

Thanks Decko and Gena!!!! Good head is hard to come by especially in beer and skimate

 

Yea, what typo???

[gena]

Thanks Decko and Gena!!!! Good head is hard to come by especially in beer and skimate

 

Yea, what typo???

I guess me and Joel are the only immature ones on here

[surgicalsense]

Oh I missed something

[Deckoz2302]

Lol my pops was a diy'er and I always loved building stuff. When most people read they read for enjoyment, I read for knowledge. And I've done a little bit of everything whether it be through personal experience or schooling. Also

Science is my strong suite, studying astrological physics, fluid dynamics, and previously took chem and bio 400 course's. These rest is taking the information in know from two different things and filling the void in between with a theory and testing that idea or finding other data that correlates. I know way to much useless information, but I love to share it haha.