matts 2 gallon pico reef Dymax IQ3

[gimptastic matt]

Tunze pump turned up today

Its smaller than i thought ill just need to widen the hole and it'll push in

Just waiting for the drill bit should be here by the weekend

[BGJ223]

Tunze pump turned up today

Its smaller than i thought ill just need to widen the hole and it'll push in

Just waiting for the drill bit should be here by the weekend

 

 

In an effort to save you some annoyances, I doubt the drill with the drill bit will fit. And do the the size of the pit, it won't work with a 90 degree adapter either.

I used a 90 degree adapter, along with conical grinding stone from a dremel. It fit perfect and made the perfect size hole for me.

[Reret10]

how much did the tank origonaly cost including the supplies but no livestock and what is your youtube channel

[gimptastic matt]

Ill use a hex drive stepped drill bitt and a 90 angle bit as i have them

but ill borrow a dremmel if it doesnt work

 

hi reret10

This is my cost run down

in £s sorry

 

Dymax iq3 £35 i got it really cheap as there usaully about 60

Extra robot light £12

25w Heater £15

digital thermoeter £3

Moon light strip and adapter £5

Waterproof led strip for chaeto £7

Tunze micro pump £11

Test kits and refractometer £60

I think thsts about it

 

My youtube channel is mattshep

hope this helps

[gimptastic matt]

Well i would have taken pictures of me setting up my extra pump

 

 

 

but!! As always i was boardering on insanity

 

drill didnt work batteries a totally buggered

couldnt find my other one

Anyway i got it done in the end

 

[gimptastic matt]

The pump was i bit over powered

and the overflow was struggling to keep up

so ive tinkered with it and got it somewhere im happy with

Ive ordered some foam discs to go under the feet to hopefully silence the pump a bit

cba doing any tests today lol

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

but im gona anyway lol

[gimptastic matt]

Week 14

 

Nitrite 0ppm

ammonia 0.25ppm

nitrate 0ppm

ph 8.0

Calcium 450ppm

phosphate 0.15ppm

kh 10

Salinity 1.026

Temp 25.5

[gimptastic matt]

Added the 10mm stickyback foam under the feet and noise has completely gone now

[gimptastic matt]

Learnt a new lesson today

i was about to do my eater change this morning and i put my airline piping in to make a siphon

any something came up so i left it there for 30 mins or so

wen i got back to it i sucked on the pipe to drain the water

and got a loverly kiss on my tounge from a bristleworm that had clumbed up the pipe

yup it could only happen to me

I hate them even more now :'(

 

 

Anyway week 15

 

Nitrite 0ppm

ammonia 0.15ppm

nitrate 0ppm

ph 8.0

Calcium 420ppm

phosphate 0.50ppm

kh 9

Salinity 1.024

Temp 26.5 (this is my new constant temp the heater is off but the new pump seems to have raised the temp)

[gimptastic matt]

Heatsink came yesterday

yay

 

Its 86mm x 126 x 35

i may add a 4th cluster of leds dont know yet

[Cheese-Lover]

 

Busted GU10's? Or did you just buy the rounds and solder your own LED's to them?

[gimptastic matt]

Yup i deconstructed some gu10s

[BGJ223]

Make sure snag keep the lights a good distance from the tank. You are pumping quite a buy of light into there

[gimptastic matt]

Make sure snag keep the lights a good distance from the tank. You are pumping quite a buy of light into there

What distance do you think?

 

Also its 12w now 6 blues 6 cool white

i switched up the diodes today to get a better color mix

[BGJ223]

With that many LEDs, you should raise it atleast 10 inches. That is a ton of light for this size tank.

[gimptastic matt]

I could stick with 9w

im just worried about the coverage

and after reading the led topic on here it recomended 10w for a 3 gallon

 

Switching out the diodes

my soldering skills aint the best as its my first time since i left school

14 years ago lol

[tylernt]

and after reading the led topic on here it recomended 10w for a 3 gallon

I can't run my IQ3 with the full 10W I built for it. Even at half power, my mushrooms walk across the rock to hide from the light.

 

10W might be great for SPS... mushies, not so much.

[BGJ223]

I am only running 6 Watts on mine. I think more would bleach my sps

[Cheese-Lover]

I could stick with 9w

im just worried about the coverage

and after reading the led topic on here it recomended 10w for a 3 gallon

 

Switching out the diodes

my soldering skills aint the best as its my first time since i left school

14 years ago lol

 

 

Using lens-less gu10 1w emitters... You are not going to have a coverage problem. They've gone from 30degree optics to 120-160degree emitters.

 

And with the lenses off you are not going to be having it 53452inches off the water. It just wont have enough focused light. If you want it high off the water you'll need to put the lenses back on.

[boxboy]

I hope this helps you. I use only 1 blue gu10 for moon lights on my 10g tank. 3" off the water. with the lenses off. All my corals think its day time haha. Frogspown fully extened. same with soas and Lps seem happy. I also had a 3gal pico. only used 1 blue and 1 white gu10 bulbs. was more than plenty for softys.

[gimptastic matt]

Cheers for the advice guys

Right ok ill try and do sum mods to it

i might put each cluster of 3 or half on a switch

i dunno im thinking ahead to upgradeing to a bigger tank

so might need the power

Im drilling the heatsink today if i get a chance

[gimptastic matt]

I started drilling the heatsink for the wires and flexi holder

 

Then some more holes for wires

 

Then we pushed 8 18 strand wires thru the flexi pipe

it was a tight fit

[gimptastic matt]

Then i puled the wires thru there holes

and stuck the leds down with thermal tape

 

And now ive come to a dead end i soldered the leds and

decided to test them when i tried to get power to the leds its not

getting past the driver and im stumped

can i run these leds on another driver

as im running the 4 that came in the gu10 fittings

[gimptastic matt]

Bump

any advice lads

[andrewkw]

I'm wondering why you are going to all this trouble when you could have just stuck a par 30 or par38 if you really needed more light over the tank and forgot about it..