metrokat Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 Chipp, I'm sorry to hear of the silicone poisoning. Loosing little creatures is a hard pill to swallow. I hope that slowly building back to a heathy thriving tank is around the corner. Hang in there. Link to comment
chippwalters Posted October 7, 2012 Author Share Posted October 7, 2012 Chipp, I'm sorry to hear of the silicone poisoning. Loosing little creatures is a hard pill to swallow.I hope that slowly building back to a heathy thriving tank is around the corner. Hang in there. Thanks Pooja. I'm hanging in... Link to comment
Spirofucci Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 I'm staying tuned for progress on this tank! Link to comment
chippwalters Posted October 7, 2012 Author Share Posted October 7, 2012 I'm staying tuned for progress on this tank! Not much to report yet. Everything's gone except the acans and the dendro. They're at a friends place and seem to be recovering in his high nutrient lagoon. He's a retailer of macros and some really really nice exotic live rock (expensive, but is the only way to own some very rare and unique corals as it's mined directly from the Caribbean and then hand manicured). I also left the two duncans with him, but they sure look like goners. He said he's seen worse come back-- so we'll see. And, my Pom Pom crab and a couple hermits made it this far too. They're enjoying the lagoon. Not sure I'll see them again. This week I reapplied aquarium safe silicon to full cleaned and dried tanks (both DT and sump) and am letting it cure for another week. I'll be in New Orleans at a conference on the 20th and will have to wait until the 26th to actually fill up the tank and sump with water, crushed coral, and a few test snails. If everything survives for a week, I'll add the live rock and let things settle down before beginning to add new corals. Here's a pic from some of the exotic LR my friend sells. I don't even know what some of the stuff on it is.. Link to comment
Spirofucci Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 Not much to report yet. Everything's gone except the acans and the dendro. They're at a friends place and seem to be recovering in his high nutrient lagoon. He's a retailer of macros and some really really nice exotic live rock (expensive, but is the only way to own some very rare and unique corals as it's mined directly from the Caribbean and then hand manicured). I also left the two duncans with him, but they sure look like goners. He said he's seen worse come back-- so we'll see. And, my Pom Pom crab and a couple hermits made it this far too. They're enjoying the lagoon. Not sure I'll see them again. This week I reapplied aquarium safe silicon to full cleaned and dried tanks (both DT and sump) and am letting it cure for another week. I'll be in New Orleans at a conference on the 20th and will have to wait until the 26th to actually fill up the tank and sump with water, crushed coral, and a few test snails. If everything survives for a week, I'll add the live rock and let things settle down before beginning to add new corals. Here's a pic from some of the exotic LR my friend sells. I don't even know what some of the stuff on it is.. Glad to hear you're gonna give it another go! That LR is amazing! Does your friend have a web site? You should post it! Link to comment
chippwalters Posted October 7, 2012 Author Share Posted October 7, 2012 Glad to hear you're gonna give it another go! That LR is amazing! Does your friend have a web site? You should post it! Yes, but he doesn't post his LR on it. It's only for locals (Austin) as he curates it for awhile after being hand picked and flown in. Here's another pic: And this one is particularly interesting because the 10" gorgonian actually came on the LR alive. The diver takes tremendous care to make sure as much life as possible survives on the LR. Link to comment
metrokat Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 That is my fav kind of rock. I bought all of mine, uncured from the same waters. Link to comment
albertthiel Posted October 7, 2012 Share Posted October 7, 2012 Nope. As I asked around, it appears it's a great networking show-- where folks get to reacquaint and make new relationships. I saw some folks from my local reef club, got some questions answered from some vendors, saw some neat tanks. There were A LOT of corals and frags for sale, which was curious to me as I wasn't sure how people could pay for frags on Friday, then leave town on Sunday, and be assured they would stay alive. I guess I'm spoiled as we have pretty great LFS's here and I'm pretty happy with the quality of corals locally. I did learn a few things about my Radion and Reef Octopus skimmer which was nice. And I saw some really nice picassos, which I'm keeping my eye on now that my tank is kaput. Tank update: I cleared out everything, siphoned off the DT water and pulled off my siliconed drain-- and sure enough, the smell of vinegar and ammonia greeted me. Turns out I put too much silicone inside the drain hose and it never dried. Shane called and put forth a plan. He said to bring back all the LR I just purchased, and he'd replace it. He also gave me a new bag of substrate and a new filter-- which was awfully generous of him as this problem was only of my doing, not his, and he certainly owes me nothing. I'm cleaning the new sump and will wait for it to dry out for a couple days-- same with DT. Then I'll silicone the drain in place and let it dry a couple days. Next, I'll fill the sump and DT with water, add substrate, some bacteria and a snail and small healthy frag, and watch for a couple days. If everything lives, we'll put in the new LR. If it doesn't I'll be quitting the hobby and selling it all real cheap! JK ;-) Interesting remarks about MACNA ... and yes I guess that is what happens, one meets new people and a number one already knows, and of course vendors make it a great marketing event, but you are right about buying and then keeping the frags alive, unless the vendor holds on to them till the show is over ... (maybe) How were the Lectures as that is always what I was interested in ... And on your tank .. super of Shane to do all of that indeed and good luck with getting it all going again. I am sure you'll get it under control Chip. Link to comment
metrokat Posted October 16, 2012 Share Posted October 16, 2012 Getting warmer. I'm still not a fan of the crushed coral but I understand the reasons for it. Link to comment
chippwalters Posted January 13, 2013 Author Share Posted January 13, 2013 For any of you around still interested... My tank crashed hard several months ago. Silicone poisoning AFAICT. Lost everything. My fault. Used the wrong brand. Just now starting to get things dialed in. Using new 100% cleaned and cured Tukani LR ( sump and LR from Shane at Fishy Business - check out his link where he talks about LR) in a completely darkened sump. Extremely low upkeep-- just a bag of charcoal, Purigen, and ATO (tbd). Zero algae-- pretty amazing as I never clean it. Hope it stays that way. :-) Recently landed some pretty sweet corals including a choice Red Blaze Goniopora from Austin Aquafarms. I'm really lucky those guys are in town. They mostly sell over the Internet and are only open for 3 hours a week to the public. Picked up some healthy Acans and a new Japanese Dendro (my fave). Still no fish. Gonna wait. Timfish stopped by today, and dropped off a few birdnest coral frags. You can see a couple in the picture above. He's been a huge help during this ordeal and is one of the most knowledgeable people in the industry whom I've come across. I can't exactly put my finger on why the tank has no algae and looks so good. A few things seemed to come together at once: Tim came by and we did a water change and algae cleaning of the tank; I changed my Radion LED fixture to ONLY show blue lights for a few weeks (I really like the ability to dial in the amount of color and intensity.) ; Added two MP10's and run them all day in nutrient export mode (very cool if you haven't heard of it. Uses two MP's and creates a 3/4 time tank wave and 1/4 export interference wave-- literally takes all the detritus and other debris off the LR and sand bed and pushes it down to the sump. Impressive.) Started cleaning Shane's sump filter each week (I had previously left it dirty for a month at a time, which Shane chewed me out for!) Tim was surprised to see the tank so clear and healthy and in such good shape. Shane mentioned a few weeks ago we may have done a bit more harm than originally thought to the original LR. But, now the sump and all seems to be working great. I dose a few hits of Start Smart complete and 8.4 for alkalinity, and that's about it. FWIW, I'm spot feeding the corals-- a lot, and still zero algae scum on anything, which was the reason for the overhaul in the first place. So, color me happy for now. Link to comment
Deleted User 4 Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 What silicone poisoned your water? Nice dendro! Link to comment
JR! Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 great to see you back chip. can you do me a big favor and link me to the stuff that you used for your overflow. like the elbow stainer and the bulk head? thanks man Link to comment
chippwalters Posted January 15, 2013 Author Share Posted January 15, 2013 What silicone poisoned your water? Nice dendro! The new dendro is sitting next to the old dendro. GE Silicone II was the culprit. Needs a REALLY LONG TIME to cure. I'd say at least 3 days with no contact to water. I've since changed to a marine silicone I bought at Petsmart. Still needs to cure for a day. Good to see you back. Thanks Pooja. Very nice to see you too! great to see you back chip. can you do me a big favor and link me to the stuff that you used for your overflow. like the elbow stainer and the bulk head? thanks man Sorry, but the elbow strainer I picked up at MACNA in Dallas. But, I did find one HERE. The bulkhead I got from Marine Depot. The gray elbow is just a high density street elbow which any plumbing supply should have. A friend dropped by and helped me out with some birdnest. I lost some green birdsnest just a couple weeks ago. The power went out and the return line siphoned off the top half of my tank for 30 minutes. When I found my tank, the water level was fine, but then I saw the birdsnest dead/dying and realized what had happened. Added a weep hole in the return so it won't happen again. I did manage to salvage some small pieces and we'll see if they make a comeback... Link to comment
Deleted User 4 Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 Ahh sucks, you're talking about the silicone in your sump right? Link to comment
chippwalters Posted January 15, 2013 Author Share Posted January 15, 2013 Ahh sucks, you're talking about the silicone in your sump right? The silicone in the sump was already cured (and interestingly, GE Silicone II). I used silicone in my return line from the bulkhead to the sump. It's an accordion type hose which needs to be attached with silicone. That's where the original problem came from. Since then, I've used a different brand and let it cure longer. 1 Link to comment
Deleted User 4 Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 I see. Makes sense. Glad you're not calling quits on the hobby. Btw, how are you liking the ada? I really love mine, just got it a month ago. The quality is superb. Best tank I've ever seen in the market by far. Link to comment
chippwalters Posted January 15, 2013 Author Share Posted January 15, 2013 Yep. Still like the ADA. It's been through 3 complete tank starts in a year and doing great. 1 Link to comment
Deleted User 4 Posted January 15, 2013 Share Posted January 15, 2013 Yep. Still like the ADA. It's been through 3 complete tank starts in a year and doing great. I see. Adg shop just couple days ago, raised the price on ada 60p from $130 to $190!! I'm worried they might raise the prices for the rest of designs....haha. Elos is marking up 10% on all tanks staring effective in feb....lol. Inflation on tanks haha. Link to comment
chippwalters Posted April 30, 2013 Author Share Posted April 30, 2013 Long time no update. Pretty much just let this thing cycle for a few months and didn't do much else but play with the lighting a bit. Finally, the whole tank settled down-- no algae whatsoever other than coralline-- tons of THAT. Lost some corals, candy canes, and SPS didn't make it. But acans and green sinularia seemed to be doing fine, as is the Japanese dendro. Just went out and purchased a nice green bubble tip anemone paired with occelaris. The GBTA seems really happy sitting in the hollow of the main rock. Fed it right away ands it doubled in size quickly. Link to comment
Drift Monkey Posted April 30, 2013 Share Posted April 30, 2013 Awesome tank...good to see another central Texas reefer! Link to comment
DaveFason Posted April 30, 2013 Share Posted April 30, 2013 Looking good Chip. Glad to see your still at it. -Dave Link to comment
metrokat Posted April 30, 2013 Share Posted April 30, 2013 Good to see an update Chipp. Hope all is well. Link to comment
chippwalters Posted April 30, 2013 Author Share Posted April 30, 2013 Awesome tank...good to see another central Texas reefer! Thanks. I really enjoy NR as it just seems like folks are overall friendlier here. Looking good Chip. Glad to see your still at it. -Dave Hi Dave! Hope all is going well for you at Nanobox! Perhaps we can catch up via chat sometime? Good to see an update Chipp. Hope all is well. Hi Pooja. Your tank looks great. Any truth to the rumor Chris Marks had to add more servers just to keep up with the activity on your message thread? Link to comment
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