"The Two Towers" 62G SPS Starfire Reef (Rebooted)

[duncan-junkie]

Wow, following your thread....WHAT A ROLLERCOASTER!!! You deffently have some patients, I would have taken the hammer to my tank by now. I really hope you get everything figured out, because you have an awesome setup!!

[JDigital]

Wow, following your thread....WHAT A ROLLERCOASTER!!! You deffently have some patients, I would have taken the hammer to my tank by now. I really hope you get everything figured out, because you have an awesome setup!!

 

Thanks, Unfortunately I lost another SPS frag that had been in the tank for a good 3-4 weeks looking great, with in 2-3 days it was a white skeleton, Started at the tips and went down.

 

Acans seem to thrive in this tank though.. I've got 1 colony and 3 frags of acans and they are all super nice. Unfortunately the tank isn't really setup or designed to be an Acan tank.. so going full acan would still require an overhaul.

[Asureef]

I feel your pain JD.

 

At this point, try removing both carbon/gfo, test 1-2x a week both no3/po4 and see how your tank respond for a few weeks. I'm coming up on 4wks without carbon or GFO and my zoas are responding very well, as I never could get them to really grow before. SPS are doing well also, I didn't noticed any nutrients spike as my po4 tested weekly was well below .03ppm. Even the little diatom spots I had on the sand is fading out, weird right?

[JDigital]

Well I have decided that I am going to restart this tank. I'm going to pull all the marco dry rock I started with out, re-home most of the fish to my 180G tank at the office, and start from scratch. New water, new rock, fresh start. There is just something not right in this tank that I can not put my finger on. This tank has been up and running for nearly a year with absolutely ZERO progress and hundreds of dollars in coral down the drain. I have lost EVERY SINGLE piece of SPS I have tried in this tank. Everything from easy to keep montis/digi's, red planet, to harder to keep stuff that was doing very well in MUCH younger, less mature frag tanks at the LFS.

 

I tried feeding Oyster Feast and Live Copepods per some conversations with Nanotopia that yielded no results with regards to improved coral vitality (SPS specifically). None of my fish are coral nippers so I can rule them all out. I've inspected and dipped all frags before putting them in my tank (although still could have missed something, the procedure was still there, and I have no seen bugs or pest of any sort)

 

I got 2 things that seem to do ok in this tank. The fish and a few (4) acans. Zoas don't grow (or gradually disappear), ALL SPS dies, I'm not interested in softies for this tank so haven't even tried putting them in.

 

So I'm gutting it and starting fresh. Maybe in a years time I will actually have something to show off in this tank, because as of right now after nearly a year I basically have a handful of fish and 4 small acan pieces. Something clearly isn't working.

[pschom]

I can't believe this has been going on for a year now! Doesn't feel like it's been that long.

 

If be so frustrated. Gotta be the water or the rock?! Do u use the same water in your 180? I'm sure you've tested for everything. At this point I'd remove the sand and everything. Maybe let the rock sit in some freshwater for a whole then let it cycle again. It has to be something in the water.

[JDigital]

No the water is different than the 180G at the office. I live in a small town (50K) outside the city (1M+) I work in, that being said, I use the exact same RO/DI unit (brand, not physical unit).

 

It's definitely frustrating pschom. As for the rock, I'm not even going to keep it. Going to pick up some new stuff (not Marco Dry Rock) from Fijireefrock.com (Pukani stuff) and mix it 50/50 with some very mature live rock from a friends frag tank system. I'm not sure what I want to do with the sand. I LOVE the sand I have right now and it's pretty difficult to find at ANY of the reef shops in Calgary. Could always try a bare bottom tank I suppose.

[jedimasterben]

Just rinse the sand in RO/DI. The water is aggressive enough to pull basically anything off of it, and will kill any baddies in it.

[flypenfly]

Ugh, good luck dude. If you're going through the trouble of getting new rocks, I would get new sand as well.

[JDigital]

whooooo!!! more good luck... My skimmer overflowed AGAIN last night... Awesome!

[flypenfly]

Float switch in cup bro

[JDigital]

The rebuild begins....

 

Pull all the marco rock and the sand bed out of the system today.. Took my fish to my LFS, and then picked up some Fiji and Tonga Branch LIVE rock from a good buddy of mine. I've got water going to make a fresh batch of Saltwater which I will use for an initial WC to pull out some of the junk that got disturbed. After that I will do another 30-40G in the next day or 2.

 

Let any sort of mini-cycle that's gonna happen run it's course and then check all params and adjust accordingly.

 

 

Fingers Crossed!

 

[pschom]

Good luck! I've been waiting a long time to see you grow some frags!

 

You get any new test kits or supplies? Maybe something you didn't have before?

[JDigital]

Well, 45G worth of water changed out since last night. Got a bit of a aquascape going but will likely pick up a few more pieces from the LFS tomorrow to finish it off along with a filter sock to help polish the water and get the fine sand dust out of the water column. Will do another 10G WC tomorrow too.

 

One of the pieces I got from my buddy had some Black Sun Corals on it and I'm actually getting some polyp extension from them already, even with all the fluctuations I've had in the past 24hrs... Temp, Salinity, Dust Clouds, etc

 

Feather dusters are coming out too.. I've noticed a few nasty 'nems that I need to blast..

 

I've also decided to bail out on the LED trend and go back to what I know so I put an order on an ATI Dimmable Sunpower 6x39W light fixture today.

 

Will update again when I've got more info.

[JDigital]

My temporary aquascape.. I still want to fill in the left side a but with some self or something. I didn't get to go to the LFS today as we are experiencing a Blizzard where I live and driving conditions are miserable.

 

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[pschom]

I lije

[JDigital]

Couple pics with the lights on and a few Acans that I salvaged and seem to have pulled through the tank change OK. Lights had only been on for a few mins before taking these pics.

[JDigital]

Acans were looking super plump tonight when I got home..

 

Also had to add a bigger heater to the system. The temperature has been down around -20 to -30C this week and it enough to cool off the front room that the tank is in and bring the tank down to around 22C. Pulled out the 150W and added a 250W. That should be enough.

[JDigital]

Goodbye LED's... Hello Dimmable T5's.

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[NanoTopia]

I love my ATI Dimmable, corals have responded favourably in my tank.

 

One thing I noticed is when you cut the power to the unit, it resets the clock to something way off. Only a problem if you have a power outage and the power comes back on, with the clock wrong. Does yours do the same?

[TheKleinReef]

welcome to the sunpower train. everyone seems to be switching back to the 'ol reliable t5.

[JDigital]

I love my ATI Dimmable, corals have responded favourably in my tank.

 

One thing I noticed is when you cut the power to the unit, it resets the clock to something way off. Only a problem if you have a power outage and the power comes back on, with the clock wrong. Does yours do the same?

 

I don't think mine did. I originally test fired the bulbs and such right where I un-packaged it. Set the clock, timer/program (50hr Burn in).. then unplugged it so I could set it up. I had to orient the fixture with the controller facing the back side of the tank as to keep the power cord closer to my power bar, the cord is too damn short if you ask me!. When I plugged it in it fired up (per the photos).

 

I have it set for 10am-1030pm right now and I went back down at 11pm to turn my RODI top-off off and the lights were off. So I am assuming the program is working. I'll have to double check tonight though.

 

Was hoping the color would be a bit more blue than it is.. but I'll have to wait for the bulbs to burn in I'm sure.

[21093r53]

unique aquarium and very nice sump!

[JDigital]

welcome to the sunpower train. everyone seems to be switching back to the 'ol reliable t5.

 

There does seem to be a trend. To be honest this is the first time I've used T5's exclusively on any of my tanks.. Has either been MH or MH/T5 in the past, but I've had the pleasure of seeing plenty of T5 tanks and taken photos of just as many. So I feel confident in my purchase/choice.

[21093r53]

tim hortons>DD

 

i had this in montreal

[JDigital]

Didn't feel like I had enough real estate in the tank so I picked up a small pre-built tower from Concepts on the weekend made from Fijireefrock.com's Pukani Dry Rock. Add's a nice touch to the left side I think.

Added some a zoa colony, SPS colony (on the tower in pic) and a Red/White Acan colony as well.

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