My Custom PicO

[timothybui]

It's been nice and sunny where I'm at.

[Hexadron]

Hell, I even got sunburn on my face when I was stuck outside! Welcome spring.

 

It's been nice and sunny where I'm at.

 

You guys suck. it snowed today

[timothybui]

 

You guys suck. it snowed today

Gotta love SoCal weather.

[BadCrab]

What is "snow" ?

[Hexadron]

What is "snow" ?

It's essentially Atmospheric water vapor frozen into ice crystals and falling in light white flakes or lying on the ground as a white layer.

 

or

 

White fluffy stuff that falls from the sky when it's cold out.

[supermarvin76]

MR1 huh? You've got me fascinated by this. I must figure out the easiest and cheapest way to run this on my PIcO.

 

I wonder if I could just toss a little pump in the back chamber and have it feed back in. I dunno.

 

Start your brain for me please...

[Mstefa1]

 

It's essentially Atmospheric water vapor frozen into ice crystals and falling in light white flakes or lying on the ground as a white layer.

 

or

 

White fluffy stuff that falls from the sky when it's cold out.

 

Well I think the question was a joke but believe it or not many people have never seen snow besides on TV. My dad who relocated to Florida misses the snow and I make sure to send him plenty of pictures of the white stuff. Just don't eat yellow snow!

 

Thought I had a problem but all is well now. While feeding my sun coral Mysis this evening I thought I'd feed my blasto in my PicO as well. To my surprise my hermit and nassarious were nowhere to be found! I couldn't believe they were not the first ones on the scene. Fortunately about 5 minutes later they arrived happy as ever. Must have gotten lost exploring the new tank.

 

I need a fish in this baby so bad! If the Picasso is out, I haven't decided what other 1 fish to get besides the goby. Also need some sexy shrimp up in here! More research needed referencing their compatibility with a pistol. Also my frag guy offered me dibs on a pair of harlequin shrimp he got in! They were so cool looking but I don't know that I could keep up the starfish feeding.

 

MR1 huh? You've got me fascinated by this. I must figure out the easiest and cheapest way to run this on my PIcO. I wonder if I could just toss a little pump in the back chamber and have it feed back in. I dunno. Start your brain for me please...

 

Yuppers! That's exactly what you can do. In my Aquapod, I have a MJ1200 pumping to a BRS deluxe reactor and then the line returns to another chamber although returning to another chamber isn't required. You don't need something as big as a MJ1200. They recommend 160GPH flow after head loss for the MR1 shorty.

 

In my PicO, I already have a pair of Cobalt MJ600 return pumps in the center taking up so much room! Add in there a heater and the giant Tunze magnets for the float switches and space becomes limited. Remember that one of my high priority goals here is so that my hardware doesn't look like a disaster like my other tank.

 

My plan would have only the inlet and outlet in the tank and the pump & reactor would be in the cabinet.

[Mstefa1]

So much to say but so little time. I've you haven't been following, I performed water changes on all my tanks and fragged about 20 items from my Aquapod. You can see my frag thread here. I think I survived paly toxin. lol Also read about the feather duster worm I found in my fuge and put in my PicO. I'd love to get a pic of my frag tank full but for now let's let everything recover and open back up.

I'd also like to say that it sucks not having an Apex on my PicO. I'm getting really tired of unplugging cables but that will have to wait to see if I have any money left over after vacation. For now, the next time I work on my tank I'll steal a power center from one of my old computers so at least I can have switches for the plugs.

 

Oh, and when I did my water changes I replaced the carbon (ROX) in my PicO and put a small amount of GFO in the media bags.

[Hexadron]

Great progress. I'll have to take some time to read through your other thread after dinner. I'm pretty bummed out after my afternoon at the LFS.

 

That's way too cool about the feather duster. Just found him there huh?!

 

Can't wait for everything to open up so I can drool over some more pictures. Help me Matt, you're my only hope! (for staying sane while I try to figure a better place to buy livestock...)

[Mstefa1]

Sorry guys, I'm just way too tired for photos this morning. I've got just enough energy to lift a beer or two and drop a few pellets in my frag tank. I'll take those pics eventually.

[Hexadron]

*cough*

 

Pictures?

[Mstefa1]

*cough*

 

Pictures?

 

My abilities are limited during my work week. Basically I get home from work, chill for an hour, sleep about 3 hrs, pick my daughter up from school, and try to go back to sleep for another 3 hours. Normally I work 4 on / 4 off.

[Hexadron]

 

My abilities are limited during my work week. Basically I get home from work, chill for an hour, sleep about 3 hrs, pick my daughter up from school, and try to go back to sleep for another 3 hours. Normally I work 4 on / 4 off.

Okay, we both have legit excuses for not doing things This weekend though...

[Deckoz2302]

Lol yall makin me feel bad for being lazy....

[Mstefa1]

Ok, here are a few pics of the frags in my tank. Note: This is NOT how my frag tank will be staying, just how it is now because I tossed them in Sunday with limited time. Still have diatoms. The frags just ate so some are not fully open. I imagine I have plenty of light, however me being a light whore I wish I had another white LED. Hell, toss another white and blue on there! Too bad I can't order them from a standard website that I normally get from so I don't pay shipping. lol, seriously though, I'm sure it's plenty of light but since I am only driving the LEDs at 700 it's like they are running half power. Can you imagine how dark it will be when I remove the white sand and switch to black egg crate?

 

http://s1287.photobucket.com/user/Mstefa1/media/Frag%20Tank/DSC03810_zps13dcd1b2.jpg.html'>

 

http://s1287.photobucket.com/user/Mstefa1/media/Frag%20Tank/DSC03804_zps2b45b481.jpg.html'>

 

So I think there are like 20 frags in there, all cut from my Aquapod. I want to raise the egg crate up suspended with PVC legs but I don't have any PVC left. My only concern with raising is that the frags will fall over. Guess I need to buy some plugs to glue them to in the future as opposed to little bits of live rock or just cut larger pieces next time. I wonder if the plugs fit nicely in the egg crate holes. Been awhile since I dealt with them.

 

I've also considered putting something else in the tank for CUC to take care of uneaten food. I'd toss a crab in there but again, worried about the frags falling. Maybe when I elevate the egg crate thecrab will be stuck on the base and not be able to climb up the smooth PVC support legs.

[timothybui]

NIce collection so far.

[Mstefa1]

And for you peeps wanting more of my PicO. Not much has changed with the exception of still growing diatoms. You can see the blastos that I put in here which I've been recovering. There are 3 polyps with a super tiny one.

 

 

I like taking FTS of my PicO. Nice and clean, much better then my Aquapod with the curved glass. My favorite shots are the corner ones.

 

 

Also nice to see a front view. Note every time the blasto & zoa frags are in the same shot the blasto blurs.

 

 

I really like the luminescence of this guy. He really knows how to glow.

 

 

And a super close up!

 

 

The coral shots were taken using 4x cheap close-up macro lens.

[dhartmann]

Awesome pix! Can't wait for my PicO to be done!

[Mstefa1]

So I took some scrap wood and threw together a stand to hold my upcoming RODI reservoir. It's going to be a rectangle 20g brute container with a bulkhead with a ball valve. The intention is to fill into gallon jugs as I'm currently doing because it makes measuring out saltwater easy, not to mention filling ATO reservoirs but I've designed it to hold a 5g bucket as well. As you can see I've made a ton of use out of my yoga mat that I bought to go under my PicO. Don't forget I have some under my frag tank as well and this used up the rest of it. I ran out of 2x4s so I had to run out behind my shed and grab a pressure treated one. I guess I should have painted it but it's only going in my basement.

 

Please ignore my mess.

 

 

Building this makes me want to build a stand for a new tank. cough cough.

[JCG66]

nice tank next to an ugly refrigerator

[Mstefa1]

nice tank next to an ugly refrigerator

 

thanks... But would you choose no tank or a tank next to an ugly refer? This is tank #2, actually I have 3 now if you include my frag tank and it took a lot for me to convince the wife to have another tank and this was the only allowed location. I actually like it there now because I have tanks on opposite sides of the downstairs now.

[Mstefa1]

Well I couldn't spend all that time in the basement without touching my frag tank. I've made an egg crate rack for part of the tank. I've got some work to do as I'm tired and everything wasn't thought through the best. I need to get the heater under the rack as there isn't room they way it is now and I need to break up that large so I have room for corals across the tank. Still, this works for now.

 

 

And for those that don't now how to remove the blue glare from their images... It's all about adjusting the white balance. Taking JPGs you need to do it before you shoot but when shooting in raw you can do it afterwards.

 

Pretty neat that you can see the reflection of some of my LEDs in the pic and you can distinguish the violet, white, and royal blue.

 

 

Also, since I elevated my frags I figured I'd toss in a crab. This guy immediately went for the live rock and he is currently picking that brown crap off there. I was very surprised. I may have to grab a few more from my Aquapod and toss them in my PicO & frag tanks.

[Mstefa1]

And of course I had to toss a few corals into my PicO. I put 2 SPS, 1 hammer, and 2 grandis palys into my PicO. I just fed some Mysis and these guys just have only been in there an hour at best.

 

 

 

Polyps are still a little shy.

 

 

And here is my blasto eating.

 

[MeepNand]

Nice man! I made one of those racks out of an old paper holder and pvc. Easy design, and cheap too!

 

Like the pic of the blastos eating.

[Mstefa1]

Nice man! I made one of those racks out of an old paper holder and pvc. Easy design, and cheap too!

 

Like the pic of the blastos eating.

 

 

Thanks! My biggest complaint about not having a controller on these tanks is that I have to remember to turn everything back on after feeding which is a big pain in the butt!