J-Ranko's IM Drop-Off Panorama 20g - new pics

[J-Ranko]

4 minutes ago, Weetabix7 said:

I love Lenny the Blenny, and congrats on the new light!!!

It'll be interesting to see the difference from the old one over your tank. 

 

Thanks!  The Radion xr30 is a hella more powerful than the AI prime, so I'm a little concerned about acclimation for my softies and LPS.  

 

Normally I would have thought this unit to be way overpowered for a 20 gallon but Uwdanno's success with it convinced me. 

 

[teenyreef]

1 hour ago, J-Ranko said:

Lenny the pretty blenny. 

 

I got my new lights. Behold!  This guy in Tucson was taking down his tank, and so I got a great deal for this unit.  It is so bright! 

 

 

Now I have to figure out a mounting solution...

Oh my, nice score!

[J-Ranko]

10 minutes ago, teenyreef said:

Oh my, nice score!

 

I nearly missed out.  He was actually selling two units. It was in Tucson (2 hour drive), and when I could finally make the time to drive down there today he had one unit left.  Glad the first buyer didn't get both.   

[J-Ranko]

New FTS for the new page.  These were before the new lights.

 

Front:

 

Top-down:

 

Left side:

 

Right side (drop-off):

[teenyreef]

Nice! Love the top down shot 

[tinyforest]

Everything looks great. Looking forward to seeing the tank under the new lights.

[J-Ranko]

4 hours ago, teenyreef said:

Nice! Love the top down shot 

Thanks!  

 

4 hours ago, tinyforest said:

Everything looks great. Looking forward to seeing the tank under the new lights.

 

Thanks! I finally got it mounted (hanging). It's now in acclimation mode.  It looks extremely blue since the reds/greens/whites are relatively lower, and then decreased further for acclimation so they're at their lowest power settings without being completely off.  The "final" spectrum color is closer to 15K.

 

I'm starting at 15% intensity gradually ramping up over four weeks to 35%.  Sounds low but even at 35% it will be double my AI prime in terms of power.  I'll reevaluate whether to adjust the spectrum and intensity after a month.

 

 

So far my corals are reacting OK. No closing up or looking displeased. I noticed the fluorescence is a lot more than with my Prime, especially of the warmer colors like orange and red, but even green.  The above FTS was during the ramp-up period, so it looks a bit dim.

 

 

This is my light schedule from ESL. It's a slight modification of one of the templates. The purple line is the initial schedule with acclimation. It will gradually ramp up the purple curve over four weeks until it matches the top blue curve.

[J-Ranko]

 

 

Soon I'll take some pictures with a fuller spectrum.  Don't want to cook them with the white LEDs, though.  

 

[Rehype]

Awesome upgrade J 

[J-Ranko]

13 hours ago, Rehype said:

Awesome upgrade J 

 

Thanks! My patience paid off with this one. I nearly bought a brand new unit last month, but decide to wait if any local reefers might put theirs up for sale.

 

As for my tank, today the RFA has moved again and attached itself to the scoly, which now looks very irritated and displeased:

 

 

I think I'm gonna have to intervene and detach the RFA from its base. 

[Weetabix7]

Uh oh!!

Yeah, interevention looks necessary. 

I'm wondering if the thing that has kept mine from wandering is that when I got it I settled it right on top of a small rock with a hole/crevice in it, and it settled it's base into that hole. When I need to move it, I just move the small rock. 

I've read in other's tank threads that they seem to like settling their bases into crevices. 

[J-Ranko]

3 minutes ago, Weetabix7 said:

Uh oh!!

Yeah, interevention looks necessary. 

I'm wondering if the thing that has kept mine from wandering is that when I got it I settled it right on top of a small rock with a hole/crevice in it, and it settled it's base into that hole. When I need to move it, I just move the small rock. 

I've read in other's tank threads that they seem to like settling their bases into crevices. 

 

Yeah. It actually settled into a crevice for a week, but it was right next to the turbinaria, so I moved the frag yesterday.  That apparently disturbed it enough to want to wander again...

[Weetabix7]

5 minutes ago, J-Ranko said:

 

Yeah. It actually settled into a crevice for a week, but it was right next to the turbinaria, so I moved the frag yesterday.  That apparently disturbed it enough to want to wander again...

 

[J-Ranko]

7 hours ago, Weetabix7 said:

 

 

The babies are more well behaved than their mother.   At least they're staying put in their glass nursery.

[xiaoxiy]

Have you considered using the Radion AB+ template for your lights?

http://ecotechmarine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Ecotech_CoralLab_WP1.pdf

 

P.S. I love the airplant container in the back LOL.

[J-Ranko]

6 hours ago, xiaoxiy said:

Have you considered using the Radion AB+ template for your lights?

http://ecotechmarine.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Ecotech_CoralLab_WP1.pdf

 

P.S. I love the airplant container in the back LOL.

 

Yup. I've look into various schedule templates, and that seems to be a very good one, though I haven't settled on any permanent one yet.  For now, I'm acclimating under a slightly modified "radiant color" template.

[Christopher Marks]

Were you able to forcibly detach the scoly from the RFA?  Or did they part ways on their own?

 

I still adore that gorgonian in the drop-off!

[J-Ranko]

28 minutes ago, Christopher Marks said:

Were you able to forcibly detach the scoly from the RFA?  Or did they part ways on their own?

 

I still adore that gorgonian in the drop-off!

Thanks!  I couldn't force it off, so I did the next best thing and put the scoly (RFA still attached) up on the rockwork, in an uncomfortable spot for the RFA. In other words I "encouraged" it to move itself.     Then I put scoly back on the bottom. 

[teenyreef]

The one time I had to pull out my rfa, I used a small power head to direct a strong flow of water right at the base of the foot, and aligned it so the current was pulling the RFA off and to the side. After about ten or fifteen minutes, it got tired of hanging on, and it slowwwwwly let go over another five minutes or so.

[J-Ranko]

22 hours ago, teenyreef said:

The one time I had to pull out my rfa, I used a small power head to direct a strong flow of water right at the base of the foot, and aligned it so the current was pulling the RFA off and to the side. After about ten or fifteen minutes, it got tired of hanging on, and it slowwwwwly let go over another five minutes or so.

 

While I didn't point a power head directly at it,  I did put it in area of very strong flow to get it to detach, and it worked. 

[Bella's Reef]

Props to you on how you get the Elegance to stay out with barebottom, I think I just have to much Flow and it wants to blow it all over the tank 

[J-Ranko]

1 hour ago, Bella's Reef said:

Props to you on how you get the Elegance to stay out with barebottom, I think I just have to much Flow and it wants to blow it all over the tank 

 

Thanks.  Mine seems to love the flow.  It tentacles are always extended and swaying in the current.  Here it is with the rest of the bottom dwellers just this evening:

 

 

It's definitely not low flow in this tank.  The Sicce return pump is on full blast, with no restriction on the input.  The Jebao pump is also pulsing in the corner.

 

 

[Gramophone]

This is just wonderful! I love how unique drop off tanks are.

[J-Ranko]

New FTS.

 

 

Side FTS:

 

Notice where the RFA has moved to, now?  Ugh.  Behind my rockwork.

 

 Upper shelf corals:

 

I'm going to take more top-down shots hopefully later today...

 

[Weetabix7]

Looking as gorgeous as ever!!!

Sorry your RFA is giving you such trouble, but I love the view of Lenny the Blenny in the side shot!!

Everything looks like it's doing well with the new light.