Reefkids: Casa Del Reef (Now with fish)

[Reefkid88]

Acrylic is here,kinda botched the weir fins but 🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️ oh well. Waiting for the one side of silicone to dry and tomorrow I will silicone the other side,bottom and add a divider in the back to seperate the overdlow section from the rest. 

 

[Reefkid88]

Filled the tank earlier to test the AIO I built to make sure water levels and everything were gonna work,and looks like they should indeed work. 

 

 I plan on getting 10g of SW this weekend and a piece of live rock and add the bagged live sand I have and get the cycle started this weekend. 

[schgr.cube]

Yessss, I’m digging that scape! Let’s go!

[Reefkid88]

31 minutes ago, schg said:

Yessss, I’m digging that scape! Let’s go!

I really like the scape,but the main rock definitely needs to have a chunk chipped off the front and the back so I could access the glass. It basically touches the glass front and back. 

[Reefkid88]

So I added some dry CaribSea and to the tank earlier,and I will add a small layer of live sand I have tomorrow. 

 

 I am thinking this will be a softy & lps tank. Some zoa's (how original),hammers and maybe a torch or 2. A local store near me has a few hammers (green,splatter,peach) for $40 a head and a few torches for $50 a head. A wide variety of z/p's for $20-$25 a frag and some acan's for $25. Maybe even some shrooms. 

 

 I would like to get a few trachy's eventually though and maybe some litho's or cyphastrea,lepto's for encrusting corals. 

 

 Fish,either a some trimma's,eviota's or a mixture of both or maybe even pair of clown's if I want to push it. 

 

 Tomorrow I am getting 10g's of mixed water,some BWA QuikCycle and some MB7,small pieces of live rock,egg crate to make a media rack,ordering an ATO and a 2.5g Homer bucket for a ATO res. Plus adding the live sand I have waiting to add before I add water. 

[Reefkid88]

Live sand,rock and water from their live rock bin is added. So today marks the first day of the "cycle". 

 

 Dude at the store gave me a nice sized piece of egggrate so I ziptied a few pieces together and threw 2 chunks of rock in the rack.

[Reefkid88]

Had anyone used the Photone app to measure their lighting ? 

[mitten_reef]

1 hour ago, Reefkid88 said:

Had anyone used the Photone app to measure their lighting ? 

no, but that looks pretty interesting - especially coming from the grow light side of things

[Reefkid88]

7 minutes ago, mitten_reef said:

no, but that looks pretty interesting - especially coming from the grow light side of things

 

 Its a pretty cool concept,but its difficult because the only t5 setting is for 3500k basically. I am going to try the sun light setting and see if that works. It was basically saying I had like 60-65 par at the bottom of the tank without water. 

 

 I emailed them to see what setting I should use I downloaded the growlight version to which seems to be a little more indepth. 

[Reefkid88]

Man,so I was looking in my closet for something and saw my little 12"x6"x6" tank and though,whew man.. Its:

 

-Already made into a AIO.

-I can make a media rack.

-I already have sand. 

-I am buying a NB Mini Tide.

-I have a piece of dry rock.

-I have a piece of LR in my 9g I could cycle it with (once my 9g is ready to go).

-I already have a small pump and VCA ¼" RFG.

 

-All I would need to do is clean up the silicone with I originally used and go over it in black silicone and oder an ATO from Amazon and my 2 boys could have "their own tank" 🤔. 

 

 Probably won't be more than a thought,but that light bulb definitely went off LOL. 

[Tamberav]

and so it starts..

 

 

 

[Reefkid88]

52 minutes ago, Tamberav said:

and so it starts..

 

 

 

If I can bribe my wife into letting me have 2 tanks,it will be a literal miracle. She wasn't even 110% convinced I needed this one lol. 

 

 I am literally patiently waiting,impatiently for the 9g to cycle. It was looking so perfect earlier. 

[Tamberav]

Just set it up and ask for forgiveness instead of permission 

 

 

 

 

[Reefkid88]

8 hours ago, Tamberav said:

Just set it up and ask for forgiveness instead of permission 

 

 

 

 

Oh this gave me a good laugh this first thing this morning lol. 

[mitten_reef]

11 hours ago, Reefkid88 said:

If I can bribe my wife into letting me have 2 tanks,it will be a literal miracle. She wasn't even 110% convinced I needed this one lol. 

 

 I am literally patiently waiting,impatiently for the 9g to cycle. It was looking so perfect earlier. 

looking real good.  I love a peninsula tank that ended up sideway...there's something really serene about and all-clear viewing area vs black/overflow/AIO background.  

 

you could borrow a page from IM, and cover your side AIO with black sticker to make it looks clean....(i didn't read the build plan, not sure if you had that planned or not)

 

 

[Reefkid88]

1 hour ago, mitten_reef said:

looking real good.  I love a peninsula tank that ended up sideway...there's something really serene about and all-clear viewing area vs black/overflow/AIO background.  

 

you could borrow a page from IM, and cover your side AIO with black sticker to make it looks clean....(i didn't read the build plan, not sure if you had that planned or not)

 

 

 

 Thank you,I appreciate it. Yeah I am going to cover that section where the media rack is. My wife makes custom stainless steel tumblers so she has TONS of black vinyl I can use. I was going to spray paint it black,but I got ahead of myself and filled the tank first lol. 

[Reefkid88]

Here you go @mitten_reef lol you pushed me to get it done. 

[Rabb.D]

nice tank sleek and great looking but doesn't the blue light bother your eyes? seems like its in your room

[Reefkid88]

3 hours ago, Rabb.D said:

nice tank sleek and great looking but doesn't the blue light bother your eyes? seems like its in your room

 Not at all. The blue light from T5's is 1000x more tolerable than it is from leds. But its also in my my living room,doesn't cast any light on my tv or anything either. 

[Reefkid88]

Got the Mini Tide in yesterday,and the light is in PERFECT conditiom so thanks to @Kellie in CA. I just dislike how the blue and cyan are on the royal channel and the violets are on the white,so I am going to swap those around. Also,I forgot to mention this light won't be used on this tank unless I can retro it somehow. I really do not want to remove 2 bulbs though,unless this was a Duo. 

[schgr.cube]

Man, looking at the difference it really is crazy just how crisp and clean the T5 does look.... I really want to do a hybrid again in the near future, perhaps once I move into the larger tank. LEDs are so nice, but theres something about T5 that can't be beat.

[Reefkid88]

54 minutes ago, schg said:

Man, looking at the difference it really is crazy just how crisp and clean the T5 does look.... I really want to do a hybrid again in the near future, perhaps once I move into the larger tank. LEDs are so nice, but theres something about T5 that can't be beat.

 Thats without the T5's even on just the Tide with all channels at like 80%. I would love a hybrid. I really want to just add a led strip to the outside of the fixture,but can't find a used one anywhere. I would love to have a NB Beam,but nobody seems to have one here or R2R. 

 

 Edit: Now I remember why I got away from led's for the most part comparing pics.

 

-Shimmer,it just KILLS it for me.

 

-Hot spots,unless you literally have a BLANKET of leds,you can't escape it.

 

-Uneven distribution of light and par. T5 for the most part,if you have unobstructed light,your par is basically the same even with the same variables you'd have in a led tank. 

 

 The only downside I have ever came across with T5 is heat and bulb replacement. Which I mean for 4 bulbs $100 isn't terrible every year. And heat hasn't been a huge factor thus far even being in FL and my house getting to 76 during the day. I may have to lower my fixture about 1-2" though to boost my par a hair. It sits roughly about 11¾" from the water surface. 

[schgr.cube]

58 minutes ago, Reefkid88 said:

 Thats without the T5's even on just the Tide with all channels at like 80%. I would love a hybrid. I really want to just add a led strip to the outside of the fixture,but can't find a used one anywhere. I would love to have a NB Beam,but nobody seems to have one here or R2R. 

 

 Edit: Now I remember why I got away from led's for the most part comparing pics.

 

-Shimmer,it just KILLS it for me.

 

-Hot spots,unless you literally have a BLANKET of leds,you can't escape it.

 

-Uneven distribution of light and par. T5 for the most part,if you have unobstructed light,your par is basically the same even with the same variables you'd have in a led tank. 

 

 The only downside I have ever came across with T5 is heat and bulb replacement. Which I mean for 4 bulbs $100 isn't terrible every year. And heat hasn't been a huge factor thus far even being in FL and my house getting to 76 during the day. I may have to lower my fixture about 1-2" though to boost my par a hair. It sits roughly about 11¾" from the water surface. 

You don't like shimmer at all, or just the amount that LEDs give you? Thats the only real downside for a T5 only setup for me, as I really can't stand the complete lack of shimmer. I need a least a little bit, but year LEDs do look a little unnatural depending on your array. I wish I could bring myself to go back to a metal halide fixture, its hard to beat that look, but bulbs are getting harder to find and they really do run damn hot / use a lot of electricity.

[Reefkid88]

16 minutes ago, schg said:

You don't like shimmer at all, or just the amount that LEDs give you? Thats the only real downside for a T5 only setup for me, as I really can't stand the complete lack of shimmer. I need a least a little bit, but year LEDs do look a little unnatural depending on your array. I wish I could bring myself to go back to a metal halide fixture, its hard to beat that look, but bulbs are getting harder to find and they really do run damn hot / use a lot of electricity.

 I really dislike the shimmer. I always run a diffuser. I have so much surafce aggitstion from my 2x ¼ VCA's and the MP10 that it creates some shimmer with just T5's that its enough for me to stand lol. 

 

 I miss my MH,I had the best growth with my 70w fixture. But you are right,I was looking just out of curiosity and the bulbs and even fixtures are hard to find. 

[schgr.cube]

48 minutes ago, Reefkid88 said:

 I really dislike the shimmer. I always run a diffuser. I have so much surafce aggitstion from my 2x ¼ VCA's and the MP10 that it creates some shimmer with just T5's that its enough for me to stand lol. 

 

 I miss my MH,I had the best growth with my 70w fixture. But you are right,I was looking just out of curiosity and the bulbs and even fixtures are hard to find. 

 

Yeah lol, I just did the same for shits and giggles, and started then thinking about making a custom fixture.... I need to stop while I'm ahead here, and actually GET the next tank before I start thinking about lighting.