130 gallon sps tank

[459b]

Been lurking on the forum for a whole, decided to post pics of my tank.

Tank is roughly 500 litres including sump. Dimensions are 1.3m x 0.5m x 0.65m. Sump has two compartments, first has skimmer and biocubes. Second chamber has phosphate reactors, heater and return pump. Lighting is supplied by six 54 watt T'5s.
I started this tank in January 2011. I've been through possibly every nuisance algae amd disease. Lost countless fish and almost packed up numerous times. Tank is finally settled and looking ok.
Some pics:
January 2011

 

[459b]

May 2011

July 2011

August 2011

 

[459b]

Jump to July 2012....please excuse pic quality, I still haven't learnt how to use a camera properly

 

[459b]

Tank how is stands today---

 

[459b]

It's not all sps---

 

[afernandez]

Looks great! Love the scape!

 

[Drae]

Well done. How did you rid the tank of hair algae?

 

[sahin]

I love your rockwork! Honestly, I think its a simple but VERY effective rockscape and looks amazing! I've actually saved the images for a future tank scaping ideas! - Hope you dont mind.

You've got lovely colours on your SPS corals, and those clams look beautiful!

Got a few questions hope you dont mind answering:

1. What is your T5 combo?

2. WHat do you feed the fish?

3. What do you feed the SPS corals?

4. What do you run your PO4 and NO3 at?

Many thanks, and thank you also for sharing your beautiful tank. :thumbsup:

 

[purplereef]

I am really interested to see what this tank will look like as it grows in. I bet it will look sweet!

 

[MistaOrange]

Looking awesome David keep up the good work...

 

[459b]

Thanks for the comments.

Drae - algae went when I was a bit more vigilant with tank maintenance. And i removed my dsb. All that thing seemed to do was collect detritus.

Sahin - I use ATI tubes. 2x coral plus, 2x aquablue special, 1x blue plus and 1x actinic.
Fish get a bit of everything. Morning and evening they get a mix of ocean nutrition pellets and flakes as well as omega one freeze dried shrimp/mysis. A few times a week they get some frozen mysis, angel formula etc. All food gets a few drops of vita chem prior to feeding.
Corals get frozen cyclops, ocean nutrition coral food and h2ocean coral foods.
I very seldom measure nitrate and phosphate. Last time a measured, nitrates were I un detectable and phosphate was 0.05. That was before changing phosphate media though.

 

[sahin]

Thanks for the comments.

Drae - algae went when I was a bit more vigilant with tank maintenance. And i removed my dsb. All that thing seemed to do was collect detritus.

Sahin - I use ATI tubes. 2x coral plus, 2x aquablue special, 1x blue plus and 1x actinic.
Fish get a bit of everything. Morning and evening they get a mix of ocean nutrition pellets and flakes as well as omega one freeze dried shrimp/mysis. A few times a week they get some frozen mysis, angel formula etc. All food gets a few drops of vita chem prior to feeding.
Corals get frozen cyclops, ocean nutrition coral food and h2ocean coral foods.
I very seldom measure nitrate and phosphate. Last time a measured, nitrates were I un detectable and phosphate was 0.05. That was before changing phosphate media though.

Awesome info there. Much appreciated. :thumbsup:

 

[Pallobi]

Very cool, well done, GREAT scape :beer:

 

[55coolgalreef]

wow looks awesome.. i love your tank aquaskaping as well..

 

[glaukos]

Nice job!
One more of my favorite tanks that leave the aquascaping,mostly to corals!
Welldone

 

[459b]

Thanks !
My previous tank scaping was a pile of rocks that were prone to falling over. This time I took my time to get a scaping I really liked, would allow for good coral placement and would be impossible for fish/inverts to knock over

 

[captjab]

Great looking tank. I really like your aquascape and great colors on your corals.
Do you mind going into more detail on your algae battle and removing your DSB?
In your newer pics it looks as if you still have the DSB, did you completely remove your old DSB and go with a SSB, or did you just remove a partial amount?

 

[Real Reefer]

Sweet tank!

 

[459b]

I had a dsb in my sump. I totally removed the dsb when I redid my sump. The substrate in the tank is there for aesthetics, it's probably an inch thick in the deepest parts.
When I ran my dsb in the sump, it also had a Refugium section above it. I found that the dsb was a detritus trap and never kept my nutrients as low as I'd like. It worked when the tank was mostly softies and lps, but wasn't cutting it with sps.

 

[sahin]

I had a dsb in my sump. I totally removed the dsb when I redid my sump. The substrate in the tank is there for aesthetics, it's probably an inch thick in the deepest parts.
When I ran my dsb in the sump, it also had a Refugium section above it. I found that the dsb was a detritus trap and never kept my nutrients as low as I'd like. It worked when the tank was mostly softies and lps, but wasn't cutting it with sps.

I had the same issue. I had a DSB in my sump but removed it later. I run a bare bottom display too. Very easy to control nutrients.