400g system from scratch pictorial

I know the aquascaping is a biaatch ! My old tank(which i have just sold) startet out as a rock wall... OLD picture :

DCP_5126.JPG


I then redid it to make some room and added a vally between the rock structures - all the way back to the back glass. That really made a huge difference. Much more reef looking and made the tank look much deeper. Also some steep reef slopes on both rock piles for different coral growth as monti caps and so on.

Sorry still old pictures....

IMG_0260.JPG


IMG_0263.JPG



What im trying to say is that the more wild it seems to be, the more interesting it will look.
If i where you i would make and wierd lookin PVC structure(go jigh, go low, deep, thin....) and then clamp the rocks to that with zip ties... ;)

Your setup deserves it :D
 
WILDTHING said:
Wow, 2 DSB's, very nice! The only thing I'd like to mention about your remote DSB is that Dr Ron suggests that unless you can feed a remote DSB then don't bother having it as the critters will die and you'll end up with a pile of sand. That being said I have my 55g sump as a DSB but my skimmer gets my overflow before it makes it to the 55g so when I feed I turn off the skimmer and allow the water to freely flow through the sump and system for about 2 hrs then turn the skimmer back on. I think it has worked, I certainly have an abundance of critters in there.

colleen
Click to expand...

Couldn't you just have your Ref first, and then your sump, that way you don't have to turn off your skimmer ??

On my 450gal setup that I am looking at building here soon, I was going to have my tank going to my ref and then to the sump and back to the tank, does anyone see a problem with this. I have not really seen anything that says what order you should have your Ref / Sump...

Shawn
 
lol Colleen. Sounds like Noodles would show Rufus who's the boss rather quickly!

Dk Coral, having space all the way to the rear glass sure did make your tank look much deeper! I'd like to try that too, but I'd like to hide my CL inlet which is right smack in the middle of my rear glass. On the other hand, for the reasons listed above, I might not want the rock close to it as that would give the invertebrates a "ladder" to get close to it. Hmm, maybe I'll split my PVC rack in two and have an open center.

Btw, I see that you're from Denmark which is also where I'm from as you might have gathered from my last name. Danish is still my primary language although I've lived here in the states for 20 years now.

I think I got the temp thing figured out as I've been able to maintain 81 degrees within +/- 0.2 degrees over the last 24 hours. Time to go empty the skimmer cup and take an ammonia reading.
 
Ammonia is up to 0.6 this morning, so it looks like things are starting to move along now. With a bit of luck, I should be picking up my sand today. I plan to add it to the fuge, but I won't be adding it to the main tank until the rock is done shedding stuff and I have a rockscape that I'm happy with.

According to the sand calculator, and assuming SD is around 70 pounds per cubic foot, I'll need 420 pounds of sand for the tank and about 250 pounds for the fuge. I got 15 bags, so I'll have a bag or two left over.
 
You might want to wait until the water cycles, then do a big water change. By doing one everyday your making the length of the cycle much longer.
 
Since you are curing your rock in your display tank, I would only do water changes on the days you're swishing your rock and re-aquascaping. At the end of curing, I would do a very large water change. To get nitrate and phosphate as close to 0 ppm for each.

Preferably, I cure rock in a separate tank from the display tank so the nutrients released during the curing process left in the curing tank instead of in the display tank. This leads to fewer nuisance algae blooms down the road.

Definitely wait on adding your sandbed until the rock has cured and as much detritus as possible has been removed from your system.
 
pclausen said:
Dk Coral, having space all the way to the rear glass sure did make your tank look much deeper! I'd like to try that too, but I'd like to hide my CL inlet which is right smack in the middle of my rear glass. On the other hand, for the reasons listed above, I might not want the rock close to it as that would give the invertebrates a "ladder" to get close to it. Hmm, maybe I'll split my PVC rack in two and have an open center.

Btw, I see that you're from Denmark which is also where I'm from as you might have gathered from my last name. Danish is still my primary language although I've lived here in the states for 20 years now.
Click to expand...

Well i thought about the name - nice to hear. From which part of this huge great country are you from ;) ?

About the CL intake - maybe it would even be nicer if you had like 2/3 and 1/3 in the tank instead of doing it all symmetricaly down the middle.

Maybe do one flat pile in one side(2/3) from the back and out and then a higher tower(pvc rack) in the other side(1/3) with a vally between ???
Just remebmer to leave some space for all the clams, fungia, tounge coral ect ect in the front on the sand ;)

Happy scaping ;)
 
The only water changes I have been doing is when I siphon out water from the main tank into my vats for swishing and re-aquascaping. It takes about 40g or so to cover the rocks, so that ends up being a 10% water change. I'm going to sit tight for a few days at least before doing anymore aqua-scaping, and consequently not do any more water changes. I'm going through those 5g IO buckets like they're going out of style!

There is no odor whatsoever in the house and the glass on the tank is absolutely spotless. I don't know if the rock is just very fresh, or if the most unpleasant period is still ahead of me. So far curing the rock has been a very pleasant experience, not at all like the warnings I got about not doing it in the tank.

I'm blowing a considerable amount of water across the rocks via the CL, so I'm not getting much detritus when I swish the rock. In fact, last time, I could still see the bottom of the vat when I was done.

My ammonia test kit only goes up to 0.8 ppm, so I guess I'll just let the cycle ride until it comes back down and then start testing nitrites, right? And once that registers 0 or thereabout (along w/phosphates), then do a massive water change to export nutrients, then add sand beds (tank and fuge), then seed the DSBs, add a cleanup crew, and THEN add my first fish. Does that sounds about right?

Dk Coral, good idea about going asymmetrical. I think I'm going to remove the pvc rack until I get the rock the way I want it, and then modify the rack to accommodate the shape(s). I'm from near Birkeroed, about 30 mins outside Copenhagen, and you?
 
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My rock got here the other day. My ammonia is already reading at .4 after a 10g water change (25%). There is no odor coming from it except when you stick your nose up to the water level. Lots of little dust/detritus on the rock and lots of dead macroalgae.

I would let the cycle almost finish out (when the nitrates are falling) then seed your DSBs. Even if its fresh, you will probably still have a minicycle (I did).

Other than that, all sounds good. Can't wait to see it done.
 
My ammonia reading was 0.4 today, so to summarize the last 5 mornings, we have:

Day 1 0.4
Day 2 0.4
Day 3 0.4
Day 4 0.6 (it was a hard call, could have been 0.4)
Day 5 0.4

Nitrites are still at 0.0. Is it possible that ammonia isn't going to go above 0.4 and that I'll soon see it drop and Nitrites come up?

Water temp continues to be very stable at 81 +/- 0.2 degrees. The heaters are set to come on at 80.7, so they haven't kicked on at all in the last 36 hours.

pH has also been very stable at 8.05 +/- 0.05 for several days. Once my reactors come online, I plan to bring it up into the 8.2 - 8.3 range.

ORP is steadily rising at a rate of around 25 a day. Current reading is 280.

Had my first few specs of dirt or whatever on my glass this morning which I promptly removed.

Btw, on the recommendation of Photon, I'm running my regular light cycle which is 12 hrs on/12 hrs off given how fresh the rock is in order to minimize die off. When the MH lights kicked on this morning, I swear the coraline algae appeared to have more intense coloring that I remember from previous mornings.

Still no SD sand from HD, but it supposedly has shipped and should be in today or tomorrow. I know I shouldn't seed it until the cycle is done, but I'm thinking it might be a good idea to drop 6" into my fuge when I get it so that it can absorb things from the curing rock.

Horsens? I have a brother that lives in Aarhus. I still read danish, but have a very hard time writing it, but I'll check out the link.
 
LOL You sound as impatient as I usually am ;) You don't have to measure ammonia every day. Relax and do it once a week :) It may take a few weeks for the rock to cure.
 
Sounds good Beverly. I'll wait it out. Wasn't really sure what to expect with 200# of rock in 400g worth of water and no sand or anything else yet. Yeah, I'm kind of impatient, but I also know the benefits of not rushing things. What is the saying? Ahh yes "Only bad things happen quickly in a reef tank"

My main concern is avoiding a big spike in ammonia that might kill some of the lifeforms on my rock, but from everything I studied, I'll likely have a fairly gentle one given my water volume.
 
I wouldn't be too worried about ammonia spikes killing lifeforms. Afterall, the rock has been shipped in almost dry conditions, perhaps stayed in a wholesaler's LR tank that isn't anywhere near being cycled with high amounts of ammonia and nitrite.

I've cured rock straight from the airport in a small tank with ammonia going as high as 5 ppm, and I had tremendous growth of organisims afterward.

More pics of your aquascaping adventures, please :)
 
I agree. I would not be to worried. And i do not think you will have that high of a spike given the condition of the rock and the amount of water.

But what do i know?

Carl
 
Good deal on the ammonia. That's what I was hoping.

I ordered one of those small battery operated gravel vacs last week. It was only like $15 from Marine Depot w/ some spare bags. I hope it will be strong enough to suck up some of the detritus and rubble coming off the rock rather than having to use the python since that pulls out a lot of water and is hard to get into some places. I have taken a turkey baster to the rocks, but I think the CL already did a better job, as I'm hardly able to get anything else to blow off.

As for my aquascaping adventures, I'm hesitant to pull all the rock out again just yet since that will dictate doing a 10% water change as well. Since my fish room is downstairs, far away from the rock, the only alternative would be to haul 40g worth of premixed water up from the basement and drop into vats so that I can store the rock in there. That's a lot of work vs being able to just siphon water directly out of the tank into those vats and let the return pump do all the work for me. I've only been shutting down the CL pump while working with the rock, leaving the return pump and skimmer running. Its pretty cool to have a 150g sump as you can hardly tell when 40g is missing from it. Maybe I'll get a small pump that will allow me to return the water from the vats back into the tank when playing with the rocks and the water in the vats remain clear. I'm hesitant to steal one of my fw tank powerheads as those are all very established tanks and who knows what I might intoduce into my sw setup.

Tonight I plan to get out the soldering iron and make a 6 LED moon light for the tank that will be attached to one of the canopy top panels (removable). I had this running back when the tank was fw, but the addition of the CL manifold and MH pedants have forced a re-design.
 
Just got home as the first thing I noticed was that my rock (and inside tank walls) are starting to turn brown. I assume this is the dreaded brown algae that is beginning to take over?

brownalgae2.jpg


Close-up of a small rock. You can also make out some green algae on the far right.

brownalgae1.jpg


I'm wondering if I should reduce my light cycle (750w MH 12on/12off) or just keep an eye on things and hope it will go away on its own in a couple of day (or weeks)?
 
Looks like brown diatoms, totally natural and as you said will go away in the cycle of the tanks maturation. You could reduce your lighting schedule by about 1/2 esp since you don't have a clean up crew yet.
 
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