40g Breeder Corner In-Wall

[gypsyboy38]

After Christmas, the misses decided it was a good time to upgrade from the solana to the in-wall breeder. She grabbed the camera and I grabbed our mini-sledge and we went downstairs. Unfortunately, the batteries in the camera died, so time skip from demo to...

Here's where I am today. After I sand, prime, and put the door in, I am allowed to actually work on the tank.

Equipment list:

Tank- 40g breeder
Sump- 20H
Return- Rio 2500+
Skimmer- Octo 1000sss
Flow- MP40/MP10
Controller- Reefkeeper lite
Overflow- glass-holes 700gph kit
Dosing- 2xbrs dosers
Lighting- DIY Led

ETA for tank water is ~ this weekend, but who knows if the camera will have batteries...

 

[IDrawFish]

Great looking build so far, looking forward to seeing some more detail. Charge those batteries!

 

[gypsyboy38]

Busy week, but not on the tank =\ I did get the door installed and the first coat of primer up.

I also got the sump baffles in. I decided to risk just doing an under/over setup because of how small the sump is. I'll be running a filter sock and the 1000sss is supposed to be fairly good at not putting bubbles in the tank. We'll see how it works I guess...

Tonight I plan to fix a few spots where you can see ridges from the mudding (...) and put the second coat of primer on. This weekend I should be able to plumb/leak test. I also need to try and find a miter saw on the cheap, since I failed to cut my door casing well on the table saw...

 

[gypsyboy38]

Finally finished mudding and priming, so I got a chance to start working on the actual tank. I got the plumbing done and started to fill, but I ran out of water ):

I also fired up the octo 1000sss for the first time! It's already trying to make a foam head too, in fresh water to boot...

Tomorrow I hope to finish filling, paint the back, salt it up, and add some rock I've been storing in the corner (wife wants the rock moved asap...).

 

[ReefWaters]

I really like this set up. I had a 220 gallon in-wall that I just broke down. I loved it but I found myself missing my old 50 cube. The size was just more manageable. But you just cant beat having an in-wall set up for ease of maintenance. You've got the best of both worlds here. Keep us posted!

 

[gypsyboy38]

Yeah, we had a 135 when we lived in Chicago, but it was just too much to take care of for me. We got a 34g solana when we moved here, but the AIO was just a pita. Anyways, ask for pics and ye shall receive.

Last weekend I tore down the solana and transferred everything over. It was earlier than I wanted to, but the misses wanted to finish painting the basement. The wiring is still a colossal mess, but it's better than all of that being under the solana cabinet!

I had already switched to using led's with the solana, so it wasn't that big of a deal to add another pendant, especially since I had a crappy enclosure built from before (bad miter cuts). It doesn't matter this time around since no one can see it!

Now here are the pics I've been hesitant to post. I'm having a hard time getting accurate pictures of the actual tank. Here are the best I came up with (though they are still off). You can see the mistake that will haunt me forever by the return... I thought it would go away with the paint, but I guess I was wrong. It's probably a little more blue than this pic.

This pic is probably a little too blue. Eventually maybe I'll get the color right...

 

[langtudatinh01]

very nice, keep it up gypsyboy. i really like it.

 

[gypsyboy38]

I mounted all my sps the other day, since they appeared to be doing after the transfer, but my bonsai didn't have the PE it used to...

):

I don't have the time/resources to set up a QT tank to treat them all properly, so we'll see how this fight goes...

 

[iwishtofish]

Beautiful setup! The rock is very nicely done. I hope that return stops being such an issue for you.

AEFWs? You are in the early stages of the tank - maybe someone can suggest a way to knock them out quickly (that isn't too difficult).

 

[gypsyboy38]

Beautiful setup! The rock is very nicely done. I hope that return stops being such an issue for you.

AEFWs? You are in the early stages of the tank - maybe someone can suggest a way to knock them out quickly (that isn't too difficult).

It isn't the return, it's the hole I cut for it. The bit skipped around a bit and the scratches are visible even when painted.

Yeah, I'm almost positive it's AEFW's. From what I've read, you need to dip affected (best to just do all) corals every 1-2 weeks in revive or coralrx. This should continue for ~6 weeks while you keep the corals in a QT tank so that the free roaming aefw and eggs can die off. I can't really set up a QT, so I'm going to just have to put corals back in the tank after I dip.

To start, I'm probably just going to treat my bonsai and my tricolor, since they are the only two with poor PE.

 

[gypsyboy38]

When I did the dip for AEFW last week, I noticed that I may have redbugs as well. In addition to treating the three potential trouble corals for worms, I also treated the tank with interceptor. I happened to have some laying around, since we have two dogs. Unfortunately, after I did all this, I had to go to a conference for a week, so I couldn't monitor how things were going. Last year when I went to this conference, my wife neglected the tank a little...so I was a little nervous. However, I just got back everything looks great. Polyp extension is way up on all the corals, so I think the interceptor treatment was really the way to go.

Also, while I was gone, my coralrx came in. I just did the second dip for my tricolor/bonsai/mille. A few living things came off, but they were too small to determine what they were. Nonetheless, significantly less came off than the first dip, so things are probably progressing in the right direction. I'll try and get some pictures up shortly. I just did a water change so I'll have to wait a little bit.

My par meter also should arrive this week, so I'll be able to see what my diy led fixtures are putting out.

 

[gypsyboy38]

FTS from today

Side shot

Here is a shot of the room. We finally got it all painted and I got the door trim/baseboard on.

 

[MrKite24]

Very Nice!

 

[gypsyboy38]

The corals lost their color during the move, but I thought I'd toss some quick pics up anyways so I could monitor their growth. Forgive me for the picture quality, I've never been the best photographer.

~~ Corals as of 3.21.11 ~~

Bird's Nest

Orange Digi

Blue Stag

Bonsai (AEFW have it looking bad)

Rainbow Monti (bleached)

Green Slimer

Pink Mille (AEFW/Red bug trouble)

Mystery Coral (I can't remember what this is, but it doesn't look good atm)

Monti Cap (horribly bleached..)

 

[gypsyboy38]

Just got back from LA and finally got around to taking a few par measurements. Not listed in either picture is the par at the surface. It's about 1100 +/- 100.

~Left side~

~Right side~

I'm pretty happy with the measurements that I got for my diy led fixtures. Par was about 200 anywhere I measured on the tank bottom, and 3-500 on the rocks. Each of the pendants are running 24 3W cree led's (12 XRE RB/12 XRE CW). Currently, I'm running the whites at 750ma and the blues at either 850 or 900ma (I can't remember which). I'm pretty happy with the color in person, when I take pictures, that's another story... I have 80 degree honeycomb optics from rapidled. They give a nice spread and minimize the disco effect.

 

[bawla47]

wow that corner in wall is such a good idea! It came out awesome with the door and all.

I think im going to do this when i move shortly. thanks for the idea!


i also have a 40g. probably be even duplicating your lights.


curious what did you do for ventilation for the room?

keep us updated!!

 

[jhs]

Thats a very clean look....I like...:beer:

 

[gypsyboy38]

curious what did you do for ventilation for the room?

keep us updated!!

I didn't do anything for ventilation yet. Eventually I'll hook up a fan to a humidistat to keep it reasonable, but for now, leaving the door open is adequate. I'll probably put the fan behind one of those return gratings you would use for your central air system.

 

[gypsyboy38]

Just got back from the last trip I'll be taking for a while. Being gone three out of the last six weeks or so didn't seem to mess up the tank too much.

Right now everything is fine except a few corals are still a little ****y from the algaefix marine I dosed last week. I cooked my rocks (for the most part) but apparently I still had a little bit of lobophora on them. Either that, or it was in my container of mb7. Anyone that has had it knows the difficulties of removing it. Since the algaefix worked last time, I figured I'd just start with it this time. I'm only at the third dose and it's working great, but I'm afraid I'll lose something if I continue.

I'll run a little extra carbon and wait a few days to see if things bounce back I guess.

 

[gypsyboy38]

Been a long time since I posted. The tank has been in bad shape for a while. It cracked in ~May and when I got the new tank installed and everything moved back in, dino's began to assert their dominance. I recently got rid of them and have gotten significantly more interested in the tank again, so it has started to look a little better.

Here are a couple of pics I took the other day with our Christmas present. I'm still not very good at taking photos with it.

Recently mounted pink mille that is trying to look good.

Cardinal that I've had since my old tank.

I'll try to post pics of a few more browned out corals and a FTS later...