92 Corner Bow Front Upgrade Build From a 29G Regular

My light came today!



So I spent the afternoon moving corals, fish, some snails and the 2 anemones. I had both tanks at the same temp, salinity and PH so I did not acclimate. I have to say, I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the AI Sol Blue and can get away with one module very nicely. It's about 14 inches awl. The lighting timer possibilities are endless and the ramp up/down is pretty cool. I really like the controller for its ease of use and endless combinations with the three bulbs. It will probably take a year of me tinkering before I settle on a fixed schedule! My lighting right now is not exceeding 20% of the maximum brightness. I don't have a PAR meter so I am being safe. I plan to increase about 5% a week unless my corals tell me otherwise.

Most of the corals are scattered on the sand. When acclimation is complete and I can get up to about 70% intensity, then I will start placing the corals. I am so happy to be rid of my algae blenny and the peppermint shrimp!! They were a pain in the derriere.



The above pic is lighting at 20% white, blue, royal blue. I find the almost neon blue stripe on the heater a little distracting!



Check out the mutant clown fish above! Lol. Interesting photographic artifact..couldn't repeat it if I tired. One anemone was easy to peel off the glass. The other on a rock....not so much. Since I had decided to leave this rock behind anyway due to some bad things growing on it, we chiseled a section of the rock and moved it that way. So it was already anchored and seems pretty happy. The clowns didn't take long to find it. The other moved around on the sand and then ended up where you see it. Not my choice as it is somewhat hidden, but when fully extended I expect to see it pretty easily.



Tomorrow is a trip to the LFS to pick up a Tomini Tang, neon goby and a few other odds and ends. The now old tank will serve as the quarantine tank for the new fish.

The next project is to figure out how to pretty up the light/chain. It's not the prettiest. At the moment we are keeping the canopy off. It's too difficult for me to get into the tank since I can't take it off by myself.
 
Tang got picked up along with a few snails, two parasite cleaner shrimp whose scientific names I have forgotten and a lovely pocillopora with neon green tips. We traded in the peppermint shrimp and the blenny. Do we ever walk out of the LFS with just what we intended to buy? Still to purchase are more snails and about 6 Nassarius snails, once we have something for them to eat.
The tang is in the old 29G for quarantine. I know it's not an ideal bare bottom Q tank but I think having live rock to pick at will make it feel more at home and I am not about to move all that sand. He is shy but is eating. So far no sign of ich at the end of day 3.
I know I said I would wait to place corals but having watched them closely, some asked to be placed a little closer to the light. I started at 20% which is being very careful and I am now at 30% intensity. Increases of 1%/day from here on in. All are doing well except the Kenya Tree which the Algae Blenny constantly picked at. I think it will come back tho'. After messing around for 10 minutes, not understanding why I couldn't get the flow right today after moving various corals I realized the Koralia had reversed. I restarted it and it fixed itself. The coral placement is not final, any suggestions are welcome.
I moved the heater up so that blue stripe is out of the picture now.



You can see the angle the lenses throw in the tank by looking at the wall behind it. The slight shadowing on the edge of the tank sides is not due to the light but due to the dumb, opaque triangular pieces on the top of the tank at the corners. So I think one module is doing the job. BUT I need suggestions for prettying up that DIY hanging kit. If we put the canopy back on, it will look a lot better as you will barely see the wires. The piece of chain hanging down the middle will be gone once we decide on a permanent height. The problem with the canopy is that it adds 8 inches and has a teensy opening so doing things in the tank is very difficult. Maybe after things are somewhat permanent we will use it...or maybe not. What do you guys think? Does it look a lot better with the canopy on top?

 
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Traded my clone RBTA and some candy cane for some really nice corals yesterday, thank you Adam of Endicott! I replaced my chewed up blue star polyp, got a nice Christmas favia, pink zoas (these are really pretty), purple death, a frag of a gorgonia, and a nice hammer head. I think I am done for now. I will let the corals grow out and add the Tomini Tang when he is finished with quarantine, he is eating well and now eats off the clip but is still quite shy of people. Now some pics!

I get an hour of mid-morning sunlight. I really like the natural look of that light my tank.

My various corals are moved to mostly their final homes now. With another 30% more light to go, some may move. I think I will end up at 70% light intensity for 6 hours and then maybe mess around with the blue percentage at that point.



Probably my favorite, the pocillopora bought at ABC Reefs



Love this guy. Tough to place out of the current. I find it challenging to place low current corals in a place where they can be seen, yet provide the various other corals the right current. It's a balancing act for sure.



baby poci and orange setosa



Christmas favia, needs to get the green outline of its polyps back



The gorgonian in strong current, the star polyp and the pink zoa



Left half of tank



Right half



I'll post back in a few months. Stay tuned.....
 
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looks great and i love your rockwork ,it looks great ! the koralias for a bit were made to reverse when you power them down and restart them so thats the model that you have .
 
i think that they were for the wave making as you could use one on each side and cycle them as they would run forward then backward thus making them more useful for wavemaking . in my opinion the tunzie wavemakers work great as i own a couple and am simply amazed by them . they really are worth the $$$$$$$ IMO .
 
Congrats on the new tank it looks great. Couple of questions for you: How is your RBTA doing? Is it staying put under the AI Sol? Also how is the visual brightness of the tank in comparison to your old light set-up and is the light being that high-up off the tank distracting? I have a friend with a 92 Corner and he was thinking of switching to the AI Sols as well so I figured you would be the perfect person to ask. Thanks in advance!
 
RBTA is doing very well. It split a few weeks ago. When I put it in the new tank, I put it on the sand near the rock I wanted it on and let it find it's own way. It went on the other side of the rock where I couldn't see it. So I flipped the rock around to face the front. It's been a few days and it is staying put. It's foot is in a really secure hole in the rock so maybe it will stay. It has a gentle current as well. I am in the process of increasing the lights so it may decide to move. I hope not as it is in a perfect spot right now.

Re the lights, the brightness is plenty, even at 40%. I had T5's and I like these much better especially the daylight as I can put whatever blue I want in with it to get the fluorescence. I plan to increase to around 70% based on what my corals and RBTA tell me. As far as light spilling over under the module due to it's height... that was a concern of mine when I was looking to buy it. I read reviews where people said it's not a factor and they were right. I can be in the dark and there is no light spilling over to distract me. They are very focused.
 
Update and Some Pics

Update and Some Pics

I think I am just about "done" collecting corals and fish for awhile. Once what I have grows out, the tank will be pretty full. I do like some white space too on the sand. I am in a group buy order for some coral one of which is a nice orange ricordia. I have a foxface and 4 chromis in quarantine and then that will be it for fish (until I see something else I want :lol2:). My SPS are growing like crazy under my LED's compared to the T5's when they were in the other tank. Every day I see growth, it's that fast. And my candycane looks better than it ever has as does my big blastmussa.



So here is my fish and coral list:

Christmas favia
Regular green and yellow favia
Green neptha
Pink mushroom (one of my favs)
Lobophytum
Various birdsnests
Blastomussa
Green star
Blue clove
Zoas : purple death, cate eye, some orange ones
Various palys
Brown gorgonian
Orange setosa
Frog spawn
Hammerhead
Duncan
Pulsating Xenia




Fish:

Tomini tang
yellow Goby
6 Line wrasse
mated pair of clowns
Bangai cardinal

Everyone is getting along and the tank is very peaceful.



In Q: chromis 4, Foxface

Inverts: RBTA hosting the clowns, spiral snails, one turbo, long skinny snails, large brittle star and one teensy brittle star, 12 nassarius snails, cleaner shrimp who loves to clean the tang.



Group buy: Orange ricordia, a few cerith snails, ornage ricordia, neon blue small zoa colony.

On order: Apex Jnr

I want a torch!!! If anyone has one I am interested if the price is right.



I am feeding a homemade mix consisting of shrimp, clams and oysters from the grocery store, ground up seaweed from the health food store, mysis, cyclopeze, ON spirulina flakes, ON Formula 2 pellets, Spectrum Thera A pellets, a few drops of Selcon, all blended together. Poured into a 1G freezer bag and frozen flat for easy piece removal. The various particle sizes feed everything in the tank.



Starting to finally get some red corraline on the new rocks.

 
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