Building in wall; Need ideas for finishing.

[reefboarder]

This probably warrants a new topic, but I'll put it here anyhow.

Took down the display and transferred everything into temporary tanks. I completed the transfer early Wednesday morning. Worked all night Wednesday night, came home Thursday morning everything looked excellent, slept woke up around 4pm went to check on the tank, immediately could smell the stench, first glance water slightly cloudy and yellowish.
90% of what I had is dead. Here's my shameful list.
Orange, green, and purple rim cap: dead.
Rainbow palys, nuke greens, purples, yellow brick road zoas, eagle eyes, unnamed orange and look a like radioactive dragon eyes: dead.
6" purple/green fungia: loss of most tissue.
Purple/green frogspawn, hammer: dead
Neon green and regular candy coral: dead.
Hawkins echinata, orange digitata, blue polyp digitata: dead
Huge frilly mushroom x3 : dead

The only things that may make it are Gary's gorg, tyree war coral, two variations of ricordea Florida, a few various shrooms, and some Kenya tree.

Fortunately for now I've only lost one chromis,and a black and white damsel. and my nem and blood shrimp all look ok.
Can't begin to explain how much this hurts, just remodeled the whole downstairs around the tank and now I just don't know anymore.
Thanks for letting me cry on your shoulders.


Sent from the 4.

 

[EllieSuz]

So sorry to hear this. Do you have any idea what caused it? Did you move old sand to the new tank? Was your rock out of water for any length of time? It's too late for you, but if we figure out what went wrong, you might be able to save someone else the same fate.

 

[Jacwil]

Oh man..I'm so sry!

Get to the bottom of it, regroup and move forward.

I'm sure I dont speak just for myself that I'll be happy to hook you up with some free frags to get you rockin n rollin when rdy.

Damn man!

 

[reefboarder]

A chromis was stuck to a return pump, and my skimmer isn't in an ideal spot so I was running it pretty dry,truthfully it had been running since yesterday but hadnt pulled anything, it is freshly cleaned spic and span so its being finicky.The temporary setup is a 125 gallon baffled as a sump, skimmer on one end, big chamber in the middle and the return on the other end.
I have a 29g refugium holding the anemones and my Picasso clowns, plumbed into the sump.
I haven't ran the lights I wanted to try keep the stress down, which is probably what the problem was.
I haven't checked the alk but I haven't added any either, I did a big water change (40g) which is close to half of what is in the setup ATM, I also only added about 30 lbs of live rock which was in the old sump and only after careful inspection for pests, the rest of the rock was cooked (bleach then acid method) and is sitting in a tub of fresh water neutralizing.
My salinity was 1.026 which is where I keep it. I don't have an ammonia, nitrate, or nitrite test anymore, been quite a while since I tested for any of that.
I started running carbon, and did a twenty gallon water change most of which I wet skimmed last night. The tissue necrosis on what was left has stopped and the fish seem better this morning, with a bit of luck I won't lose anything else from here on, but I'm not too optimistic.
I am running rodi now to make more water tonight.
Keep your fingers crossed for me guys.


Sent from the 4.

 

[NirvanaFan]

I doubt that not running the lights is what caused it. The fish should be less active, which should mean less ammonia from them. 8 hours is quick.

Keep an eye on your salinity when running your skimmer wet. Remember that the skimmer pulls out saltwater, so you have to replace it with saltwater. Test for Alk, Mag, and Cal if you have those kits handy. Baby the crap out of the corals you have left.

 

[block head]

Sorry . My friends 180 took a brutal loss as well. I tank sit his tank often. His in wall was never finished and has a small shelf on the viewing side. Not having access from the front would be misrable IMO. The shelf is very practical. I'd not consider an inwall without an acesss panel. The furniture industry has excellent hardware and clip systems that allow quick removal

 

[reefboarder]

The wet skim was replaced with salt water. I got the idea to skim real wet and drain the collection cup into a bucket from Gary. It theoretically should pull out more gunk than just taking out water and adding new, so it's something that I've toyed with in the past.
I just woke up so I'm gonna be checking in on it here soon.


Sent from the 4.