CADlights 39g Pro build thread

[CalmSeasQuest]

Happy New Year everyone!

Work has kept me pretty busy as of late - Just a few updates...

I've had lots of problems with return pumps. I replaced the stock pomp with a Rio Hyperflow 20 return pump. Great output and very efficient but it often fails to restart due to calcium buildup. I finally replaced it with a Water Blaster HY7000 - It just barely fits in the pump section of the sump and provides ~1600 GPH @ 105W of "always-restarts" power. So far it's running flawlessly.

Added a Osmolator to handle ATO and separated Kalk dosing to a BRS dosing pump managed by the Apex.

Removed 2 EVO 1400s from the FT and replaced them with a MP40. They were freezing up every couple weeks due to calcium deposits.

Added a few bells/whistled to my Apex including AI integration and a salinity probe (really handy.)

The Tunze 9011 skimmer continues to impress - it pulls great (although I have a very light bio load) and ALWAYS restarts.

Even though this tank has been up for about 15 months, I'm still learning and adjusting, with lots of room for improvement.

 

[coolcorals]

Hope everyone is having a great New Year, and all your tanks are healthy and thriving! It's been a while since I posted, but have been working on stocking (overstocking?) my tank.

It's been running about 9 months, so it's time to replace the Actinics. I replaced the stock MH with a Phoenix 14k. Like the color of the Phoenix, but it's a bit on the bluish side. Still much better than the yellow I was getting from the stock bulb (I have the older fixture from 2008). Everything in tank seems very happy (see Purple Birdnest on bottom, which started as a small frag!).

Any suggestions on good T5 bulbs that go well with/compliments the Phoenix. Want something that's good for coral health, but also has that color pop! Hope to stay in the same color range - maybe slightly less blue, but a bit more color.

Am looking at the Giesemann Actinic+ or Pure Actinic. Which one's bluer? Any suggestions? Or would you recommend one of the other Giesemann T5s? Also, would there be any benefit in mixing two different T5 bulbs?

Thanks for any suggestions. And I thought I'd toss in a FTS, just for fun.

 

[reeftivo]

No experience with t5's but the tank is looking great coolcorals!
Love the additions! Birdsnest is looking nice and the crazy growth on the orange branching monti is cool. You're not overstocked yet! Just leave it for now and watch things fill in.

 

[coolcorals]

No experience with t5's but the tank is looking great coolcorals!
Love the additions! Birdsnest is looking nice and the crazy growth on the orange branching monti is cool. You're not overstocked yet! Just leave it for now and watch things fill in.

RT - great to hear from you (BM skimmer is still running great - thx again)! Was starting to think all the CAD 39 reefers had moved along. :wavehand:

I'm still researching the T5s - this is my first tank with MH and T5s, so everythings an adventure. Have read good things about Giesemann, ATI and UVL. Plan to mix two different color bulbs.

Do you have any idea what the stock T5s are? They seem to be a lighter blue than pure actinics - just so hard to tell. Local LFS carries Giesemann, so might see if I can do a test run. They are running Radium 20k and Giesemann Pure Actinic and Actinic+ with great results!

Thanks on the corals. Both started as small frags, but seem to love the conditions. Have managed to "accidentally" frag both - hands in tank! Knocked a large branch off the Org Monti - learned SPS break so easily - but it's already encrusting.

How's your tank doing?

 

[reeftivo]

Reefer Madness!!!!!!!

Still around coolcorals! I pop in and take a peek once in a while but there hasn't been much activity in a while so I haven't posted. Been busy at work and at home. Glad to hear the BM skimmer is working well for you. Re: the T5s, I'm not sure which ones they use for the stock CAd fixture but I personally loved my Giesemanns (actinic +). As you mention, the ATIs get really good reviews as well. I had the pure actinics a while back but didn't care for the color too much. I'm very happy with my lumenmax setup right now so no complaints here. My tank is doing good. I have not had the growth that I had hoped for in the first phase of zeovit but I'm super pleased with the cleanliness and ease of maintenance I now enjoy. I'm now into phase two with stable low nutrients and I have been schooled by some of the other zeo users to remove most of my sand bed. This has evidentally slowed the whole process, so I will be gradually removing the sand over the next few weeks and just leave about a half inch to an inch of substrate. I will post some fresh pics soon but right now I'm very discouraged with my photo skills using my new DSLR. I suck at photography-LOL. I get better pics from my old point and shoot-LOL.

Will post pics soon

Happy Reefing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tivo

 

[reeftivo]

colors are great but the stupid camera operator (me) can't wrap his tiny little brain around the fact that he needs to read his camera manual-LOLOLOL!

another cruddy pic as usual. This is from a couple months ago. I've since added a hydno, orange cap and an awsome little six line wrasse (love that sucker).

 

[Ram Jr]

It always surprises me to see how much money 1 puts into a 39 gal tank. I also would of never thought that a 39gal tank would need a tunze 9011 skimmer. That thing is rated to 300 gal right?

 

[reeftivo]

What can I say? We like to waste money-LOL.

I've run skimmerless and have owned most budget skimmers and we just settle with what works for us.

If I was on a tight budget, I wouldn't be in this hobby-LOL

There's a guy on the zeo forums running a kz rev medium on a 20 gallon long-wow!

Happy reefing

 

[reeftivo]

It always surprises me to see how much money 1 puts into a 39 gal tank. I also would of never thought that a 39gal tank would need a tunze 9011 skimmer. That thing is rated to 300 gal right?

Back to this!

Tunze skimmers are by no means built like tanks, but they are built well. The design is what makes them work. Many other medium to larger high end skimmers can have the air dialed back and still be pretty efficient, but the tunze in my experience can be dialed way,way back to work on much smaller nano tanks without losing efficiency. The 300 gallon rating for other tunze is somewhat realistic but what I like about them is that they seem to be able to handle a wider range of tank sizes than other brands. I've used ATB, Bubble king, ATI, Vertex, Bermuda, Warner marine, BM, ASM, Octos and as of now, I'm super happy with my 9410.

 

[CalmSeasQuest]

FWIW, I Love my 9011 - Not just because it skims very well, but unlike every other skimmer I've had on the 39GPro, it ALWAYS restarts Cleaning takes just a couple moments and when you clean the collection cup (although I use the outlet hose kit) you're also cleaning the entire reaction chamber without having to remove the skimmer.

In fact I just ordered a 9002 and 3615 for a desktop Nano I'm building.

 

[reeftivo]

Happy new year Tom!

I hear ya re: the Tunze! I keep trying different mods on my other skimmers (reducing intakes, regulate air, different pw's, mesh, lower water levels, higher water levels etc. and I keep putting that darn Tunze back in because it always pulls gunk. The only thing I did to it to get a drier skim was to cut down the standpipe an inch so that the water level in the skimmer was a bit lower without running it in less water. I'm very happy with mine.

Hope all is well and keep us updated on your other builds

Happy Reefing

Tivo

 

[coolcorals]

Reefer Madness!!!!!!!

Still around coolcorals! I pop in and take a peek once in a while but there hasn't been much activity in a while so I haven't posted. Been busy at work and at home. Glad to hear the BM skimmer is working well for you. Re: the T5s, I'm not sure which ones they use for the stock CAd fixture but I personally loved my Giesemanns (actinic +). As you mention, the ATIs get really good reviews as well. I had the pure actinics a while back but didn't care for the color too much. I'm very happy with my lumenmax setup right now so no complaints here. My tank is doing good. I have not had the growth that I had hoped for in the first phase of zeovit but I'm super pleased with the cleanliness and ease of maintenance I now enjoy. I'm now into phase two with stable low nutrients and I have been schooled by some of the other zeo users to remove most of my sand bed. This has evidentally slowed the whole process, so I will be gradually removing the sand over the next few weeks and just leave about a half inch to an inch of substrate. I will post some fresh pics soon but right now I'm very discouraged with my photo skills using my new DSLR. I suck at photography-LOL. I get better pics from my old point and shoot-LOL.

Will post pics soon

Happy Reefing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tivo

Haven't been on RC in many months, so still have about 20 pages to read in this thread. But I have been fiddling with the tank - mainly adding and adjusting corals. Also, working on my dosing schedule to bring up my Calcium, but trying to do it slowly.

I remember you had tried the Giesemann - that may be why it was my first choice. Don't know much about ATI or UVL, but they also get good reviews. I may just try the Giesemann mixed T5s - I like the effect on the LFS's 600g and I'd prefer to buy local when I can (support the good reef shops).

The tank looks great - nice colors! Also very clean. Nice large (and happy) Acro in the rear right. Very interested on your progress on the Zeovit method (need to read last 20 pgs to catch up). How does it ease maintenance? And why do you need to remove the sand?

We just got a new Point and Shoot and I'm still working on setting for best shots - it has an Aquarium setting, but photos come out really blue (could be the Phoenix 14k).

Glad to see some of the old crew still around and your tanks are doing well!

 

[reeftivo]

Thanks coolcorals,

Nice to hear updates!

Can't go wrong with the giesemans. Are you struggling with keeping Ca up? I only have issues with Ca if my Mg drops below 1200. keeping the Mg at 1300 or slightly above should keep alk and Ca proportional to one another. I always keep a bottle of kents Mg supplement around just in case.

Zeovit?
How does it ease maintenance? I believe it enables the system to bind ammonia (in the zeolites) before it can be converted into nitrite. Thus greatly reducing the development of nitrate and phosphate. The dosed strains of bacteria colonate the zeolites and further reduce nitrate and phosphate introduced by feeding and animal waste. With that being said, it seems to minimize the amount of waste accumulated. Thomas Pohl is very proprietary with everything he makes. Probably for fear that he will be stolen from-who knows?

Many call it snake oil and many call it gods gift to reefing. All I know is that it's hard to find a bad looking zeo tank and after the first month of running the system, the first thing I noticed was the sand bed started to whiten up and my algae started to subside everywhere. The deposits in my sump started dissapearing as well. It really freaked me out!

I use a photometer to check for phosphates and ideally the PO4 should be kept in check at less than .04 ppm. Mine was constantly .04 and I could not get it lower than that. I mentioned the sand bed because I was told by the moderators on the zeo forum that a BB or 1 inch sand bed is ideal for ultra low nutrient since anything over 1 inch could still pose issues with built up nutrients. Since I've started the system, I've lost all my snails since there really isn't any algae for them to feed on. The inverts I still have are small hermits, 1 cleaner shrimp and my old serpent star. I'm a bit surprised that the star is still alive but it's doing well picking up any left overs from feeding.

Many people including myself have had success with macro fuges, probiotic systems and others. I wanted to try zeovit because of the color tweaking aspects and the notion of an overall cleaner tank. The Cadlights sump won't accomodate a standard 1 liter zeo reactor so Eddie at Cadlights helped me with the glass to make a larger 15 gallon two chambered sump. The stock Cad sump would work for zeovit if one uses a smaller canister filter for the stones. You would have to just have the filter situated so that it can be vigorously shaken a couple times a day to release the mulm built up on the stones.

I'm happy so far!

Tivo

 

[reeftivo]

Really screwed up yesterday with my ATO!

Got home last night from work and noticed my corals looked stressed. No polyp extension at all and the fish were bouncing around more than usual. I opened the cabinet and noticed my sump level was pretty low. I figured "ouch" my ato pump failed and now my sg is through the roof. Well, the sg was through the roof but the pump was fine. What happened was that I unplug my zeoreactor everytime I do a stone change and didn't notice that when ever I unplug it, the movement from me reaching back there was evidentally bumping the power cord to the ATO controller and over time it had worked its way out enough that when I bumped it last night it unplugged. OOPS! The controller is alarmed so if the pump failed, I would have heard it and since there was no power, there was no alarm.

Probably not too much of an issue for many people, but for me it is. I have alot of evaporation from vigorous surface agitation and fans, so I use up about 5 gallons of RO water every three to four days.

My poor little dudes were suffering for a while! I brought sg back up and things are somewhat back to normal but I'm getting some shedding from the base of a couple acros and I'll have to wait to see if they recover.

Lesson learned!

Tivo

 

[coolcorals]

colors are great but the stupid camera operator (me) can't wrap his tiny little brain around the fact that he needs to read his camera manual-LOLOLOL!

another cruddy pic as usual. This is from a couple months ago. I've since added a hydno, orange cap and an awsome little six line wrasse (love that sucker).

RT, you have a nice mix of SPS, LPS and softies. I ended up heavily into the SPS - first tank with SPS, so went a bit crazy.

Both you and a local reefer noted how crowded my looks - I think I did the SPS, like I did LPS and sofies in my other tank. It's crowded, but I'm hoping to do a bit of fragging to keep the corals in check - may or may not work. I tend to buy corals like I have a tank twice the size!

Quick question - for SPS frags do you prefer to glue them to plugs or epoxy them onto the LR?

 

[coolcorals]

Thanks coolcorals,

Nice to hear updates!

Can't go wrong with the giesemans. Are you struggling with keeping Ca up? I only have issues with Ca if my Mg drops below 1200. keeping the Mg at 1300 or slightly above should keep alk and Ca proportional to one another. I always keep a bottle of kents Mg supplement around just in case.

Zeovit?
How does it ease maintenance? I believe it enables the system to bind ammonia (in the zeolites) before it can be converted into nitrite. Thus greatly reducing the development of nitrate and phosphate. The dosed strains of bacteria colonate the zeolites and further reduce nitrate and phosphate introduced by feeding and animal waste. With that being said, it seems to minimize the amount of waste accumulated. Thomas Pohl is very proprietary with everything he makes. Probably for fear that he will be stolen from-who knows?

Many call it snake oil and many call it gods gift to reefing. All I know is that it's hard to find a bad looking zeo tank and after the first month of running the system, the first thing I noticed was the sand bed started to whiten up and my algae started to subside everywhere. The deposits in my sump started dissapearing as well. It really freaked me out!

I use a photometer to check for phosphates and ideally the PO4 should be kept in check at less than .04 ppm. Mine was constantly .04 and I could not get it lower than that. I mentioned the sand bed because I was told by the moderators on the zeo forum that a BB or 1 inch sand bed is ideal for ultra low nutrient since anything over 1 inch could still pose issues with built up nutrients. Since I've started the system, I've lost all my snails since there really isn't any algae for them to feed on. The inverts I still have are small hermits, 1 cleaner shrimp and my old serpent star. I'm a bit surprised that the star is still alive but it's doing well picking up any left overs from feeding.

Many people including myself have had success with macro fuges, probiotic systems and others. I wanted to try zeovit because of the color tweaking aspects and the notion of an overall cleaner tank. The Cadlights sump won't accomodate a standard 1 liter zeo reactor so Eddie at Cadlights helped me with the glass to make a larger 15 gallon two chambered sump. The stock Cad sump would work for zeovit if one uses a smaller canister filter for the stones. You would have to just have the filter situated so that it can be vigorously shaken a couple times a day to release the mulm built up on the stones.

I'm happy so far!

Tivo

Thanks for the info. The Zeo tanks definitely look clean. I'm okay with algae in the tank - food for the snails and crabs. But my sand does get a bit dirty looking, so would be nice to have cleaner sand. And there's definitely crud in the sump.

Right now I'm using the LR/LS/weekly WC method. My Phos/Nitrite/Ammo/Nitrates have been reading zero (I realize that could be from the algae).

My Cals is 425, but I'm working on getting it to 450. My Magn is high - 1450. Am trying to slowly raise Calc and Alk, and drop Magn below 1400. I dose ESV B-Ionic and Kent Tech-M; still working out the dosing levels/frequency.

 

[reeftivo]

RT, you have a nice mix of SPS, LPS and softies. I ended up heavily into the SPS - first tank with SPS, so went a bit crazy.

Both you and a local reefer noted how crowded my looks - I think I did the SPS, like I did LPS and sofies in my other tank. It's crowded, but I'm hoping to do a bit of fragging to keep the corals in check - may or may not work. I tend to buy corals like I have a tank twice the size!

Quick question - for SPS frags do you prefer to glue them to plugs or epoxy them onto the LR?

Your tank looks fine! Not overcrowded! Sorry if I mentioned that before, I was wrong! Let the mag fall to 1300 and you'll be good. With mag at 1500 or so you could run the risk burnt tips so let it fall a bit. I had a bryopsis problem in one of my old tanks and ran the mag up to 1550 to battle it. I lost an acro and seriatopora but got a handle on the bryopsis.

Glue? I find it much easier to glue to plugs then snap off the pin and then epoxy to rock. When ever I've tried to adhere a frag directly to the rock, I've always damaged it too much and had problems getting it to hold. JME.

Tivo

 

[timdanger]

Thanks coolcorals,

I use a photometer to check for phosphates and ideally the PO4 should be kept in check at less than .04 ppm. Mine was constantly .04 and I could not get it lower than that.

what kind are you using? I got one of those green handheld Hanna Phosphate Checkers for Christmas -- tested it 4 times, and it reads 0.00 every time. I just feel like that cannot be correct (especially given that i have some algae growth, not to mention reasonable SPS coral growth), but who knows.

 

[timdanger]

Thanks for the info. The Zeo tanks definitely look clean. I'm okay with algae in the tank - food for the snails and crabs. But my sand does get a bit dirty looking, so would be nice to have cleaner sand. And there's definitely crud in the sump.

Right now I'm using the LR/LS/weekly WC method. My Phos/Nitrite/Ammo/Nitrates have been reading zero (I realize that could be from the algae).

My Cals is 425, but I'm working on getting it to 450. My Magn is high - 1450. Am trying to slowly raise Calc and Alk, and drop Magn below 1400. I dose ESV B-Ionic and Kent Tech-M; still working out the dosing levels/frequency.

sounds familiar. i actually have been struggling to keep Ca/Alk levels up, even with Mg up around 1400-1500. I actually upped my dosing from 16ml/day to 22ml of both Ca and Alk 2-part solution per day, yet my Alk never goes above 8.5 (lately hovering between 7.5-8dkh). Meanwhile, My Ca is struggling even to get to 400 anymore. I have several pieces of SPS in the tank, but honestly, the uptake is pretty surprising, especially given that i am performing a water change every 10 days with D-D H2Ocean salt.

 

[timdanger]

Glue? I find it much easier to glue to plugs then snap off the pin and then epoxy to rock. When ever I've tried to adhere a frag directly to the rock, I've always damaged it too much and had problems getting it to hold. JME.

Tivo

that's what i do as well. either snap off the plug or cut it off with bone cutters.

the only place i've had a hard time with doing that is with ORA frag plugs. i ended up having to get creative with mounting my red planet because i couldn't readily figure out a way to cut the end off of the plug (even bone cutters weren't working?!).