Coral Tank from Canada (1350gal Display Tank)
- Thread starter nineball
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nineball
Active member
It is very tempting to go all LED's. The latest tech that we got from Orphek would certainly fit and we are exploring some new LED options with the company who appears very willing to work with us to 'experiment' with various combinations and configurations to get the absolute best possible outcomes.
The concern I have is not so much whether I would prefer the LED technology as I am convinced it is the way to go but I need to satisfy myself that the metal halide/T5 units are NOT supplying light spectrum that the reef inhabitants need.
Aesthetically, you can't beat the light from all the technologies taken together.....LED/MH/T5. There is a definite qualitative difference if you take away any one. Today, I believe the best practice IS all three although that may well change and I am hopeful that it will soon.
Peter
Quantum meters are what most people use.
http://www.apogeeinstruments.com/quantum/coral-aquariums.html
http://www.apogeeinstruments.com/quantum/coral-aquariums.html
padova335i
Member
amazing man, amazing! in time leds should have the correct light spectrum.. but im not sure they do yet.. as far as sps growth goes anyway.. but im not too up to date with the led tech..
Padrino
New member
SeattleReef
New member
Peter,
Well it took the better part of a week (and I'm talking reading 24/7 :spin2
but I finally finished it all. And this thread is definitely deserving of my first post. Kudos to team Nineball and thank your for your amazing work and exciting read! :reading:
I haven't had a tank in about 10 years and am looking to get back into it again. I will move slowly but I sure learned a lot more with Mr. Wilson's and the rest of the pros here.
I read somewhere in your thread that you lived in St. Johns at one point. How long did you live there? Growing up our family had a house on Deer Island, New Brunswick, not too far from St. Jonhs, and there were lots of great memories. The Bay of Fundy is an amazing place!
Ok back to your tank... A couple of questions! Have you decided on any more grand masters? You said a while back that #2 would be relieved in Feb....so now it's May so how about a second?:worried:
Second question and an easy one...can you tell me if there is a special fish or coral that you have been waiting on getting? Maybe a prized fish? It would be fun to see what's on your short list...or dream list.
Hope to see you at Sea-MAX this summer, I'll be there.
Now I have to go and read Ching's thread... :beer:
-Ryan
Well it took the better part of a week (and I'm talking reading 24/7 :spin2
but I finally finished it all. And this thread is definitely deserving of my first post. Kudos to team Nineball and thank your for your amazing work and exciting read! :reading:I haven't had a tank in about 10 years and am looking to get back into it again. I will move slowly but I sure learned a lot more with Mr. Wilson's and the rest of the pros here.
I read somewhere in your thread that you lived in St. Johns at one point. How long did you live there? Growing up our family had a house on Deer Island, New Brunswick, not too far from St. Jonhs, and there were lots of great memories. The Bay of Fundy is an amazing place!
Ok back to your tank... A couple of questions! Have you decided on any more grand masters? You said a while back that #2 would be relieved in Feb....so now it's May so how about a second?:worried:
Second question and an easy one...can you tell me if there is a special fish or coral that you have been waiting on getting? Maybe a prized fish? It would be fun to see what's on your short list...or dream list.
Hope to see you at Sea-MAX this summer, I'll be there.
Now I have to go and read Ching's thread... :beer:
-Ryan
SeattleReef
New member
-Double Post-
dave.m
Active member
Some close-up photos on how-to with an expert on hand would probably be appreciated by anyone new to raising mangroves. Just a thoughtnineball said:
Query for Mr.Wilson regarding dipping corals: How would you treat a coral with Christmas Tree worms in it (supposing you wanted to retain the worms, of course)? Do you have any experience with these?
Thx,
Dave.M
nineball
Active member
nineball
Active member
Thank you. We have a way to go yet but it feels good to make a little progress. One of the challenges we are facing at the moment is choosing corals that display well under blue light. It is almost impossible to correctly guess what the result will be in the fish store but we are beginning to get the hang of it. Mr. Wilson's experience and willingness to experiment are a tremendous assist in this endeavour. It is clear that placing the various forms of coral can be a vary tedious business at best. However, the parallel to many of the best practices in gardening calls for a lot of patience and understanding to produce better results.
Another principle that I am coming to terms with is that a healthy reef is always evolving and that immutable fact is that change will always be a random factor mixed in to the best laid plans. If I can accept this fact of life, I might eventually get to enjoy this hobby.
Peter
nineball
Active member
Peter,
Well it took the better part of a week (and I'm talking reading 24/7 :spin2
I haven't had a tank in about 10 years and am looking to get back into it again. I will move slowly but I sure learned a lot more with Mr. Wilson's and the rest of the pros here.
I read somewhere in your thread that you lived in St. Johns at one point. How long did you live there? Growing up our family had a house on Deer Island, New Brunswick, not too far from St. Jonhs, and there were lots of great memories. The Bay of Fundy is an amazing place!
Ok back to your tank... A couple of questions! Have you decided on any more grand masters? You said a while back that #2 would be relieved in Feb....so now it's May so how about a second?:worried:
Second question and an easy one...can you tell me if there is a special fish or coral that you have been waiting on getting? Maybe a prized fish? It would be fun to see what's on your short list...or dream list.
Hope to see you at Sea-MAX this summer, I'll be there.
Now I have to go and read Ching's thread... :beer:
-Ryan
I did live in Saint John New Brunswick for a couple of years as a kid. It was at a time when there was a lot of development with oil refineries which did not leave me with the 'best' olfactory (sulphur stinks!) memories. Thank you for taking the time to read through this whole thing. It increases the value to this community whenever someone new takes the effort to heart. Welcome to our group.
I am close to announcing the Second Grand Master. The challenge for us was that although certain aquarists are associated with certain styles the best examples we have been able to find have either moved on to another build with a different style or taken a vacation from the hobby. The debate within the team was wether we should recognize someone who was not currently active in the hobby. The consensus after a number of discussions was that if we felt the individual was one of the primary influences on a particular style then we will recognize that individual's contribution to our hobby. So Yes, soon the second award will be announced.
I do not have a short list yet of fish or corals but I can tell you that I hope to add a school of moorish idols if I can find a healthy group to choose from. I have not found that I am attracted to either fish or corals because the are rare or expensive. I am fascinated with various Gorgonians and get an enormous boost of satisfaction in being able to host them in my main display tank with all the other mix of life on the reef.
Again welcome to Reef Central and for sure welcome to our growing family. I hope you are encouraged to share your journey when the time is right.
Peter
nineball
Active member
Good question Dave. Mr. Wilson and I had that very discussion this afternoon but I will let him pull the covers back on that one. Good suggestion on the mangrove photos........
Peter
Finally 8 days from start to finish. I had been out of the hobby for the last 7 years until I decided to check out the tank of the month and saw this thread. I realize I have alot of catching up to do since my departure. Truly inspirational. If only I had a Mr. Wilson, Chago, Grimm brothers, and others in the Cincinnati area to guide me. Special thanks to Peter for re-introducing my long lost love for the hobby and contributing all that he has to the community.
Thanks, Mike
Thanks, Mike
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dainiusiva
New member
Peter, one more question regarding LEDs - earlier in the thread you have mentioned a 'perfect' LED system, if i remember correctly designed by Philips. Only negative aspect was the price... So, could you elaborate a bit on the design and construction of that system?
Thank you!
Thank you!
Wow, what can I say? I stumbled across Chingchai's thread a few weeks ago and it was quite obvious by Peter's remarks that he was someone very special with a eloquent way of expressing himself. When he mentioned he was about to start a build , I was naturally drawn in.
I must say Peter, you are one exceptional human being . What you , Mr. Wilson and the rest of the team have been able to accomplish is nothing short of phenomenal .An educational ,exciting and very enjoyable journey, presented with class , humor and with great feeling of involvement within the reefing community.I applaud and thank you for your effort, well done sir !
The four grand masters theme has always been interesting to me. I never peeked ahead to see who they would end up being and have always felt that it would be very difficult to pull off. My first thought was that honoring Chingchai for his influence would be a noble gesture , but there is only one grand master and that of course is mother nature . That is after all what we are trying to duplicate IMO .I hope you don't take this wrong , I have only admiration and thanks for your effort and contribution. Keep it up , you are an inspiration to us all !
Nick
Thank you!
Wow, what can I say? I stumbled across Chingchai's thread a few weeks ago and it was quite obvious by Peter's remarks that he was someone very special with a eloquent way of expressing himself. When he mentioned he was about to start a build , I was naturally drawn in.
I must say Peter, you are one exceptional human being . What you , Mr. Wilson and the rest of the team have been able to accomplish is nothing short of phenomenal .An educational ,exciting and very enjoyable journey, presented with class , humor and with great feeling of involvement within the reefing community.I applaud and thank you for your effort, well done sir !
The four grand masters theme has always been interesting to me. I never peeked ahead to see who they would end up being and have always felt that it would be very difficult to pull off. My first thought was that honoring Chingchai for his influence would be a noble gesture , but there is only one grand master and that of course is mother nature . That is after all what we are trying to duplicate IMO .I hope you don't take this wrong , I have only admiration and thanks for your effort and contribution. Keep it up , you are an inspiration to us all !
Nick
nineball
Active member
A few comments on the Philips LED system. They were 'pricey' but if they did what we wanted I'm not sure that adjective would hold. I was never able to properly asses the capabilities of the lighting system aside from the anecdotal observations from the system I had installed (external to the display tank). These lights were pretty much only targeted for commercial installations. They were suitable for the aquarium trade, pure coincidence, because they are designed for outdoor wet environments and in some cases even in water environments. They came with a fairly elaborate hardware architecture that included a robust controller capable of acting as a global domain controller and a suite of local domain controllers, each capable of managing 60 lighting units or modules. The lights were capable of taking a number of different lenses that added to the flexibility. The functional lighting capabilities were unmatched by anything I had ever seen in the sense that I could choose any colour I wanted and shift that colour seamlessly to another under program control. Each light segment was individually addressable with its own IP and could be independently accessed under program control. The lights can be extremely bright and full mixing of the individual RGB lights occurs within 6 in with no colour separation or rainbow effect.
Note*** I just realized that I have been writing as if this were in the past tense, and for the record everything I have described is in fact in place today. I have approx. 160 feet installed and running.
I have not been able to get anyone who knows or cares within the Philips lighting organization to take any interest in assisting me to do a proper evaluation of this technology for the aquarium trade. PAR or PUR for that matter is NOT on the radar for the commercial applications but LUX is because that measurement deals with the visible light spectrum and that is very relevant in places like Las Vegas.......
I believe that properly engineered (housing and optical lensing) these lights have the capability of providing the ideal full spectrum lighting that is as close to the real thing as we will ever see short of the sun. That is to say, that there is a shifting curve to the natural light presented to the reef habitat in the ocean that this technology can address. Nothing that I have seen in the aquarium trade can match this or even come close. In fact it's almost like comparing a candle to a laser.
However, all this lighting competence would definitely come at a significant cost which would in all likelihood put the vast majority of hobbyists out of reach for this technology.
The best consumer system that I have seen to date is the Orphek system and as most of you who have been following this thread know I have made the commitment tangible by putting these lights over the Display Tank as well as the Wilson Bars in the fish room. The Orphek company has continued to work with Mr. Wilson and I to improve what I have with the belief that if we can improve the results for these tanks that the hobby will be better off for it.
So far I am pleased with the progress and the real litmus test....life in the tank......appears to be doing very well. Time and this active community on this thread will be the best judge of that. I just have to keep up my photography lessons to share the journey as best I can with this group!
Peter
nineball
Active member
Nick, thank you very much for your generous remarks. You are right in acknowledging this thread community as a significant element in this build. Just about every element of this process has been touched or improved by and through feedback coming from this group. I fact I would suggest that a best practice for this hobby is the effort to involve members of this forum in a significant build of this nature. I still have a significant way to go down this road and I plan to continue to share and seek advice with the enormous benefit of having the long term followers of this thread in tow.
As far as the Four Grand Masters and 'Mother Nature' are concerned.........I will be naming the Second Grand Master soon. I think we can all be proud of the selection of the First Grand Master Chingchai. There was not ONE dissenting vote leading up to the selection and not one reservation by members of this community that he represented the best in all of us for the results he has achieved. My patient goal for the subsequent awards is to achieve the same level of respect and credibility.
Mother Nature by the way couldn't produce what Chingchai has assembled in one thousand gallon cube of ocean reef. Only an undersea gardener with the competence and dedication that Chingchai has applied in his effort to try and take the best that mother nature supplies and put it in close proximity in one tank. He has raised the bar for this hobby and in turn made it even more difficult to identify who the other three peers should be......... soon, real soon.
Oh and before I forget, welcome to our community and welcome to the reef central forum.
Peter
nineball
Active member
Mike, while I have TEAM NINEBALL you have WKRP!!!!! Please give your receptionist my email!!!!!!!
Thanks for your enthusiasm Mike and welcome back to our community of everything salty. There's more coming so please stick around..........
Peter
kinlayan
New member
I cant agree more with this statement - in an aquarium we are often trying to mix different species in a closed system as opposed to the open ocean reefs
the truth is that in nature and i recently observed this diving in the red sea, the diversity is determined by environmental and dominance factors - If one did a video on a section of reef over 10 years one would be amazed at what corals thrive then perish and then thrive- while we seek to emulate nature we must also learn that reefs change all the time as they grow!
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