Greetings Peter,
I have been following this thread from the start with great enthusiasm and enjoyment especially with Mr. Wilsons excellent inputs.
I have been giving some thought recently though to your plumbing setup, not in regards to your closed loop setup as I know that has been dealt with.
It is more to do with how your intending on tieing in the "mars bars" system, sump, main display, external refugium etc. in such a way that the water will be functionally turning over adequately throughout all of the systems so that you will be efficiently removing waste via your mechanical filtration.
I personally have run multiple systems together as a co-existing setup but have always noted at one time or another that certain aquariums in this layout run better than others.
Also curious as to your goals in regards to aquarium turnover for the main display as well as the mars bars, refugium etc....
Thanks,
Patrick
Patrick, The mars bars will NOT be tied directly into the main display tank or any of its supporting systems. They each have their own basic systems with chiller/ refugium/sump etc. I may augment them but I will be taking my time determining what additional equipment and measures depending on how they evolve. Although I may steal some of the display tank water for the fish mars system I will probably start and maintain the coral mars system on its own water supply from the outset. I plan to take Chingchai's lead and tailor the environment to an oyster egg rich solution with purpose adapted lights to foster healthy growth specifically for coral for one of the Mars Bars. This regime I suspect will require some special effort to deal with the inevitable consequences of a well lit, nutritionally enriched, high flow environment.......in other words there will be a lot of glass to keep clean and a different water management cycle from the main display tank. I will NOT be using a skimmer on the coral mars bar as it just doesn't make sense but I will have live rock and other methods of filtration suited to the purpose of the coral mars tank. I fully expect to be rotating coral from the display tank to this one to ensure the best display presentation is always at peak.
My philosophy is NOT to put the entire display tank at risk trying to save a single sick, damaged or unhealthy coral. For me it just doesn't make sense to risk an entire ecosystem to 'experiment' with a cure or solution. It's not that I'm financially stoopid either. I will try and remedy a problem with a hospital tank but I will not knowingly risk the hard fought stability of the main display tank with experiments especially with my lack of knowledge and experience in this domain. I am not trying to promote this philosophy folks so please give me a break here. I am just using basic common sense, I hope, to minimize the risks of catastrophic failure.
While I am on this subject of catastrophic failure I should note up front that I expect, just as in the wild, I will have a ton of stuff to deal with including some not so good stuff. That's evolution and reality creeping in. Just ask anyone living in or near the gulf today. It may change the world but it is far from the end of it. One of the cornerstones of evolution is adaptation to change. Yet I've noticed that we in this hobby do everything in our power to avoid change or disruption. Lightning, hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes and yes even chemical spills strike the reefs in an unbelievable regular fashion. Someday we may just learn to control those compulsions that we can do something about like off shore drilling but there will still be these natural organic disruptions that somehow, some way, the reefs will cope with. I'm going to try and make that reality part of my approach to this wonderful hobby. I guess I'm also saying that there's a bazillion things that can go wrong, as you folks have been assuring me from the beginning of this project, even before the tank gets wet. So I'm learning to accept that before the first live rock comes out of the temporary storage tanks. For me, this process carries as much value in the learning process as does the final achievement.
I'm going to get heck again for too many words and not enough pictures .................... Oh and Patrick, welcome to our group and congratulations on this being your first post!!
Peter
