EL CHUPACABRA trimless 15g reef

ELCHUPACABRA

New member
So I thought I would introduce myself and share my 15g + 15g trimless nano reef with the locals.

Many years ago I started off with a 50 gallon FOWLR in high school that was lame in retro spec. Really sloppy, just had no clue.

Then at the beginning of this last summer I decided to make a 4g nano reef. I drove to Cali, went surfing and went to some 30+ fish stores looking for live rock and supplies. Came home and started the adventure.
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I added the false plexi glass wall that has a powerhead siliconed in and forced water up over the falls into the fuge area that housed rubble and eventually chaeto. Bought a false perc, pep shrimp and CUC. All was good, and started buying some corals locally. Oh yeah I had 1 18w PC 10/6.5K and 1 18w PC super actinic bulb for lighting.
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(did I mention I blow glass, self taught, the goblet is safeguarding a mushroom during attachment)
My collection began to grow along with my experience as a reef-keeper, all was looking great. Then I ordered my first coral online from a member on a different board, who had never shipped before and killed the pink zoos I bought in transit due to poor packaging, and due to my inexperience I put them in my tank and crashed it. Who would have though I crashed 4g of water (nerrrrr). Things got gnarly in my under water world and I lost a ton of stuff. All those cheap frags I talked Rob into selling me where now dead. I wanted to quit...

Well I decided to stick with it and went all out and made my existing tank. It took tons of preparation, and loads of work but finally all that I had learned I was able to physically manifest into a clean reef tank. I am a college student so obviously everything is made out of titanium, and the stand is just a bunch a $100 bills I glued together using a special laminate process I created, naturally nasa generated me a superstarfire tank. Oh wait, I am poor, I had to make everything, with a dremel, jig saw, and a spoon. I was sick of everyone doing the same old thing, AGA tank with blue/black background. I set out to make something different.

So I went my own route. I hate substrate it is messy and clouds up the tank, but I hate bare-bottom it looks horrendous IMO. So I said, I like zoo's why not have a carpet of zoos for substrate? I wanted the tank to look clean. I wanted something natural looking. So I bought a 15g, drilled it, ripped off all its trim and painted the back with bright pink and ballerina pink speckles, backed in a custom color spray paint I mad by mixing pink, and purple. It looks just like the live rock and already looks like it is becoming incrusted with coraline. I figured if everything is going to turn pink and purple I might as well embrace it. For the zoo carpet I lined the tank in little marble tiles and fragged away.

For lighting I made my own since that is what I could afford, and I wanted overkill. I helped a friend out with putting a 250w MH on his FW planted tank, and in return he gave me his 48" coralife PC light that was completely broken. I gutted it, and sawed that hunk of metal in half (with a jig saw, in my old apartment kitchen, (wrong tool!!! wrong place!!!)), put 2 70w 14k MH in there and 2x18w PC super actinics. I ordered the ballast for super cheap online, got in on a group buy for the bulbs and hijacked the bulb socket and UV glass out of 2- 300w halogen security lights I picked up at walmart for $8 a piece, just so happens to be the same socket (70w and 150w fit socket).

The tank has a stockholm overflow where water travels to my sump which house rubble, chaeto, ATO(kalk) and the return pump. Most of the water goes back into the sump and a small amount (via adjustable valve) gets sent back up top, this is to keep low flow through the return and eliminates micro bubbles that are caused with high flow between the 2 tanks, I can twist the valve and see living proof of this. I am not into skimmers, I have no problem maintaining zero parameters.

The display features a second pump that runs my closed loop up top for tons of flow (adjustable of course). I cycled it for a couple of months and finally transfered my 4g which was full to say the least to the new tank (which I just moved to my new house very near to the UofA).

With out further a due, I give you EL CHUPACABRAS trimless 15g:
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Here is an idea of the background color:
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MH:
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Actinic:
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Above left:
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Above Right:
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Dosing and testing:
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I am thinking of going sps from here...

15g es bueno. What do you think?
 
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Welcome to the forum!

I like the idea of the zoa covered bottom, I can't wait to see it mostly covered. Have you seen that anywhere else?

2x70w halides should have enough penetration to keep many SPS in the top 6-8". With the closed loop, flow shouldn't be a problem. You'll probably need to start using a 2 part calcium/alkalinity buffer like B-Ionic.
 
I just made up the zoo carpet thing, I always used to think inside the "box", then one day I wondered if the "box" was flammable and burnt it down, I was like 6 then, now I always think outside the box. I am pretty unconventional and wanted something unique but it had to look clean, this is what I came up with. Some of my pinks have spread to another tile already, so it should work out fine. I have found that as soon as a polyp grows past the super glue thats holding it on, growth is substantially way faster than the same zoos growing on live rock. The tiles are 95% calcium carbonate. I painted the tank pink because I am a manly man that doesn't care how my eye perceives different wave lengths of white light reflected of the surface of the paint, that and it matches (I have received some heat already for the pink). I can't wait either for it to be covered!!! Most of the single polyps have 3-4 new polyps emerging, and growth is great. I always scour the LFS tanks for single polyps and by them, I want variety in my rug.

I am dosing Kalk in my ATO, and kents liquid calcium + proBuff DHK, + a ton of other stuff se pic above, is that adequate or do you think I need the B-ionic. Honestly I only tested this water once months ago, and once last week (all levels were at zero) but I will be religious about it again once I get some SPS, for now I have a well balanced system that seems to be fine on its one, in fact I have never even done a water change on this tank. But I am considering one soon for the fun of it, and will be back on it weekly if I get the SPS.
 
Hey, welcome man. The tank is stylin. A pink polo shirt on a guy is is a bit wierd, but pink in a reef is stylin.

If you go sps you need to monitor Ca, alk and temp. You also need to use a good skimmer, or since you have a small tank, you may get by with weekly 15% water changes. Skimp on this and the sps will not do so well.

I have read several threads of late where people do not use skimmers on small reefs because they remove too many trace elements. Religious weekly water changes will replenish these elements and remove the toxins.


What are your present Ca and alk levels?
Good luck.
 
I guess I will run these test for the first time on this tank
CA =285-salifert 600+seatest(40 drops and it never turned blue I hate seatest, this happened the one other time I tried this test, I am almost out of the drops after 2 test, what a waste of cash this test is!)
ALK: KH=8.3 Alk=2.97-salifert

Oh no you had to ask, I know the CA is really low or I am testing it incorrectly, I doubt that though. I put kalk in last week, I guess I need to do it everyday, I am striving for around CA=420 correct? I guess I also need to be dumping in the kents liquid calcium on a more regular basis. I have to admit I am not that religious about dosing things other than ZooPlex and CoralExcel, I didn't really care that much about these other things since my softies didn't need them. I also have been dosing purple up a couple of time a week, but I really hate it because it clouds the tank up all day and I can't even see my corals. What should I be striving for on my ALK? I guess I am now seeing what happens when you never do a water change, I will mix water tonight and do one tomorrow. Ignorance is bliss, I really want some SPS so I will get my levels to what ever they should be at, any recommendations?
 
Ca should be 400-500 and alk should be between 8-10dKH. What does the Salifert Alk red in dKH?

There is more to just keeping your alk in the normal range. It must be in that range and stable. If yo ubounce between 8.3 to 9.2 back to 8.4, then sps will show signs of illness, growth retardation, or death.

If you can make it over today, I can show you some tools to use to get it under control.
 
Michael, the sound byte is awsome. The video is a bit pixelated but fun to watch. There is some crazy flow in that tank, dude :thumbsup:
 
if you click on the little triangle in the corner and set it to original size it is a less pixilated. Goggle just destroys the quality when you upload. funny you should say that about the flow, since I had to turn it almost off to get the top down pics, but yes tons of flow... The domino damsel is doing a fine job of eating the flat worms which are now almost annihilated. I think never feeding him might have helped encourage him to chow down on the pests.
 
Recently my tank has become less and less of a part of my life. I have been leaving for weeks at a time to teach snowboarding. I just fill up my auto top off, cross my fingers and hope for the best. I actually just moved the tank to my new apartment last week, and left to snowboard for a week. Amazingly when I got home this morning every thing was doing stellar.

My clowns are doing great, and must be surviving off my massive pod population for food. As for the frags, I frag them for fun, everything I do is for fun. I am always up for trades, and if you don't have anything I guess I could sell some.

I added some SPS from Cerreta (great guy, thanks again), and everything is thriving. Supposedly these are supposed to be really difficult, but I have found quite the opposite to be true.

Once school starts I will be back around the tank on a daily basis, and hopefully all will continue to go well. I have a new rock setup since the move, and the magic carpet is going great, lots of growth, I recently fragged a bunch of toxic waste, greens, blues, safe crackers, radiactive dragon eyes, and my armor of gods have started reproducing. I am off to wolf creek for expert backcountry riding. I will try to post some pictures, when I get back.
 
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