IM Lagoon 25 Office Tank
- Thread starter ReefTron5000
- Start date
ReefTron5000
Member
Updates:
- The light fixture is working great, I would highly recommend.
- I took the Reef Octopus skimmer offline. It proved unnecessary. Even without the skimmer, my nitrates are at 0 ppm. I have to dose nitrates to bring them up to where I want (2-5 ppm). Also, it was loud for my office. At some point I will probably install the small Tunze skimmer I'm currently using in my QT.
- I also took the IM Desktop Reactor with GFO offline. It also proved unnecessary as my Phosphates are also super low, like under .008, WITHOUT the GFO. I MAY start this back up.
- I imagine my nitrates and phosphates are low because I'm running Ultramaxx as well as I've kind of got a lot of sand for a tank this size, so lots of filtration.
- I f'd up and had a couple of mini-disasters with dosing. Once, calcium got sky high, like past 700. Then, the more disastrous situation was alkalinity went through the roof. I lost several pieces.
- I'm on top of tank parameters at this point and have started dosing kalkwasser instead of B-ionic 2 part. I still occasionally manually dose 2 part but the kalkwasser seems to be keeping up with tank needs at this point.
- On the bright side, I've definitely got decent growth and the fish seem to be happy.
- The light fixture is working great, I would highly recommend.
- I took the Reef Octopus skimmer offline. It proved unnecessary. Even without the skimmer, my nitrates are at 0 ppm. I have to dose nitrates to bring them up to where I want (2-5 ppm). Also, it was loud for my office. At some point I will probably install the small Tunze skimmer I'm currently using in my QT.
- I also took the IM Desktop Reactor with GFO offline. It also proved unnecessary as my Phosphates are also super low, like under .008, WITHOUT the GFO. I MAY start this back up.
- I imagine my nitrates and phosphates are low because I'm running Ultramaxx as well as I've kind of got a lot of sand for a tank this size, so lots of filtration.
- I f'd up and had a couple of mini-disasters with dosing. Once, calcium got sky high, like past 700. Then, the more disastrous situation was alkalinity went through the roof. I lost several pieces.
- I'm on top of tank parameters at this point and have started dosing kalkwasser instead of B-ionic 2 part. I still occasionally manually dose 2 part but the kalkwasser seems to be keeping up with tank needs at this point.
- On the bright side, I've definitely got decent growth and the fish seem to be happy.
NewbReefer316
New member
Tank is looking great. I'm in the process of setting one up myself. If you ever want a smaller skimmer you can go back to your tunze 9001 and just add another eheim 600 pump so that each return has a pump that runs it and the line just goes straight up.
PanicATTACK187
New member
glad you took all that crap hanging off the back. these are sexy little tanks and that stuff was just an eye sore. the light is pretty bulky but tank looks good. im gonna try to fit the tunze in mine as well but doing a 5 gallon water change a week i wonder if its even worth it.
ReefTron5000
Member
UPDATES:
- Continued to have issues stabilizing calcium/alkalinity through dosing. I stopped dosing kalkwasser because it was making a mess in the back chambers. Everything was gunking up and it was a general pain in the *** to deal with.
- Dosing 2 part manually every few days seems to be working okay. Just dump in a bit of alk and calcium and I'm basically good to go.
- Last week switched from Instant Ocean to HW MarineMix salt from BRS. IO is SO low in cal/alk so this should really help me keep my numbers up without dosing too much.
- I've had terrible luck with 2nd clowns in this tank. The first frostbite I had swam into the back and ended up in the skimmer. Then, I had a really nice frostbite clown in there that somehow jumped out of the tank during a water change and I didn't notice. Shitty mistakes both times. Haven't picked up a replacement yet but I'm planning on getting another very small Da Vinci.
- SPS lost a lot of color but over the last few weeks they have REALLY been coloring up. Very happy about this. Its frustrating actually because in this tiny tank, my SPS are looking on point but in my big 130 at home, I've been trying for 3 years to get my SPS to color up but I can't
Fra
- Fragged a few heads of bambams and rastas from the home setup and added them here. Doing well.
- I kind of went nuts at Reefapalooza and bought a bunch of stuff for both this tank and my main. Acans seem to do REALLY well in this office tank so I picked up two largish colonies and a smaller 4 head frag. They're all doing fantastic. Don't wanna jinx anything but its really crazy how happy the acans are in this tank. Also picked up that frogspawn but I gotta find a good spot for it.
Pics!
- Continued to have issues stabilizing calcium/alkalinity through dosing. I stopped dosing kalkwasser because it was making a mess in the back chambers. Everything was gunking up and it was a general pain in the *** to deal with.
- Dosing 2 part manually every few days seems to be working okay. Just dump in a bit of alk and calcium and I'm basically good to go.
- Last week switched from Instant Ocean to HW MarineMix salt from BRS. IO is SO low in cal/alk so this should really help me keep my numbers up without dosing too much.
- I've had terrible luck with 2nd clowns in this tank. The first frostbite I had swam into the back and ended up in the skimmer. Then, I had a really nice frostbite clown in there that somehow jumped out of the tank during a water change and I didn't notice. Shitty mistakes both times. Haven't picked up a replacement yet but I'm planning on getting another very small Da Vinci.
- SPS lost a lot of color but over the last few weeks they have REALLY been coloring up. Very happy about this. Its frustrating actually because in this tiny tank, my SPS are looking on point but in my big 130 at home, I've been trying for 3 years to get my SPS to color up but I can't
Fra- Fragged a few heads of bambams and rastas from the home setup and added them here. Doing well.
- I kind of went nuts at Reefapalooza and bought a bunch of stuff for both this tank and my main. Acans seem to do REALLY well in this office tank so I picked up two largish colonies and a smaller 4 head frag. They're all doing fantastic. Don't wanna jinx anything but its really crazy how happy the acans are in this tank. Also picked up that frogspawn but I gotta find a good spot for it.
Pics!
ReefTron5000
Member
Haven't updated in a bit.
.
moondoggy4
Team RC
How do you like the stand? It seems that they have a new style I like the old style like yours.
The tank is looking real good.
The tank is looking real good.
Abstractxx02195
New member
Hi, do you have any updates on this? I have the same tank and I am officially tired of my IM ghost protein skimmer. Hasn't done anything for me but make noise since I got it. Trying to find a solution that fits back there with no mods needed.
Anybody have any suggestions?
Anybody have any suggestions?
I had an IM 38 nuvo. I used an Aquamaxx HOB skimmer and it was awesome. I had tried little Tunze one but wasn't happy with the results. The Aquamaxx pulled out way more and never overflowed.
