Join me for a strange one...

[tahiriqbal]

That tang looks well looked after Keith. Its all coming together nicely, keep us posted and might need to pick your brain on my touch screen.

Tahir

 

[inkjet21]

mcmaster-carr has a 2-1/2 glass saw for 38 bucks

 

[saf1]

Nori. Thanks!

I wonder if lettuce would work too?

Lettuce as in what people and other land animals eat? No. Simple rule of thumb is to only feed what is in their natural environment. And lettuce or broccoli isn't something they ever eat. Best source of food for home use is actually mentioned above, Nori.

You can usually find it in the super market or online - even your LFS should have something. Another trick I used with my Kole tang was to leave a tank wall/corner alone that I never cleaned and algae grew there which he would eat non stop. I'd also move a rock from the sump that was growing hair algae or other types that he'd scrap off to keep him healthy. Nori (natural, unseasoned of course) was also something he would eat - as did my purple tang.

If you have a lighted sump or even a refuge then you may consider picking up some stuff from ipsf. They have some great products that you could grow which is pretty much their main diet and natural. Or maybe a local club is growing and you can snag some to try.

Stay away though from lettuce or other stuff they don't get naturally. It won't have the proper nutrients and will more than likely kill them over time.

 

[kcress]

Ebay has cheap hole saws Kcress.

Very interesting build Can't wait to see how it progresses now. I'll still be lurking along.

Thanks for the tip PaPa. I went there and found the exact saw I needed in the USA and bagged it for about $20.

That tang looks well looked after Keith. Its all coming together nicely, keep us posted and might need to pick your brain on my touch screen.

Tahir

Thanks tahirigbal. Any time.

mcmaster-carr has a 2-1/2 glass saw for 38 bucks

To many $$ but less than my local hardware store that wanted $68 for only a 2".

Lettuce as in what people and other land animals eat? No. Simple rule of thumb is to only feed what is in their natural environment. And lettuce or broccoli isn't something they ever eat. Best source of food for home use is actually mentioned above, Nori.

You can usually find it in the super market or online - even your LFS should have something. Another trick I used with my Kole tang was to leave a tank wall/corner alone that I never cleaned and algae grew there which he would eat non stop. I'd also move a rock from the sump that was growing hair algae or other types that he'd scrap off to keep him healthy. Nori (natural, unseasoned of course) was also something he would eat - as did my purple tang.

If you have a lighted sump or even a refuge then you may consider picking up some stuff from ipsf. They have some great products that you could grow which is pretty much their main diet and natural. Or maybe a local club is growing and you can snag some to try.

Stay away though from lettuce or other stuff they don't get naturally. It won't have the proper nutrients and will more than likely kill them over time.

Hey saf1! Thanks for the lesson. Makes total sense.

 

[kcress]

Here's some pictures to update all you folks. I find it fascinating how marine Life just moves in and does what it's driven to do. It's especially fascinating to see the Life responses to changes made to the microcosm. I believe all life will do this,(terrestrial, etc.), but that marine life is by-far the most aggressive due the instant access to nutrients and energy.

While looking at these pictures keep in mind the flow in the tank is whoa-fully little since The Wave is not running yet. This means the sand isn't moving and long algae has free reign. Also there is zero nutrient removal occurring. Water is just being returned from the temporary "bin sump" to keep the water in motion. I also have a horrific micro bubble storm on. A two square foot part of the front window bubbles-up in about 20 minutes after a cleaning. Hopefully the new sump will help here.


So here's the pictures in no particular order.

The brown hair algae doing its thing.

An interesting Blue Eye. This is a cave in the ceramic background that seems to be collecting blue photons.

Here is one of the three rocks I brought over from the old system. It was covered with long GHA which someone has pruned down to nothing. It has some nice feather dusters on it that are now propagating around the tank. They're in two other places now.

Here's a general background shot that shows the transformation of the ceramic background. As some of you mentioned it will 'Lifen up' and look great. I couldn't be happier with the look. It remains complex and mysterious.

Another of the background with Tang spying on us.

One of the brought-over rocks with a bunch of worm holes in it. I don't recall ever seeing those before.. ?

Here's a red beach that showed up in a single day! It's completely localized. It's right on the edge of the sand crater made by my current water return outlet.

This is one of my previous tanks. Remember they were three 55s chained together with siphon jumps. This is the newest and best looking of them and will be the sump.

The sump is coming along and when I get it going together I'll show you all what the plan is.

 

[Everyones Hero]

That's amazing. I've never seen a tang that wide before. The entire tank & setup is awesome. Looks better than some of the setups at the big aquariums.

As for where all the algae came from- you did dump a bottle of ammonia into the tank, didn't you? Ammonia breaks down into nitrate, which is a food source for algae.

 

[kcress]

Update time!

The Hair Algae cometh! I'm pleased because I read that as a healthy eco system with the algae flourishing. Tang is over joyed and porking out again. I have still not fed him, several months now.

So I have embarked on my horizontal AS (Algae Scrubber). I'm using one of my old 3/8" glass 55g tanks for my new sump.

I've made two acrylic trays that will sit in the top of the sump.
Front tray which will drain to the second tray.

Second tray that will dump to.. something. Not clear at this time.

To make a rough surface I could torture myself scratching up plastic mesh or... I can buy the ready made definition of scratched up material - Velcro hooks. I bought a form of it that has super-duper-de-lux-hyper-psycho-sticky-mad adhesive on the back. I have NEVER seen an adhesive as aggressive as this stuff. You are completely screwed if you let it touch ANYTHING before it is exactly where you want it.

Anyway I've lined the trays with this cactus-from-a-roll.

 

[srusso]

Let's get some more pics of the tank! One pic?! What a tease! How about a FTS! Lol!

Why the old dump bucket style?

I have been thinking of using Velcro forever, never had the guts to try it... You sure that glue is going to be ok in the tank?

 

[kcress]

I needed some sort of way to hold my algae trays. I was fretting over how to glue some sort of rails to the insides of the tank when my better half said, "Why don't you make a PVC frame?" Bingo! That is a much better solution since this whole thing is a research project. With a PVC frame I can alter it at will.

Next I had to yank my temporary tote-based sump out, pull the pump, and cut off all the very hard fought drain lines coming from the tank's original overflow sump so I could fit this taller tank into the space. Notice I was a good boy and put down some closed cell waterproofed foam insulation to arrest some of the heat that would try to jet out the bottom of the sump into that concrete.

I have the new sump in and the 2" return plumbed in. BTW I have been using the very useful teflon tape jammed together method of assembling my 2". It has worked great and allowed easy reconfigurations. The extension cord is to power three powerheads to keep things stirred for Tang whilst the pump is out of service.

I re-plumbed my T4 up to the sump outlet hole I've sawed. I set it up the manifold to accept a second pump in case the Big Wave needs it.

 

[kcress]

Let's get some more pics of the tank! One pic?! What a tease! How about a FTS! Lol!

Why the old dump bucket style?

I have been thinking of using Velcro forever, never had the guts to try it... You sure that glue is going to be ok in the tank?

Hey ya srusso!

No dumping.. I can understand your confusion form my comment though. Sorry about that. "Drain" would've been a better word to use.

We'll see about the Velcro. I have no concerns about the glue. For starters almost none of it will even contact the water. It's all stuck down like tar.. Man that stuff is sticky.

 

[06bug]

Let's see a distant shot of the tank and wall.

 

[kcress]

We have water!
Made the weir out of glass.

The weir makes it real easy to measure the thru-put of the pump/return system. 440gal/hr

The first tray landing.

Here I have a two barrel carburetor. Looks OK but the hell with it!

Going with a four barrel!!

Check this out. In the first 15 minutes this algae has already piled up.

 

[kcress]

Let's see a distant shot of the tank and wall.

I'll take a full picture for you when I get a chance.

 

[on3ofak1nd]

need a forklift to move that thing around.......sheesh.

fingerlakes board? There's palm trees in that pic! There ain't no palm trees around the finger lakes! lol.

I was thinking exactly the same thing!!!!! lol

The fingerlakes board isn't very active unfortunately.

 

[reefkeeper125]

wow just read through all 34 pages awesome build.

 

[kcress]

06bug; Here's the best I could do at the moment. It's hard because I have light coming from the tank from a totally expedient light fixture.

Here's the screen at 7 days.

And as I was taking the algae screen picture I saw water fanning out along the glass from the weir to the low water side. Just a tiny rivulet. I thought, "What is that? A leak?" Then I noticed the weir itself..
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Not good.:hmm4: It was installed straight as an arrow. That'll teach me to buy what they carry at Home Despot and think I can get away with it.

You would NOT want to live below this dam.

What a royal PIA to fix.

So reefkeeper125; Not all of it is awesome.:hmm5: But thanks just the same.

And as for on3ofak1nd.. Are you lost?

 

[reeftanknewbie]

Great design on the ATS and sorry to hear about the Weir. Maybe it was too thin of material for the pressure of water. Instead of taking it out could you just double it up so that there is two exterior walls of the Weir?

 

[der_wille_zur_macht]

Can you raise the water level to the right of the weir to even up the pressure?

Looking forward to seeing how this TS works out. Mine is "failing to thrive." I'm pretty sure it's because I lack any of the common (desirable for turf scrubbers) algae species in my tank...

 

[kcress]

Great design on the ATS and sorry to hear about the Weir. Maybe it was too thin of material for the pressure of water. Instead of taking it out could you just double it up so that there is two exterior walls of the Weir?

Definitely too thin.. Since there is now a large bead of silicone on both sides of the weir I can't figure out how to "back-it-up". I even have a large sheet of the same thin glass that I was going to use for the sump covers before I switched to acrylic.


I've shut down the sump and siphoned the high water side down level with the low side. The weir is, of course, now straight as an arrow again.

Can you raise the water level to the right of the weir to even up the pressure?

Looking forward to seeing how this TS works out. Mine is "failing to thrive." I'm pretty sure it's because I lack any of the common (desirable for turf scrubbers) algae species in my tank...

That's what I'm going to try... Am trying at the moment. Now that I've isolated the sump from the tank I can "mix salt" in it. I'm adding RO water now. I'll be raising the sump level about 5 inches. We'll see if that does the trick.

The algae is... um.. growing. I think. You see the pictures above. There are little tufts of it here and there. If I ever get any I could send you some for seeding.

 

[Wildman]

I am following this closely. This is almost exactly how I want to set up my ATS but was told it would not work. I have my fingers crossed because this is the design I want to go with.