Mhucasey's SPS obsession

[mhucasey]

Real live rock is full of surprises that go bang in the night, it's like a bloody lucky dip. Plastic rock just sits there being boring even after the lights go out. Reminds me i need to catch the mantis shrimp that's slaughtering my snails...... pretty sure that came in on a fish........

I still have live rock in the deeper tank, so I won't be surprise free

Btw, it's gonna take a lot of bog to get those panels smooth enough for painting.

Maybe Ill leave them as-is. You did say that if the tank looked too good you'd have to come and crack it:lolspin:

 

[mhucasey]

Interesting panels Matt. I like them.

Me too, we auditioned a lot of materials before deciding on this stuff. Its a PITA to work with. The other side of the peninsula will just get standard wainscot sins it is mostly covered by a couch anyway, these panels would get beat up over there.

Dan at SCC is cool. He has all the fancy SPS too and prices are always negotiable. All his corals are under ATI powermodules and Giesemann bulbs. By the way, congrats on ROTM.

Thanks for the heads-up about the store. Very interesting how they use T5s and AquaSD uses Radiums, here in SD where the cost of electricity is near criminal. Will from AquaSD said he couldn't afford not to...

 

[m3lacoste]

I just realized I have an almost new Nextreef MR-1 XL that I am not using, I can mod that one to have a bigger reactor for the upgrade tank! Muhahaha!

The reactor partially looks so rough because everything wants to grow inside it, I have found Serpent stars, copepods, amphipods, chitons, Featherdusters, and Aiptasia...it always cracks me up when people state that pumps kill plankton.

I have a Nextreef XL too, I may have to copy your modification idea. lol

 

[mhucasey]

I have a Nextreef XL too, I may have to copy your modification idea. lol

It's working pretty well. It doesn't run dry and recovers on its own after a power fail. The biggest thing I learned was to increase the size of the downtime from 1/2" to 3/4".

 

[cugly]

Looking great Matt dude u probably seen me at asd i go atleast 2 times a week for water if you see a guy wearing a bmw jacket its me in blue bmw say hi.

 

[reefwiser]

Its available at Home Depot and Lowes. They have it in stock at Lowes but Home Depot may make you order it.

Similar to the back splash I used on my stand. [emoji1]

 

[mhucasey]

Looking great Matt dude u probably seen me at asd i go atleast 2 times a week for water if you see a guy wearing a bmw jacket its me in blue bmw say hi.

I usually go on Sundays, ill keep an eye out

 

[mhucasey]

Lots going on over the last few days. First, I got the last of the plastic rocks and assemble the second and third structures:

Getting that done allowed me to get almost all of the real live rock out and glue the SPS in place!

At the same time I was able to glue the rest of the panels in place, still adjusting and caulking and painting to be done, but you can get the idea:

And I went to the LFS and got one of my favorite fish. His name is Dennis:

I also picked up "George", a powder blue tang:

And finally the first four chromis:

 

[cFloor]

Stand is looking great, and excellent pick up on Dennis!

 

[mhucasey]

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[sahin]

Nice Borb. :beer: Tanks are looking great buddy. :thumbsup:

 

[reefmutt]

Nice Matt!
I really love the scape. Great overhangs and open spaces and coral placement is really natural.
Dennis the borb. Cool!
I still want to add a pbt to my system. Great fish.

 

[mhucasey]

Nice Borb. :beer: Tanks are looking great buddy. :thumbsup:

Nice Matt!
I really love the scape. Great overhangs and open spaces and coral placement is really natural.
Dennis the borb. Cool!
I still want to add a pbt to my system. Great fish.

Thanks guys, I really have lusted after these Borbs since I first saw them and it looks like they are flooding the market or something. I got mine for 185 bucks. I went to a LFS I hadn't visited before today and they had two for $180 each minus 30% for Memorial day weekend!. I remember seeing them for about 400-500 dollars a few years back.

Yesterday I also got a new coral, and its a beauty:

It really looks like that in person, probably brighter. I was able to frag off a smaller piece too.

I got this in trade but the colors on the top down were what sealed the deal for me:

 

[mhucasey]

Today I got a RR Yellow torch and a pink(currently brown) mille. The store I went to was Shipwreck cove in Encinitas, they have a ton of SPS and I was able to see grown up versions of each of these to verify that the colors will be what I expect. The store exclusively uses T5 bulbs. Lots of Bulbs.

RR Yellow torch:

(Eventually) Pink Mille:

And now some random coral shots:

 

[mhucasey]

More coral porn:

 

[reefwiser]

Nice new pieces.

 

[reefmutt]

Wow!! Nice new additions!

 

[sahin]

Awesome additions. Colours on the current acros look pretty good! :beer:

 

[mhucasey]

Nice new pieces.

Wow!! Nice new additions!

Awesome additions. Colours on the current acros look pretty good! :beer:

Thanks guys, after a lot of gluing and bruising, the Acros need some recovery time. Surprisingly, quite a lot of them have been coloring up like champs through all of this:dance:

I didn't worry too much about my initial Bulb set up but I seem to have hit a nice combo out of the gate. To start I went with 4 ABS, 2 Fiji purple, and the other six Blue Plus. I then swapped out two blue plus a few days ago with KZ Super blues(I have a bunch of them from a sale and was trying to broaden the blue spectrum). Finally I swapped out one more Blue plus last night with a Giesemann Actinic Blue for some extra actinic punch.

I have two used Giesemann Super actinic Tubes, but they look very dim to me. They only have a few months use but they almost don't look like they are on.

I tried a 5th ABS last night as well and love the look but I was a bit worried about cooking my new corals so Ill hold off for now.

Today I got a good deal of the one end of the stand done. It will be full of drawers!:

Working on one more extra deep drawer and then Ill trim out the end around them. All PVC board on the outside as well, so no rotting or staining ever

I finally have room to store all my tank stuff under the tank instead of on the counter:lolspin: This pleases the wife immensely

 

[Wazzel]

Very nice Matt.