My 240G Addiction - It's a Miracle

[8BALL_99]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13368134#post13368134 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jknecht
Congrats on the tank. That's a great way to move the crate. So does it have water in it yet? JK! Miracles builds a great tank. Did you go with Starphire? This was my first tank with Starphire and love it.

Haha not yet still likes a little. Its my 2nd Miracles tank with Starphire glass. I agree I think its crazy not to get it on larger tanks. It just looks so much better!


OldTimer, Thats great glad they got you one.. Haha I never said who paid for the rental fee for teh skid loader.. Wasn't me. Derek said he would cover it since he couldn't get the lift gate like I requested! To tell you the truth for me the skid loader worked out much better.. My driveway is about 200 yards long so we would of had to load it onto my truck or trailer then drive it to the house and unload it. I don't even walk to the mailbox no way I'd carry that tank that far haha

 

[8BALL_99]

To give you a little better idea of the distance haah.. The pic above my wife was zoomed in

 

[jknecht]

Oldtimer - Good to hear you're getting your tank! I couldn't be happier with mine. You're money must be greener than mine. I almost went with the BK 300 External but decided to go internal instead. Good luck, I would help you if I lived closer.

Here's a pic of the skimmate after about 18 hours. It's skimming a little wet right now. I just dialed it down a little to get it a little drier. Not bad considering it's not even broken in yet and I really haven't adjusted much.

8BALL_99 - Now that's a long driveway. I'm not sure how you and Oldtimer got so lucky. I had to pay for my truck rental. I'm not complaining; I love my tank.

As promised here are some shots of the aquascaping. Oldtimer you will be happy to know I did not use any foam. All Marshall Island and Eco-Rox.

What do you think? Please be honest. I think my wife likes it a little more than I do. But I'm a little picky; it's growing on me. I do really like the caves and overhangs.

Left Side

Right Side

 

[Dudester]

Personally, I think the aquascape looks fantastic, plenty of open areas to allow good flow and hiding places for fish, and nice overhangs for not-so-light-loving corals. I do find the height to be a little too uniform for my taste, however, and with the rocks being so tall throughout the whole tank, there might not be room for any colonies to achieve much vertical growth. Just a thought, really not criticizing, as I don't know what you plan long-term. If this will be a bonsai-type reef with shorter, pruned coral colonies, it will be absolutely fantastic.

 

[jknecht]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13372783#post13372783 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Dudester
Personally, I think the aquascape looks fantastic, plenty of open areas to allow good flow and hiding places for fish, and nice overhangs for not-so-light-loving corals. I do find the height to be a little too uniform for my taste, however, and with the rocks being so tall throughout the whole tank, there might not be room for any colonies to achieve much vertical growth. Just a thought, really not criticizing, as I don't know what you plan long-term. If this will be a bonsai-type reef with shorter, pruned coral colonies, it will be absolutely fantastic.

Thanks! I agree with you on the height; it is a little too uniform. I'll have to work on it a little more. Also, great point about colonies I definitely need to make room for them. I would like to have some nice SPS colonies.

 

[Oldtimer]

I like the openess of the rockwork, although I ageee with Dudester's comments about the uniformity in height. I'm personally a fan of open structures and minimal usage of rock. I plan to have a couple islands of rock, one per each end of the tank, allowing for plenty of room for coral to grow and fish to swim. I also plan to use some Eco-rox seeded with some live Marshall Island/Fiji.

Kudos for not going with styro. Very inorganic and fake looking IMO... not to mention petroleum based and environmentally unfriendly. I prefer it the way nature intended.

As for my tank move, we've got a steel push cart on wheels that will get the tank from the truck to the rear of the house. My driveway is no where near as long as 8BALL's.

8BALL - That's some great customer service! Wish I could get him to pay for a crane to lower it into my basement. :lol: I'll have to manage with 6 guys and an appliance dolly.

 

[8BALL_99]

Well I think what helped with me was I already bought a 190 from them a few years ago. I sort of told them I had to have a lift gate this time cause the last time the truck showed up with 30 mins notice.. Rounding up 3 or 4 guys on a weekday in the middle of the day with almost no notice was not a fun task. I got lucky though.. But this time with a larger tank I made sure I had a plan for unloading it lol. I think they really did try to find a smaller truck with a lift gate for me, But just couldn't. I agree though, great customer service to cover the rental fee. I didn't ask him he was just trying to make up for not coming through on the Gate..

Will

 

[mcliffy2]

Honest opinion - good but not great. I think while you see caves and open spaces now, when the corals fill in, it will end up with the fruit stand (sloped rock wall) look, as the corals will quickly take up all that open space. Here's a few ideas:

(1) as others suggested try playing with the dynamics of the height, overall I think the rockwork is a bit too high in general - its personal taste to an extent, I like 8-12 inches for corals to grow in. Try picturing what the tank will look like filled with corals, when you can't even see the rock anymore.
(2) try to make multiple identifiable structures - right now, everything is connected and it looks like one big structure. This will become even more the case as corals grow in.
(3) don't be afraid to throw some rock in the sump, and don't get attached to that one awesome rock and sacrifice the overall aesthetic of your scape.
(4) try out a few different scapes and play around with it before the corals go in, no time like now.

In the end though, whats important is that you are happy with how it looks, so take these suggestions with a grain of salt.

Here's an idea what I might try removing and moving, but again this is my personal taste, so take what you like, and ignore what you dont

 

[tangreefkeeper]

show us more

 

[reefgeek67]

This is a great project, I am very impressed with every aspect of it along the way!!! I am planning a 125 sps reef(space requirements keep me to a smaller tank than i would like). Im glad you documented this project so well. its a big help for ideas=) Good luck with the system!

 

[jknecht]

mcliffy2 - Thanks for the advice. I haven't had a chance to play around with the aquascape much more.

reefgeek67 - Thank you. I hope my thread helps others that's really why I did it. I got many of my ideas from other great threads here.

I posted these in another thread but thought I would post them here as well. The new skimmer is working great. These were taken a couple of days ago.

I've been looking at calcium reactors. I was always thinking I would go with a GEO 624. But I really like what the AquaC RX-1 has to offer. I plan on having a lot of SPS. Any advice? Should I go with the RX-1 or 624?

 

[mcliffy2]

Skimmer is looking nice and gunky.

I had the same decision to make on my 238g, and went with the RX-1. I just set it up yesterday, and plan to tune it tomorrow. The RX-1 is a much better design for a number of reasons, but it is not as tried and true. Seems that everyone who has them likes them tho. If you hold off for a few weeks, I'll be able to give you my initial impressions of whether the design performs in practice...

 

[jknecht]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13434287#post13434287 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by mcliffy2
Skimmer is looking nice and gunky.

I had the same decision to make on my 238g, and went with the RX-1. I just set it up yesterday, and plan to tune it tomorrow. The RX-1 is a much better design for a number of reasons, but it is not as tried and true. Seems that everyone who has them likes them tho. If you hold off for a few weeks, I'll be able to give you my initial impressions of whether the design performs in practice...

Thanks! I will defintely hold off a couple of weeks to see how you like the RX-1. I really like the recirc feature as well as the easy loading of media. I await your review.

 

[gimmito]

Jknecht,

I just finished reading your thread...very impressive. We're in the process of remoldeling our house and building a 400 gallon display is in the plans. I got alot of great ideas from your build...so thanks !

Jim

p.s.

I notice you are into home theater...what type of set up do you have ?

 

[Zoonutt]

What a great thread! Nice build,u have alot of good ideas. I noticed when u recived you eco rock u had a brain or favia skelton,I also recived one of thes on my rock and am happy to report it came back to life,it has lil clear polyps that come out all day,it looks just like the 1 u pictured and is now starting to color up,thanks for keeping me busy at work,reading ur thread.......

 

[jknecht]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13505558#post13505558 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by gimmito
Jknecht,

I just finished reading your thread...very impressive. We're in the process of remoldeling our house and building a 400 gallon display is in the plans. I got alot of great ideas from your build...so thanks !

Jim

p.s.

I notice you are into home theater...what type of set up do you have ?

Thanks. I can't claim all the ideas are mine. I borrowed many ideas from a lot of great threads on here.

As for home theater I have a BK AVR317 Receiver, Rotel amp, Monitor Audio Silver series speakers, Samsung TV, Denon DVD Player (sorry I don't remember all the model numbers). I haven't upgraded to Blu-ray yet. Since getting into reef aquariums I haven't put much time into the HT. I would love to upgrade my receiver to either a Denon or the new BK AVR707.

Good luck with the remodel and your 400G build.

 

[jknecht]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13505735#post13505735 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Zoonutt
What a great thread! Nice build,u have alot of good ideas. I noticed when u recived you eco rock u had a brain or favia skelton,I also recived one of thes on my rock and am happy to report it came back to life,it has lil clear polyps that come out all day,it looks just like the 1 u pictured and is now starting to color up,thanks for keeping me busy at work,reading ur thread.......

Thanks! That's cool about your skelton. I've been really happy with the Eco-Rox. I'm glad I could keep you from your work.

 

[martinphillip03]

Any first impressions of the AquaC RX-1 Calcium Reactor?

Marty

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13434287#post13434287 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by mcliffy2
Skimmer is looking nice and gunky.

I had the same decision to make on my 238g, and went with the RX-1. I just set it up yesterday, and plan to tune it tomorrow. The RX-1 is a much better design for a number of reasons, but it is not as tried and true. Seems that everyone who has them likes them tho. If you hold off for a few weeks, I'll be able to give you my initial impressions of whether the design performs in practice...

 

[mcliffy2]

Unfortunately my impressions are delayed a bit - I believe I had a faulty regulator, and the instant I fired up the reactor, it flooded the body with CO2, and literally blew it up! One thing I can say is that AquaC customer support has been top notch. It wasn't any defect in their reactor (could arguably be their instruction manual, but that is splitting hairs), and the regulator was a 3rd party product packaged by the vendor with the reactor. But nonetheless they are sending me a replacement for $75. They could have pointed the finger at the reactor manf., who would have said not our problem because I was following instructions that came with the RX-1, not theirs...but instead they did everything they could to make sure it was taken care of.

 

[jknecht]

I don't have much to report. I needed to raise my skimmer up a little bit and wanted a stable platform for the skimmer to sit on. So I came up with the following.

3/4" Acrylic

I originally had the skimmer just sitting on those pvc couplings which worked well; but when removing the collection cup the skimmer would like to slide around a little. It's perfectly stable now.

Skimmer back together

I also picked up a few corals a couple of weeks ago.

1 - Acropora Blue (I need to get the exact name)
1 - Purple / Blue tipped small Acro colony (I need to get the exact name)
1 - 3 headed Frogspawn
1 - Galaxea

I only have a pic of the Galaxea right now. I need to take a pic of the Frogspawn

The bad news is the Acro's I picked up got nuked in my QT tank. I traveled out of town one day after getting them and my lights didn't turn off on the QT. They lost all of their color. They do have a little polyp extension so I hope they recover.