My 65 Gallon Mixed Reef

[biggles]

Here's 3 shots i just took. 2 x B+ at the front, then B+/Fiji purple only at the back and finally just the radium by itself - no white balancing so just what the iphone camera recorded.

 

[buzzy]

Haha rodger that sir us ANZAC's need to stick together!

Tanks looking amazing as usual mate, what are you feeding the corals apart from the food for the clown?

 

[biggles]

Every night about an hour after lights out i feed a good pinch of reef roids which i just dissolve slowly under water rubbing it between my two fingers. There is a visible PE reaction within 30-40 secs and then i collect 2 turkey basters of any crap that has settled in the sump and squirt that into the 6095 to shred it into the water, the acros PE goes ballistic when they sense the detritus. In the morning i add a pinch of cycop eeze powder the same way i do the roids. The clown gobbles lots of it up and the shrimp picks it from the hammer tentacles. Every 3 days i feed the hammer half a frozen mysis dissolved in tank water with a pinch of cyclop eeze and a pinch of roids. Everything in the tank goes nuts at this time, corals, fish and shrimp lol. That's it, the fish only gets food i know the corals benefit from before passing through the fish.
Still constantly running at zero phos and nitrates, alk steady at 7.5 again and calcium sitting on 420.

 

[Bello]

Uh oh....so you're now recruiting, eh Biggles?? As if the aussie sps and radium weren't enough

Welcome to the Tank Battles club Buzzy :lol:

I'm just reminded that I need to do some light blasting of my own for the couple turds I've got. Will post a couple a pics on my thread perhaps today or tomorrow...but no new additions, so not really exciting

My son is beginning to get bossy!! :lol: Earlier, I could leave him be, and do some tank work and watch him at the same time. Now he insists on following me, and loves getting his hands in the water :lol:.... I'll make a reefer out of him someday

I should be getting in a few frags in a month or 2. No more colonies, unless they are sensational.....but that usually involves a bloody high price.

Did you have a look at the link of the youtube video above? Would you say that those colours were accurate?

 

[biggles]

Of course i'm getting Buzzy on my side - i just saw TBD's latest RAW tank images so i know what can be achieved with the right LED setup.
I think nuking those brown outs into submission is the go mate, soon as they start to pale noticeably (tan colored), drop them to half way and leave them there unless they start to darken again at which point i'd raise them until darkening stops. Then just watch for a color to develop. If the color appears at the base first it's prob still in too high a light area, at the tips it's just right or can do with more. All this is only based on wild SPS experiences so bare that in mind Bello
Kids are drawn to water like magnets lol, not being a panic merchant but there is no way he can get to the lower tanks can he mate - tanks with even a few inches of water can be a deadly attraction and easily overlooked when deciding what is and isn't a danger to the most important thing in your life
New frags will be good to see, i need to spend my money on gear now before i get too far ahead of myself with stocking lol. I did watch the video and it looks close but there is definite blue wash out and missing red to the picture. It's very obvious that the corals are brightly colored but the lighting is not showing it due to bad white balance or lack thereof during the videoing.

My tank journals are always casual with an emphasis on providing a place for a few of us less anal retentive reefers to hide out and trash talk fellow reefers - along the way we usually learn stuff from each other lol. There will be no screw polishing or extravagant build discussions permitted here - if you nail two bits of wood together you're a legend but keep that crap to yourself. All ideas shared here only work when you don't freak out every time a pod farts in your reef......

Btw, i tried a single dose of amino acids 3 days ago and today everything has darkened again - i now hate AA's and have thrown the stupid crap in the bin. This is a scientific observation backed by extensive and rigorous lab testing and backed by lots of fellow reefers who may or may not exist........ i rest my case. :reading:

 

[MARINECRITTERS]

Wow, amazing tank, the colours are crazy!

 

[troubadour11]

Mad scientists??.....I dunno about Troub, but I can confirm that I'm plain mad :lol:

I'm only mad when I put on my top hat and sit down for tea with my good friends the March Hare and Field Mouse. Well, and when I don't have the time/money to keep on with this build!

I think that you both have a good observation on the LED light mixing/spread/coverage. I bought a pre-built oak stand and canopy for my set up. I have already gotten the stain info from the cabinet maker because I am expecting to build an oak riser for the canopy. Right now I'd barely have room for the heat syncs and splash guard above the water line. So it's getting a good 4-10 inch raise in order to increase coverage and give us a little bit more room to access to the tank for maintenance or what have you. So that sounds right along the same lines that I was thinking. Although with a 25 inch depth (probably about 20 inches to the sand bed) I was still contemplating some optics if the LED's were another 6-10 inches above the water surface. But...

Bello is giving me pause to reconsider any optics as well... Here's a question... what would your thoughts be on running say 80, 90, or 100 degree optics on JUST the outer rows or front row only of LED's? My thought being that it would provide wide coverage and color mixing of the diodes over the tank, but then allow the outer edge near the glass to get a little deeper penetration and less light spill out of the tank. Possibly making a clam or something like that a little easier to maintain on the sand bed. Just a thought to bounce around and get your opinion on

As for the Reef Angel. It's getting built into this 90 reef. A Christmas gift that I've opened the box, looked at all my expensive toys, then packed it back up and been hitting the books :reading: As you said, it will be a fair amount of work. But I'm going the S...L...O...W... ... ... build route, putting in the time and research, and trying to get an amazing set up for drastically less then it would be to buy it all ready made. The way I look at it: everyone says patience, patience, PATIENCE. So going the slow route to save money forces the patience on me and (hopefully) smart decisions.

Hmmmm......here's the plan....no code....plain and simple, we're gonna use the latest led technologies and whateverthehellitis's to beat your Radiums

Hey Bello, I think I'm going to need some code on my end... that Reef Angel and fancy-shmancy multiple led diver set up I'm working towards is going to take at least a little plain and simple code to run or we could be in trouble in this battle.

Biggles: 1... The shots of your light setups are so nice! Pretty cool to see the mix. 2.. I see you're recruiting help now. Shaking in your boots already huh? :strooper:

And thanks for the opinions on Nems. The wife really wants a mated pair of clown fishies. Hence why she wants a Nem. I can easily convince her to stick with LPS in it's place (hoping they would host in a torch, hammer, frog spawn, etc). But the reefer addict in me wants to give it a shot since I've never had one. We will see... rocks, plumbing, and water first. LOL :artist:

 

[troubadour11]

Oh, and thanks for the link to the other "Who has really colorful acros under leds?" thread...

YAY for more :reading:!!!

 

[biggles]

Wow, amazing tank, the colours are crazy!

Thanks mate, i hope to see growth and colors improve over the next few months as i'm going to keep my hands out of the tank and just keep everything the way it is. The only thing i'm going to do now is keep increasing the coral food slowly until i see a problem and then basically back it off a tad and keep the food dosing high as possible - stable as well.

The way I look at it: everyone says patience, patience, PATIENCE. So going the slow route to save money forces the patience on me and (hopefully) smart decisions.

Yes you do that Troub, we'll all just wait around for weeks twiddling our reef thumbs waiting for your journal......... Follow the S.A.S motto like me and Bello in your reefing Troub - Who Dares Wins :thumbsup:
Those shots are pretty close to a true brightness comparison but they all have more blue than your eyes see. The Fiji purple is very bright to the eye when compared to the higher PAR B+ bulbs. I really like these T5's as i've never had anything more than low PAR T8 actinics on previous setups. They are why i'm getting away with a single 250W radium over such a large area.
I think you should go with a nem but introduce it early - before anything but a few corals. Try to have your circulation sorted so the nem can settle where it wants and stay put. The only reason i had probs is because i put them in with tanks holding triple the acro numbers i have now lol. You should give one a go as i had a friend with two clowns hosting in a Macrodactyla doreensis and it's the coolest thing to see in a tank. I'm thinking about getting a carpet nem when i get run the 400W - go for it but treat it like you would your first acro frag - like your first born lol :thumbsup:

Pre radium

7 days post radium.......... a war is coming Troub :strooper:

 

[troubadour11]

Yes you do that Troub, we'll all just wait around for weeks twiddling our reef thumbs waiting for your journal......... Follow the S.A.S motto like me and Bello in your reefing Troub - Who Dares Wins :thumbsup:

I think you should go with a nem but introduce it early - before anything but a few corals. Try to have your circulation sorted so the nem can settle where it wants and stay put. The only reason i had probs is because i put them in with tanks holding triple the acro numbers i have now lol. You should give one a go as i had a friend with two clowns hosting in a Macrodactyla doreensis and it's the coolest thing to see in a tank. I'm thinking about getting a carpet nem when i get run the 400W - go for it but treat it like you would your first acro frag - like your first born lol :thumbsup:

Trust me biggles, my thumbs have fallen off from twiddling them. Spreading out the build costs over time has a great plus side of plenty of time to research. But it is time to get a move on already!

But now I think you've convinced me to take the dare and move ahead with planning out the stock list to incorporate the Nem. Because I of course want to win! :celeb3: I have no doubt that it would be one of the coolest things to see!

And that pre/post shot was really cool. I wonder where the color will eventually settle... but it's looking good to me right now :thumbsup:

 

[biggles]

I'm like you Troub, i don't have the money to purchase everything i want up front so i do the best i can until i have the right gear - the 6095 and controller are my next priority as my flow now is already shaping a couple of colonies weirdly.... The sooner you get your rocks wet the sooner the cycle wait can begin so that's the only thing i'd be concerned with if i was you mate. :beer:
I hope you realise that all these 'threats' of detonating a nem bomb over the tank battle field will result in an escalation of hostilities........ :strooper:

I'm willing this colony to turn a cool pink without requiring a ton of light but not much has happened so far. The branches are holding their near white color so i'm hopeful that it's getting enough PAR where it is on the low raft rock and over the next few weeks it will begin to 'pop'

 

[Bello]

Oh boy... this is a truly verbose thread!!....biggles, if you were to write a book of your reefing adventures, pretty sure that the past few pages would easily fill up the first chapter :lol:

Thanks for the tips on the sequence of possible observations of the "Biggle's Light Blasting Bomb Theory". I also found your feeding sequences to be very interesting, will probably give that a go as well. Not completely, since I've big ol' fish there, but thereabouts....

Looking back at the youtube link that I provided, I do observe that some are indeed pale, and not as impressive as I imagined. Still a good looking system though, and similar should suffice for now.

I really didn't observe any changes when dosing Amino's in my case...None whatsoever. Perhaps my system isn't as low nutrient as imagined, but perhaps also the case that not all Amino's are created equal.... by "darkened", did you mean you observed browning...or...??

The new pink acro, still wondering if its A. Microlados, looks pretty darn good. So not a SSC, but great find nevertheless :thumbsup:

Good idea to get with the gear first, I'm in the process of redoing the same. Need to consider what I really need or what will really help, but there's really no sense in filling up the tank with livestock that there's no real room for.....

Its been busy....and I'm seriously suffering from sleep deprivation :furious:

 

[Bello]

Troub:

I'm still confused about the LEDs. I don't claim to be an expert, and you should do what feels right for you

My previous couple of conversations with biggles dealt with the coverage per say. However, if you were to look at my acro tank, with the simple aquascaping, 80% of coral are DIRECTLY below the fixtures. So perhaps coverage may not be my issue. Could be intensity. This is also referred to in TBD's latest updates.

Optics are really your call. I can only state what I'm happy with. With no optics, there are absolutely no spotlighting effects that can be noticed with the naked eye, provided the leds are placed reasonably close together. You could always start with no optics, and buy 'em later if you think you need them.

Reef Angel coding? Funny thing is, I have a degree in Computer Engineering, and I interned at Microsoft....but bought a GHL.... Just fed up of coding.....forever

Good luck with the Nem bomb :lol:

 

[troubadour11]

I am definitely no expert on any of this. I have just been researching like mad while saving up for this build and piecing things together.

But I do think I'm buying into the coverage and light mixing ideas you both mentioned. That's why I will be building that lift for my light rig to get it a little higher above the water line and allowing for more distribution and mixing of the light before hitting the corals. And from some other threads and what I'm hearing here... It sounds like most have issues with led's running them on to high of a power. Which would make optics less important in my mind unless you're running the light rig a few feet above the water line. I'm looking at (2) 6x20 inch heat syncs starting out with a mixture of 48 total (24 per sync) cree LEDs. The heat syncs would each have an additional 12 open slots to add more diodes and drivers later if needed for power or color mixing. The diodes would be spread approximately 1.5 inches apart across each sync. That's where I think I am headed rather then going the pendant or cluster style fixtures.

And yes, part of having my Reef Angel driving it all is to create the toy bells and whistles (sunrise/sunset, storms, etc.) for fun... but to also have the ability to manually dim the whole system for acclimation, dialing in what seems to make my tank happy, and everything else. I am an animator and artist by day... I deal with coding very minimally. A very small amount of scripting on occasions. But I think between the forums and brute forcing it, I'll be able to slap some code together that will function. Or I'll end up like this: :headwalls:

I haven't read or learned much on amino dosing. Am I right in assuming that is most useful on an ULNS? I've really been reading lots of conversations on theories of Alk and the amount of nutrients in or passing through the system and how that could relate to coral coloration. Obviously lots of variables like lighting and such. Just curious if dosing amino's would possibly have a similar effect as running more nutrients through a system or how it fits in to feeding and nutrient export.

>>> Look >>> :jester: >>> My nem bomb idea is growing and percolating in my brain >>> We'll call it project Anemisis!!! Mwa-hahahahah :blown:

 

[Bello]

The LED plan so far sounds pretty good. I like the idea of big heat sinks. A side benefit of a bigger heat sink, apart from better coverage, is that should the fans fail, you'll still have better wiggle room till the led's get affected. I've got about 40 led per heat sink, similar size, in rows an inch apart, so very similar to your plan.

I don't remember how tall your tank is? Lemme know, but I think 24 per sink should be a good start :thumbsup:

Looking forward to the Reef Angel linkup, should be fun . But if you've done scripting, it should make things much easier at the very least :thumbsup:

Amino's are basically coral food. But most effective if you're running an ultra low nutrient system, wherein corals relish the extra food. If I understand correctly, it would then therefore increase the population of zooxanthellae on the coral. Excessive dosing, would then turn 'em brown poo style. This is what I think I understand, and Biggles will correct me and rub it in, if I'm wrong about this :facepalm:

Have you considered a multi tank system...no I don't mean another biggie tank, say about a 10-20 gallon, plumbed to the same system to house the nem, and begin Project Anemisis :hammer:

 

[Bello]

uh Biggles, are you surrendering? :strooper:

 

[biggles]

Oh boy... this is a truly verbose thread!!....biggles, if you were to write a book of your reefing adventures, pretty sure that the past few pages would easily fill up the first chapter :lol:

Well there's only 3-4 of us following my reefing adventures so i can prattle on all i want without fear of contradiction.......:frog:
When i used those amino acids i saw a darkening of the pigments, both the colorful ones and the brown zoa populations overall - everything looked more saturated but not in a way i like, hard to explain but i'd rather have pale corals over darkened ones any day.
I cut a branch off that new colony which is in low/med light and stuck 2 frags of it in medium and high light areas to see what they do just in case it does something cool in higher light.

All this reef angel talk is well and good Troub but we'll see how things go once it becomes self aware and shuts you out of the system - i've watched all the Terminator movies Troub and your playing with fire mate........
Project Anemisis - go for it mate, what's the worst that can happen, your nem goes wandering and stings the crapola out of all your prized pieces...........:blown:

uh Biggles, are you surrendering? :strooper:

Yes mate i'm quaking in my reef boots worrying about the results you and Troub will get from your John Travolta lights.......... I attacked the sump yesterday so i had to put some frags back in the display temporarily while i tinker down below. Feeding a lot of coral food still every day and only seeing a small amount of GHA on the ends of the powerheads so i'll keep it at the amounts i'm dosing now for a while. I'm turning that right hand rock into a blubbery flubbery coral rock to keep pesky spreading corals like the red shrooms i've attached to it from becoming a problem.

 

[1000_smiles]

Well there's only 3-4 of us following my reefing adventures

don't be so sure about that:wavehand:

nice tank by the way:thumbsup:

 

[Bello]

don't be so sure about that:wavehand:

nice tank by the way:thumbsup:

Thank you!! Now biggles, you've got no excuse to hide all those kick *** aussie corals from us!!!

All this reef angel talk is well and good Troub but we'll see how things go once it becomes self aware and shuts you out of the system - i've watched all the Terminator movies Troub and your playing with fire mate........

:lol:

The right hand rock is a good call :thumbsup:. I'm trying to get rid of all my shrooms from the drop off too. They're taking up valuable real estate!

With the amino's it seems that the colours didn't get deeper/richer? It didn't make a damn difference in my case, probably since I'm not as low nutrient as you, and no matter how much of that I throw in there, doesn't do squat. It would seem that you're getting better results with other coral foods compared to aminos. Hoping to hear more from you on this :thumbsup:

What else are you feeding the corals? Cyclopeeze and??

.... And I thought I was the only guy who put his hands in his tank a lot :lol:

 

[troubadour11]

All this reef angel talk is well and good Troub but we'll see how things go once it becomes self aware and shuts you out of the system - i've watched all the Terminator movies Troub and your playing with fire mate........

HAhaha... Since I have to write the code to run the Reef Angel, I'll have to be sure I program it not to do that :beer: and if it still tries to go Terminator... I'll go: :strooper:

Project Anemisis - go for it mate, what's the worst that can happen, your nem goes wandering and stings the crapola out of all your prized pieces...........:blown:

Yes mate i'm quaking in my reef boots worrying about the results you and Troub will get from your John Travolta lights..........

I guess the worst that could happen is I find an anemone that likes to dance. With disco style John Travolta lights, that would be deadly... :uzi:

But then again, I'd have a tourist attraction and a prized anemone rather then corals! "Come one, come all... just $1 per viewing to see Michigan J Nemone!" :jester: