Oceanic 215 with Solaris Build
- Thread starter Me No Nemo
- Start date
This question has been asked many times and I fail to understand why people will give this question a very wrong answer which can become a disaster with the tank disintegrating / failing. Some tanks, mostly the glass ones are built with the bottom sheet of glass "floating" inside the outer edges or vertical panes of Glass. They are designed this way and the outer vertical panes must rest on "solid ground" If you put a soft foam or rubber under this type of design you will put pressure on the bottom "floating" pane of glass thereby causing it to shatter / crack or split from its sidewall seems because of the external pressure on the pane upwards. You cannot and should not listen to blanket advise statements that are not qualified from this very dangerous perspective.
You may have a tank that will benefit from foam, but depending upon its design you may have a tank that will become a disaster because of its design if you put foam under it. This is easy to check, if your tank has the vertical panes otside the bottom pane, then donot put something under it that might cause the pane to have upwards pressure on it. If however the bottom pane has the upright panels mounted on top of it [ie inside the outer edges] then you can put foam under it.
This has been answered many times before. It is wise or foolish depending upon the tank you have!
If in doubt about anything like this, check with your manufacturer, who has the last say on that product you have. Just be warned, blanket answers can be disasterously wrong [including mine!]
You may have a tank that will benefit from foam, but depending upon its design you may have a tank that will become a disaster because of its design if you put foam under it. This is easy to check, if your tank has the vertical panes otside the bottom pane, then donot put something under it that might cause the pane to have upwards pressure on it. If however the bottom pane has the upright panels mounted on top of it [ie inside the outer edges] then you can put foam under it.
This has been answered many times before. It is wise or foolish depending upon the tank you have!
If in doubt about anything like this, check with your manufacturer, who has the last say on that product you have. Just be warned, blanket answers can be disasterously wrong [including mine!]
Last edited:
melev
Well-known member
The best advice I can give anyone asking this question is to ask the mfg of the tank. They alone are the ones that will honor a warranty and will provide you with their recommendations.
If you have a glass tank with foam underneath just because you were told to do so by people on RC, I would advise that you support everything evenly. That would require trimming the foam to fit the contour of the plastic trim so that the glass bottom is supported but not pressed against abnormally.
Keep in mind there are reports by people describing how the bottom panel failed and all the contents poured into their stand. In those cases, I would have preferred a solid plywood top and sheet of foam to support that heavy load. There's a difference in weight between a tank full of water and a tank full of water, DSB and LR. A floating panel can only take so much. Trimming the foam to fit the shape of the base of the tank would work out well, imho.
My tank is glass with a thin plastic trim. I contacted InterAmerican and they told me "<i>a full sheet of 3/4" plywood and a sheet of dense (pink or blue) 3/4" foam, of course</i>" and that is exactly what I did.
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
Hi Vinc...excellent advice above. Your best bet is always to discuss your setup with the manufacturer when possible. I have a solid plywood base with nothing between it and the tank. But, please check with Oceanic for the final say. Let us know how you make out.
I was impressed with the older version (the one and only Solaris I've actually seen in operation) that I saw at Sea in the City after the conference. From what I remember it had a blend of other color LEDs other than just Blue and White, I though I saw some yellow and/or red or redish orange LEDs in the mix????????? This newer version is evan more impressive. :eek1:
What would be an inteligent guess as to the deepest you could keep Acros with good color and growth at 100% light out put? And at 100% white, do you think you would wash out the effect of the blue LEDs, and do you think you would burn off corals near the surface of a very deep tank??
What would be an inteligent guess as to the deepest you could keep Acros with good color and growth at 100% light out put? And at 100% white, do you think you would wash out the effect of the blue LEDs, and do you think you would burn off corals near the surface of a very deep tank??
Last edited:
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
Hmmm, hard for me to say. I can say that my anemone has the best color it's ever had and it's at about 30" down in the tank and I have my whites at 35% right now. I think you can certainly do the whites higher, but I like 20K lighting and the color I get on my acros at that K rating. The more I've dropped the white down, the better my color has gotten IMO. I know there are some people running the whites much higher without burn off, so maybe they will chime in here.
ReefingBuddha
New member
Well it seems that Marcy is only using 67.5% of the power that she would usually use by only having the whites down at 35% and that Killagoby is only using 80% of the power he would be. Not sure if those are oversimplified calculations and I might be wrong but I'm pretty sure that's right. So more props to them. Would be nice to get a kilowatt meter on their lights so see how things are going.
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
Well, there's been a lot of weather changes, so it's hard to tell for sure (29 one day, 80 two days later...only in Florida!) But, my electric bill has dropped quite a bit, despite the increase in energy prices. Now that all the power tools, and other lights are gone, I'm hoping next bill will give me some idea as compared to last year same time.
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
Well, I'm having problems getting some decent photos, but here's what I could get this morning. I have a good friend who has awesome equipment...used to be a photographer for Rolling Stone Magazine...and I'm going to get him over to do some better shots for me. I just can't get this camera tuned in to show the actual colors. In person, the tank looks much different colorwise. The colors just don't "pop" like they do in real life.
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
Here are a couple other shots, not from home. Just a quick update on my ancient Maroon clown pair...they are over 30 years old and have been together all that time. The anemone will soon need it's own tank it's getting so large!
Some mixed macros in my refugium at my store. These are from ORA...just thought the colors are crazy! Most of this is gracillaria...brown, green and red.
Some mixed macros in my refugium at my store. These are from ORA...just thought the colors are crazy! Most of this is gracillaria...brown, green and red.
Me No Nemo
Premium Member
About 3 month difference between pics:
