Polywise's 300 glass reef with equipment room

[AriMiko43]

Awesome job Jim. I just went through the whole thread. Can you fill me in on what you did for the ventilation? Dave M brought up a ventilation concern for my tank and I want to do something. I saw the thread you put up on the ventilation. Is it just one vent coming from outside with no in-line fan and two vents with in-line fans going out hooked up to a Temp Humidity Climate Controller?

 

[polywise]

Arimiko43,

I just posted some details about the ventilation on your build thread....

 

[polywise]

not much new to report -- tank is chugging along...

here is a video I just took of the tank

https://youtu.be/S-P8eHoC3Pc

 

[dave.m]

Really starting to fill in. Have you considered adding some chromis to your tank?

Dave.M

 

[polywise]

Dave,

I know -- too funny right
I love those chromis


I am seeing some good growth and color...
been really trying to keep alk more constant, testing / adjusting more frequently.

I also have a few pet projects underway in my grow out tank in the basement...

 

[polywise]

Got a GoPro camera, and am giving it a try. I have plans to eventually take some under water video of my tanks
here is a current video of my 300 gallon tank

December 17, 2015
https://youtu.be/qzsqa4qvEGA

 

[polywise]

Here is a video from my 150 grow out tank in my fish room

https://youtu.be/xX6P4ch2jLE

 

[polywise]

getting ready to go to a local frag swap (FFM) in march..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhRvIaVrdWc

 

[polywise]

check out the colors on this millie growing in my system

 

[polywise]

here is a quick video of my fish room.

going to try to clean up the wires involved with the RKE over this summer..
(if I ever get motivated)

https://youtu.be/bwhdpPRVCA0

 

[polywise]

here are some coral I'm growing in fish room tank

https://youtu.be/mQOX9yXOWXQ

 

[ADVRESOURCE]

Jim, Nice tank. Dose or only Calcium reactor?

 

[polywise]

thanks

I only use a calcium reactor with a PH probe in the reaction chamber to control the desired PH. Been running it since 2003 ..... I check DKH weekly, and I notice from time to time I still have to bump a bit with baking soda.

 

[polywise]

Over the past month or so, I have sold off some of the larger coral, and some larger mini colonies that were in the grow out tank. I also collected, and fragged some digitata's,and zoo's that were beginning to overtake a portion of egg crate on the floor in the tank.

While things were rather spatially open - I removed as much reef rubble and detritus as possible.

This week past weekend I did some maintenance on my grow out tank. In lieu of random egg crate towers that had been holding various frags ( picture ) , I am going to combine with (1) egg crate platform that is 3'x3' leaving 1' clearance inside around all 4 sides of the tank for various power head positionings.

The big challenge was moving all the frags that I have off of the towers, and then installing the new platform. It's not too hard, just a PIA.

 

[polywise]

got the red planet moved into my display tank with the help of my son ....

 

[polywise]

I was able to get things straightened out in my grow out tank. I thought I was going to have some extra space on the rack, but it's already pretty full...
at least now it looks somewhat more organized. The platform is 3'x3' in a 4'x4' tank.

 

[polywise]

red planet did not like its new location.

This past weekend, I had to do some unwanted moving of coral in my display tank. I really hate moving things around in the tank. I never put my hands in there...unless I really have to.

I had to move a large tricolor poccilopora that was shadowing a blue tort
I moved a JF birdsnest to the floor of the tank that was in the shadows and not doing well, and also ended up smashing a favorite green torch into four pieces

I am running out of space & I think I'm going be finding new homes for the coral you see that are not on the reef structure in this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nwsXkvZbO0

 

[polywise]

Here is a little update.

I went to the Manhattan Reefs frag swap in December, and bought 4 cool frags.
wd tenius, orange millie, and two bubble gum digitas from a MR member
All are doing well.

I also am trying this year to grow out some more difficult coral
This week I picked up a frag pack.... let's see how they do

I lined them up in my tank in the order that they were shown on the frag pack picture.

 

[ReefKeeper64]

Jim, Just read your entire build thread and it's quite an impressive progression and end result. You definitely know what you're doing and have had great success. The videos show your progression well.

Have you had any significant setbacks or problems with your new at home system? Pests? Ich, etc? What was the cause of your crash in your at work system years ago? What did you do to make sure that didn't happen again? What's your water change schedule? Is it manual or automated?

 

[polywise]

Reefkeeper64,
Current system seems to be going well. I have not really had too many acquisitions put into the tank, but I make sure to dip everything that I do put in the system.
I also keep a close eye on my alk..
This system is being run with a reefkeeper RKE, so I have some control with regard to setting alarms if something goes out of parameter range.

I do have redundancy for the system.. multiple heaters and chillers on different electrical circuits, as well as a complete back up RKE , modules and controllers.
and extra critical pumps.. spare ballasts MH and VHO bulbs.

As for my old system, (no controller)
The failure occurred while I was out of town. I had (2) chillers running on parallel plumbing circuits. One was taken of line for fan motor replacement, and the part was not delivered before I went on vacation. The second chiller failed when I was out of town and the tank cooked.. still gives me a sick feeling to even think about it..