Starting a log

First of all I want toi thank Lionel for coming tho the rescue even though I gae him a false alarm in needing water...SORRY MAN!!!! Turned out that the lady/shoppe that I have been buying water for the house for years gave me a deal I couldn't pass up. I spent $97 bucks in filling my tank with 300 gals plus...Then same night I called...Again Sorry for making you rush.

2nd thanks goes out to JEFF DA MAN!!! Hey guys, the BIG GUY is ALWAYS WORKING. I called Jeff to see if he had any live rock alying around, like most of us reefers do, and he gave me my Christmas present early! He stated that his current passion; the set up tank at work has him full dedicated and that it was time for him to break down his house rig. Said since I called, it must have been something kicking him in the butt to get it done...SOOO

I went over, helped take out the rocks, drained his tank, and went home and placed them in mine right away...

JEFF...LIONEL Thank you both very much.

OK OK OK...pics you say????


Here's one form the get go
first, the freshwater leak test was officially over... started to drain the beast. please not the shadetree carpenter work on the wall frame

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and another
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and another
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second, I had to move the Orca 250 closer and to the side of the tank so the drain would fall directly into the return area of the sump
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you can notice the skimmer return gray elbow turned down barely coming from the right side
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here's the sand filling started...used Jeff's technique and glad I did; justed seeded it with my sand from the old fuge

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and another
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While that was happening, I started to work on the Reeflux 250MH 12k's on the ice cap e-ballasts; I had two of them and needed two more...more more on this later...anyways, thought I'd show how I did it because the trick was to get the opening nipple in my 250's SE facing up, or as close to 9-3 o'clock as possible.

here are the LA3 reflectors ~ 4 of them... this is what is should look like once I finish. This is why I decided to do this...not as easy as you'd think...this nipple thingy that is.
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First, the reflectors
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make sure you remove the protetive plastic coating
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The socket came with the reflector
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Here are the lights I'll be using.
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With the lamp out of the box, I can show the nipple. I HAVE TO DO THIS MAN!!! When I first heard of this I said to myself
*someone must be using kalk illegally or something* but here it is..the lamp's nipple...little pointy thingy on the top of the inner bulb. This inner bulb is considered the same as a DE with the glass outter shell of the SE as the protective UV lens required of DE usage...This is why we UV protective cover no need...:strooper:

http://im1.shutterfly.com/media/47b8cf08b3127ccec5ef9d21685800000040O01AZOGjZw1csQe3nwo/cC/f%3D0/ps%3D50/r%3D0/rx%3D720/ry%3D480/]/img]

Here's another shot of the nipple...

[img]http://im1.shutterfly.com/media/47b8cf08b3127ccec5efa6dfa91300000040O01AZOGjZw1csQe3nwo/cC/f%3D0/ps%3D50/r%3D0/rx%3D720/ry%3D480/

and another, but you get the idea...

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get the screws out of the box, temporarily set the socket in place and then screw a bulb in...DO NOT AFIX INTO REFLECTOR YET!!!!
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Why not afix it yet...because if you have to remove the ceramic glass socket in order to rotate the internal housing to have the nipple orientate to the top, it is much easier this way...

...because I found out the hard way...had to take it apart to do it...sigh...

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Here is what it should look like..sorry for the lousy pic but camera had a hard time focusing amongst all the reflective surface.
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Sorry bad pic post..little tired

With the lamp out of the box, I can show the nipple. I HAVE TO DO THIS MAN!!! When I first heard of this I said to myself
*someone must be using kalk illegally or something* but here it is..the lamp's nipple...little pointy thingy on the top of the inner bulb. This inner bulb is considered the same as a DE with the glass outter shell of the SE as the protective UV lens required of DE usage...This is why we UV protective cover no need...

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Here's the lamp socket mounted...
[imghttp://im1.shutterfly.com/media/47b8cf08b3127ccec5ef584728c400000040O01AZOGjZw1csQe3nwo/cC/f%3D0/ps%3D50/r%3D0/rx%3D720/ry%3D480/[/img]

Here it is with the nipple facing up, or as close to up as I could get it... I will recommend to the company that they design an adjustable socket in order to facilitate this endeavor...
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another thing worth mention: When you rotate the sockets make sure that the wiring remains in place because as you can notice, the black wire must sit in the groove in the ceramic galss or else the socket it be tightened down in a canted position and will not center in the reflector...yes, I learned this the hard ways too..

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Here's a better pic of what I mentioned above...note that the hole on the left of the pic has a groove toward the back of it and the right one does not...BE AWARE OF THIS....please.

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ok...on to the frame. Got some angled aluminum from Marunaka and rivieted it together to make a form fitting frame that supported the 4 LA3 reflectors
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bought frame iron racks and mounted them to the to the interior wood frame with brackets made for them...
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I can rest the ballasts and all wiring on these
 
Well, here are some sneak peeks at my tank. I told Tylersdad that I'd post a few. Have been trying to work with the manual adjustments of my camera. If we wait for that, sneak peeks may never come.

Here's one with the light cover open. I went with 2t2crash to the kadena woodshop and found some red oak panels. I may do the whole cover over...it is currently falling off.
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Here is the left corner as you are standing in front of the tank.
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The tomatos are gone since the pic was tank. They were just trashing the tank and being food hogs. Sashimi baby!
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Here is one of a small rock work piece I did. Thank God for acrylic tanks cause this baby is just propped up there
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Here's a full tank shot as you walk in the front door
:eek1:
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Here on the pics were tank Jan 30 2009 and on...not may but good enough to post.
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Here is one of a piece of mine...sorry for the lighting ~ working on the operator malfunction situation
:O

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Current pic of the center taken from the left side of the tank
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Close-up of one of my babies
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Full tank shot from the left side of thank...and don't laugh at my ghetto door holder...it's working overtime right now!
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Here my clams are infested with aiptasia but I have a secret weapon on order to combat these worthy adversaries!!! STAY TUNED!!!
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This one here is the size of a small soccer ball.
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My soccer ball again with my camera hungry yellow tangs coming to papa for some grub!
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Sorry getting ahead of myself adn the comments: The soccer ball is the green on with the tangs in front...The other piece, now that's a different story...
 
Some more tank pics ~ and yes, that's an American size couch in front of part of it
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With the flash on:
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Right corner shot
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Front close-up ~ no flash, well, as close as I could get to take the pic
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Moved back a little bit
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Hope you enjoyed!!! More soon! I hope
 
Oh, I also went to ACO Monday and bought 10 turbo cone snails and 20 sand sifting snails, and a sea hare but my anemone tried to eat it and killed the darn thing. It was on temp loan from ACO adn I was suppose to return it once I was done with it but I had to go there to apologize and we actually laughed about it ~ just a little...
 
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