Sun Powered Reef

Hello friends.

I'll try to anwser to each and every one.

Migas

Thank you for your kind words, they are inspiring.

Carman34L

In Portugal we could it "granizo" is very, very rare, and when it hapens it's only small balls, but if the weather turns bad i can allways put the night winter cover preventing some temperature loss, a piece of "Blue Roffmate" like this:

DSC01411.JPG


Je®vis

In my others reffs this kind of snails wore a little strange, some just comet suicide, the others toke to many time to adapt, i think the secret ingredient is the natural light cicle, they just miss the low tide efect.

oregonanenome

In this tank and in this time of year, it evaporate about 2 Liters per day.


And now the updat:

I did some work today, finish the calcium reactor pH controller calibration, now is working just fine:

DSC01412.JPG


Looking very closely i found some coraline algea growin... this tank has only about 1,5 month old:

DSC01406.JPG
 
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Vitor!! you think like me!!! We use sunlight.

it´hard to use sunlight but is posible. I have algae (a little) because I don´t have skimmer and my water is not RO.
I have an experimental system, smaller than yours, and diferent.
my system consist in a outdoor display and indoor surge device and sump.
the temperatures are fine all the time, even in summer, because my sump works like a regulator (is bigger than the display).
the link of the explanation of my system
http://www.clamsdirect.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2131

I have
2 Tridacna maxima
2 Montipora
1 sexy shrimp
live rock
no skimmer
no fish
parameters are fine

new pics 16.00PM
P4130088.jpg


P4130082-1.jpg


I´m not testing the sunlight (because I know it works), I´m proving if the rainwater is viable in a reef tank.
the next...is Acropora because is more dificult to maintain than Montipora.

Victor, your system is my goal...ok.
I enjoy your reef really.


martin
regards
 
great set up...love that night time shot. did you have to put on a fixture on top of the fuge for that? it's amazing to see all those corals in their natural colors
 
Hi friends.

I'll try to answer to each one:

kelvin88

I save about $70 USD each month, remember, i have 750 lt, if you use 2 watts per litre you will get about 1500Watts of power, the price of 1 Kwatt in Portugal is about 0,1011â"šÂ¬:

8 hours X 1500 watts = 12Kwatts X 0,1011â"šÂ¬ = 1,210â"šÂ¬

12Kwatts x 30 days = 37â"šÂ¬ ($50 USD)

THINK ABOUT THIS:

If you'll try to replicate the same ammount of light indoor that i receive in my outside pool the costs would be astronomical, not mentioning the cost of the lamps.

Now talking about the temperature, i made some changes this weekend in my setup, now i have a 2ºC diferential, this means that all the heat acumulated by day is preserved by night, this oscilates betewn 25ºC to 27ºC, in this time of year my temperature controller is in standby mode most of the time, the power consuption is very, very low.

kigs

This colours are the real thing, not the blue actinic fluorscent light that are used in a indoor tank.

heckel90

I like your espirit, it takes a lot of corage to take a step to the unknown like this.

Best Regards

Vitor Pestana
 
Hi Julio.

Using this setup, the temp is very stable, the tank is completely isoled from the air, this way you can absorve the sun heat during the day and use it by night, never the last, i advice the use of a temp controller/Heaters/Chiller, some days are hot/cold from the others, summer and winter time for exemple.

For the months of the year when is extremely hot (13h00 - 16h00)you can allways put a shadow by the pool... very simple.

All the best;

Vitor Pestana
 
Hi vitor,
great looking setup,
I didn't see it listed anywhere, but approx how many gallons (or litres if you prefer) is the whole setup?

Thanks
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9759693#post9759693 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by miztic
Hi vitor,
great looking setup,
I didn't see it listed anywhere, but approx how many gallons (or litres if you prefer) is the whole setup?

Thanks

Hi miztic

The whole system has 750 litres in th main tank, and 200 litres in the sump.

Total 950 litres, about 250 gallons... i think.

All the best

Vitor Pestana
 
Best way to see your tank is from the top ! Really good idea. How long has this system been up and running ?
 
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