The inwall 380 starfire reborn
- Thread starter JohnL
- Start date
).
the frag tank is part of the fuge currently, which is part of the sump/filtration, so it benefits from the flow created by the drains running through the sump. The top sump is split into 2 lengthwise sections. The front most is used for the frag section the back for macros, etc. There is an 8 bulb tek light hanging over the tank (I got it used at a good price). Currently there are only 4 bulbs running, on the two separate ballasts within the fixture. Two are running sunlight T5s (6500k) over the macro for a photoperiod of 12 hours (coming on before and going off after the dawn/dusk T5s do/will). The other 2 are blue plus bulbs over the frag section. Right now there is only zoas in the frag section, but that is only temporary. I keep forgetting to order new lights for that section to replace the worn out ones so that we can put some SPS out there. When we do that we will need to create some shaded sections for the remaining zoas though.
No new picts of the fish room specifically, but once we finish up with all of our changes I can take some new picts.. but due to some delays that might not be until the middle of next week.
No new picts of the fish room specifically, but once we finish up with all of our changes I can take some new picts.. but due to some delays that might not be until the middle of next week.
Spent today finishing putting up the lights, moving the returns and cleaning and relocating the Vortecs. Here is what the tank layout looks like now
I also took some more measurements for the T5s and the supplemental T5s (for supplementing the halides) ring in at 2.9 amps, 117 V and 230 watts (over 330 VA). Interesting how much appears to be "eaten" up by the ballast. This is driving (2) 24" bulbs and (2) 36" bulbs (which are actually 22" and 34" I think). These turn on and off at the same time as the halides do. They run off of a single IC 660 ballast.
The single 5' bulb that is driven by an IC 430 (for dawn/dusk) pulls 1.22 a @ 118 v (144 VA) and comes in at 105 w. This one runs for 4 hours before and 2 hours after the halides (12 hours total).
No other new pictures for now.. but if things work out then maybe some more tomorrow.
What part of the fish room exactly were you looking for details on Eric ? I ask because the pictures previously posted (and the build details posted) are still relevant. Nothing major (or even really minor) has changed since we posted about it all. If you let me know which piece of it you are interested in I can try to direct to you the post that contains the info you are looking for
. If you just started following our thread and wonder what the heck I am talking about (pictures, build details, etc), then you may need to check back before the split at the original thread .
We have had our equipment out in the garage for the last 2 tanks. Our previous tank was a 92g AGA corner tank that had a 75g sump (which was upgraded to a 100g sump before we upgraded tanks) and 50g prop tank out in the garage connected to it. Such an arrangement has always been our preferrence
I also took some more measurements for the T5s and the supplemental T5s (for supplementing the halides) ring in at 2.9 amps, 117 V and 230 watts (over 330 VA). Interesting how much appears to be "eaten" up by the ballast. This is driving (2) 24" bulbs and (2) 36" bulbs (which are actually 22" and 34" I think). These turn on and off at the same time as the halides do. They run off of a single IC 660 ballast.
The single 5' bulb that is driven by an IC 430 (for dawn/dusk) pulls 1.22 a @ 118 v (144 VA) and comes in at 105 w. This one runs for 4 hours before and 2 hours after the halides (12 hours total).
No other new pictures for now.. but if things work out then maybe some more tomorrow.
What part of the fish room exactly were you looking for details on Eric ? I ask because the pictures previously posted (and the build details posted) are still relevant. Nothing major (or even really minor) has changed since we posted about it all. If you let me know which piece of it you are interested in I can try to direct to you the post that contains the info you are looking for
. If you just started following our thread and wonder what the heck I am talking about (pictures, build details, etc), then you may need to check back before the split at the original thread .We have had our equipment out in the garage for the last 2 tanks. Our previous tank was a 92g AGA corner tank that had a 75g sump (which was upgraded to a 100g sump before we upgraded tanks) and 50g prop tank out in the garage connected to it
. Such an arrangement has always been our preferrence 
erics3000
Active member
I think I am good. I will go back again through your post. It has just been a while since I seen your thread. Thansk if I have any questions I will hit you up.
I had a leaky bulkhead when testing my sump today and had a big puddle in my garage. I am so glad it was not in my house. equipment outside is quickly becoming my preference too..
I had a leaky bulkhead when testing my sump today and had a big puddle in my garage. I am so glad it was not in my house. equipment outside is quickly becoming my preference too..
some equipment and livestock update.
First for the equipment
The new T5 lighting has been working out fine, the coverage is impressive. The light used for daw/dusk, which is a single 80w (5') bulb plced in front of the LA IIIs actually can be seen when the halides are on. I put a remote switch on the ballast the drives that one lamp and went inside while the halides were on. Turning it on and off was quite visible in the tank and having it on actually lightened up some areas under the halides and in almost all corners of the tank. I was not expecting this from a single T5 placed 8" above the water (and alongside 400w MHs).
We are however seeing some color loss in the corals along the sides and the ATI AquaBlue+ bulbs are looking a bit white in comparison to the AquaConnect halides and they seem to be washing out the corals a little. I suspect this is due to the IC ballast overdriving them. So we ordered a set of ATI Blue+ bulbs from ReefGeek yesterday to try out. They will be for the (2) 24" and (2) 36" bulbs, we are not replacing the dawn/dusk 5' bulb at this time (and actually already have a 5' Blue+ here if we decide that we want to try it out).
The AquaSurf is all setup now and operational on the spare AC Jr. (pictures to follow). The program code that we use can be found in this thread here. It has a daytime wave, more gentle night mode and midday chaotic flow mode (to help carry detrius out to the sump). The AC Jr is just a temporary setup since we picked up a used AC III and will be consolidating everything onto that controller. After which we will be working on a remote screen and control capability for the AC III. I got the idea from this thread here. I was at first thinking of tackling it with an LCD screen from CrystalFont, but since we have an old iPaq PDA running Windows CE w/ builtin WiFi, I am going to see if I can program the monitor/control app onto it first (since it won't cost me anything more than time.. so long at the iPaq doesn't die on me half way through it all).
That is about it for equipment (That I can think of), now onto livestock.
I am going to start off with the obituaries
. No confirmed deaths, just have not been seen for XX number of days. Alot of these we only just realized that we had not seen them for some time.
neon goby (not see for well over a month now)
orchid dottyback (not seen for at least 2 months now)
female flame wrasse (not seen for over a week).
For the neon, the one that went missing was the small one, the larger one is still present and active in the tank. Not really sure what happened to the smaller of the pair. We had them for a couple of months before he went missing.
We still have an orchid and indigo dotty back that occassionally hang out together. The 3rd orchid was actually the larger of the 3 (by almost a factor of 2) and was the most established. We had her for over 2 years (and 2 different tanks).
The flame was a relatively new addition but had been swimming around and eating. We witnessed no aggression from any of the other fish and she even hung around with the trio of blue sided fairies. We were going to order some mates for her the other day and realized that we had not seen her for several days (over a week at the time of this writing). I can only suspect that she is no longer with us (and she was a truly beautiful and vibrant fish). I am going to put the additional flame purchase on hold until I can possibly figure out what happened (IE: lots and lots more reading about keeping flames).
Here is something that will surpise everyone (I know that it surprised me). We had picked up some mudskipper blennies with our last shipment of fish out of Hawaii, 1 each lrg, med and sm. The med immediately jumped into the overflow before I could get the mesh cover back on, and the small one followed suit days later. After fishing them both out we didn't see them for some time (but the large one swims freely around the tank and has been a lively addition). Long story short I was puttering around the fuge yesterday and saw the medium blenny perched in there. He had made it back into the overflow, through the skimmer (with the O3 dosing) and into the sump/fuge. Pretty impressive that he made it through all of that intact. That Dart neddlewheel would have made mincemeat of him if he had managed to get sucked in *shudder*. I tried to catch him out but he quickly disappeared into the macro algae
We are going to be moving around some rock and corals today. Both mounting corals that we have had acclimating on the bottom of our tank and also relocating corals to better take advantage of the new pump placement.
I am uploading pictures now and hope to have some posted shortly
First for the equipment
The new T5 lighting has been working out fine, the coverage is impressive. The light used for daw/dusk, which is a single 80w (5') bulb plced in front of the LA IIIs actually can be seen when the halides are on. I put a remote switch on the ballast the drives that one lamp and went inside while the halides were on. Turning it on and off was quite visible in the tank and having it on actually lightened up some areas under the halides and in almost all corners of the tank. I was not expecting this from a single T5 placed 8" above the water (and alongside 400w MHs).
We are however seeing some color loss in the corals along the sides and the ATI AquaBlue+ bulbs are looking a bit white in comparison to the AquaConnect halides and they seem to be washing out the corals a little. I suspect this is due to the IC ballast overdriving them. So we ordered a set of ATI Blue+ bulbs from ReefGeek yesterday to try out. They will be for the (2) 24" and (2) 36" bulbs, we are not replacing the dawn/dusk 5' bulb at this time (and actually already have a 5' Blue+ here if we decide that we want to try it out).
The AquaSurf is all setup now and operational on the spare AC Jr. (pictures to follow). The program code that we use can be found in this thread here. It has a daytime wave, more gentle night mode and midday chaotic flow mode (to help carry detrius out to the sump). The AC Jr is just a temporary setup since we picked up a used AC III and will be consolidating everything onto that controller. After which we will be working on a remote screen and control capability for the AC III. I got the idea from this thread here. I was at first thinking of tackling it with an LCD screen from CrystalFont, but since we have an old iPaq PDA running Windows CE w/ builtin WiFi, I am going to see if I can program the monitor/control app onto it first (since it won't cost me anything more than time.. so long at the iPaq doesn't die on me half way through it all
).That is about it for equipment (That I can think of), now onto livestock.
I am going to start off with the obituaries
. No confirmed deaths, just have not been seen for XX number of days. Alot of these we only just realized that we had not seen them for some time.neon goby (not see for well over a month now)
orchid dottyback (not seen for at least 2 months now)
female flame wrasse (not seen for over a week).
For the neon, the one that went missing was the small one, the larger one is still present and active in the tank. Not really sure what happened to the smaller of the pair. We had them for a couple of months before he went missing.
We still have an orchid and indigo dotty back that occassionally hang out together. The 3rd orchid was actually the larger of the 3 (by almost a factor of 2) and was the most established. We had her for over 2 years (and 2 different tanks).
The flame was a relatively new addition but had been swimming around and eating. We witnessed no aggression from any of the other fish and she even hung around with the trio of blue sided fairies. We were going to order some mates for her the other day and realized that we had not seen her for several days (over a week at the time of this writing). I can only suspect that she is no longer with us (and she was a truly beautiful and vibrant fish
). I am going to put the additional flame purchase on hold until I can possibly figure out what happened (IE: lots and lots more reading about keeping flames).Here is something that will surpise everyone (I know that it surprised me). We had picked up some mudskipper blennies with our last shipment of fish out of Hawaii, 1 each lrg, med and sm. The med immediately jumped into the overflow before I could get the mesh cover back on, and the small one followed suit days later. After fishing them both out we didn't see them for some time (but the large one swims freely around the tank and has been a lively addition). Long story short I was puttering around the fuge yesterday and saw the medium blenny perched in there. He had made it back into the overflow, through the skimmer (with the O3 dosing) and into the sump/fuge. Pretty impressive that he made it through all of that intact. That Dart neddlewheel would have made mincemeat of him if he had managed to get sucked in *shudder*. I tried to catch him out but he quickly disappeared into the macro algae
We are going to be moving around some rock and corals today. Both mounting corals that we have had acclimating on the bottom of our tank and also relocating corals to better take advantage of the new pump placement.
I am uploading pictures now and hope to have some posted shortly
Here is the AC Jr and AS under our stand. I should have the second pair of pumps hooked up to it today.
Here is a wider shot of the skimmer currently (and more or less the tank room also).
And here is the lighting rack with the T5s all installed. You can see the different elevations for the T5s in the front, center and sides. I will also be raising the ones on the sides until the new bulbs get here next week. The corals underneath them are close enough to the surface to not need the lights as close as they are now.
Here is a wider shot of the skimmer currently (and more or less the tank room also).
And here is the lighting rack with the T5s all installed. You can see the different elevations for the T5s in the front, center and sides. I will also be raising the ones on the sides until the new bulbs get here next week. The corals underneath them are close enough to the surface to not need the lights as close as they are now.
I really need to break out the tripod, and I will, after I finish the re-aquascaping this weekend.
For a changeup here are some LPS on the bottom of our tank
To get back on the SPS track, here is a yellow acro that I got from a fellow reefer. To give a better idea of color (and lighting, etc) you can see a bali green slimer behind and to the right in the picture
Just some random shots
For a changeup here are some LPS on the bottom of our tank
To get back on the SPS track, here is a yellow acro that I got from a fellow reefer. To give a better idea of color (and lighting, etc) you can see a bali green slimer behind and to the right in the picture
Just some random shots
We are still experimenting with coral and other livestock placement, so nothing it set in stone just yet. But we will let it all stay the way it is for a couple of weeks to see how we (and the livestock) like it.
Here is the somwhat cleaned up zoa/paly garden :
And the start of an acan garden around a blue rimmed squamy :
As you can see in many of the picture the fish want to be part of the fun (and get in each and every picture). So I took a couple of just them
Here are the three musketeers (as I call them). and you can see a very fat purple tang swimming to the front to get into the shot :
Here is a shot of just the purple tang
Here is the somwhat cleaned up zoa/paly garden :
And the start of an acan garden around a blue rimmed squamy :
As you can see in many of the picture the fish want to be part of the fun (and get in each and every picture). So I took a couple of just them
Here are the three musketeers (as I call them). and you can see a very fat purple tang swimming to the front to get into the shot :
Here is a shot of just the purple tang
To keep the tang theme going, here is the "king" of our tank, an orange shouldered tangt, with our ever colorful powder brown behind him :
And of course our sailfin
Off the tang track here is our splash of yellow, an h. chrysus. I couldn't get a good shot of her companion an h. ornatissimus
Then our red tailed tamarin (who has been with us for some time now and is eating well, thankfully)
Our other fish that is known for being tough to keep, the golden angel, didn't want to pose for us today, but rest assured he is alive and doing well. He may be in one of the larger shots in the background somewhere, so long as I was far enough away from the tank when I took the shots (he is a shy one).
And of course our sailfin
Off the tang track here is our splash of yellow, an h. chrysus. I couldn't get a good shot of her companion an h. ornatissimus
Then our red tailed tamarin (who has been with us for some time now and is eating well, thankfully)
Our other fish that is known for being tough to keep, the golden angel, didn't want to pose for us today, but rest assured he is alive and doing well. He may be in one of the larger shots in the background somewhere, so long as I was far enough away from the tank when I took the shots
(he is a shy one).Our blue sided fairy wrasse trio can be seen here. It is not the best picture, but all I could do w/o a tripod today. I wanted to post it to show the differences that have developed between the 3. I would have to say that we now have a distinct make and 2 females. They were all pretty much identical when we bought them 5 months ago.
And finally here is an FTS, taken from an angle because I didn't feel like trying to stitch 2 picts together to get an FTS (and becuase there is a fireplace straight back where I would need to back up to to be able to get an FTS with a single shot)
And finally here is an FTS, taken from an angle because I didn't feel like trying to stitch 2 picts together to get an FTS (and becuase there is a fireplace straight back where I would need to back up to to be able to get an FTS with a single shot)
I wanted to poll the community to see if anyone had any insight into our flame wrasse dissappearance ? She had been hanging out with and getting along great with our blue sided fairies (appearing almost to have inserted herself into that harem). We keep a mesh top on our tank and witnessed her eating (and did not witness any other fish showing her aggression). We don't have any crabs or other cirtters that would have been able to eat her (while she was alive that is). I have a closing window of opportunity to get more flames, but wanted to try to figure out what happened to our previous one first. If we pull the trigger then the next order will be 4+ flames (maybe they do better in numbers than alone ?). Any insight or experience would be greatly appreciated.
I am also going to be fabricating some sort of top for our overlofw to help increase the security afforded us by the mesh top. Just in case she met her demise that way.
I am also going to be fabricating some sort of top for our overlofw to help increase the security afforded us by the mesh top. Just in case she met her demise that way.
erics3000
Active member
Wow great PICS. I love the powder brown.
that sucks with your wrasse. I lost a 6 line in my 150. I dont know where he went. I did have an agressive angel that I thought might have did him in. My dog got my hawk fish that jumped out. before I put any jumpers in my new tank I want to put some mesh on top just to be on the safe side. Hope you get it straightened out with the fish you want.
that sucks with your wrasse. I lost a 6 line in my 150. I dont know where he went. I did have an agressive angel that I thought might have did him in. My dog got my hawk fish that jumped out. before I put any jumpers in my new tank I want to put some mesh on top just to be on the safe side. Hope you get it straightened out with the fish you want.
Since I realized that our tomini tang decided to bow out of the photo shoot, once I was able to get him out to get a few shots I took a couple of him
He dooesn't like to stray too far from his "cave" towards the middle back of the tank. I apologize for the picture quality, but he wouldn't come any closer than 3'+ from the front glass.
He dooesn't like to stray too far from his "cave" towards the middle back of the tank
. I apologize for the picture quality, but he wouldn't come any closer than 3'+ from the front glass.
