Top down shots

[Big E]

Ed,

Your thread has inspired me to improve my tank. Reading up on vinegar dosing now and will be giving it a try as part of the 'regular' maintenance. I like to keep things simple too and don't do much other than alk/calc dosing either, so this is right up my alley.

Sounds good............the fundamentals have never changed.

Keep in mind the vinegar is just a nutrient reducing tool like all the others.

If you're going to do it don't use competing tools like a refugium, GFO, ect. You'll lessen it's effectiveness and the control you have.

Expect months of adjustments and results.............it's tricky and you don't need to dose near as much as you think. Most people overdose and then do all kinds of crazy stuff chasing numbers.

-------------------
Thanks cmador,

I never got hung up on the wet/dry thing. I run the skimmer about an 1" from the rim and it does what it does. I usually get a good build up of sludge in the 4 inches of the cup tube and wipe it down weekly.

I don't get a lot of wet skimate in the bucket, so I guess I skim more dry than wet.

I'm lucky if the actual cup reservoir gets cleaned every few months, so that tea in there may have been from a recent spike and spillover.

 

[Melchior]

Sounds good............the fundamentals have never changed.

Keep in mind the vinegar is just a nutrient reducing tool like all the others.

If you're going to do it don't use competing tools like a refugium, GFO, ect. You'll lessen it's effectiveness and the control you have.

Expect months of adjustments and results.............it's tricky and you don't need to dose near as much as you think. Most people overdose and then do all kinds of crazy stuff chasing numbers.

The only thing my sump has in it is a skimmer. It's basically an empty 20L with a few pumps and a heater in it. No GFO, no Carbon, no zeovit or anything like that. I have pretty rich colors in the corals that are doing well in my tank, and i rely on polyp extension and color vibrance more than anything to determine how well things are doing. I have not kept on the maintenance as much as I should have the past six months or so and the algae growth has increased a bit. I really only test for alkalinity and salinity, with an occasional magnesium test once in a great while. Algae types are a great clue to what's excessive - phosphates give me red slime, nitrates give me green algae and cyano and I experience some browning in corals, etc.

Vinegar seems like a decent thing to reduce that without having to break the bank. I'll let you know how things work out. I have the same volume you do (100g) so your starting doses seem like a good place to start out.

 

[007Bond]

Thanks all,

It's been a while, so I've got some new frags & some other shots.

[/IMG]

Hey Ed,...corals are beautiful as ever! What is the encrusting coral in the pic to the right? Thanks,---Rick

 

[westreef]

Ed, the colors of your corals are stunning!

It is a very good advice: " When everything looks awesome with good growth, that's when you want to test." Especially every tank is different!:idea:

 

[Big E]

Hey Ed,...corals are beautiful as ever! What is the encrusting coral in the pic to the right? Thanks,---Rick

Thanks Rick.............do you mean the upper right corner? If so,that's the Paletta Pink Tip.

 

[Big E]

Ed, the colors of your corals are stunning!

It is a very good advice: " When everything looks awesome with good growth, that's when you want to test." Especially every tank is different!:idea:

Thanks Bernie! I hope someone can acheive more success with some of the comments/ideas I share here. Most of it is basic fundamentals and common sense.

 

[007Bond]

Thanks Rick.............do you mean the upper right corner? If so,that's the Paletta Pink Tip.

Ya Ed,...that one. Pink fits the picture, but is all the greenish/orange encrusting under it the same coral? I googled it and none of the pics. show that kind oh encrusting. I really like the coral, thanks Ed.---Rick

 

[Big E]

Yes it's all the same coral..............when it's higher up it will get some yellow to it. Those encrusting areas are getting direct light so they lighten to a yellow and some pink will sometimes show through.

It gets direct flow 24/7 so it's completely encrusting the rock all the way around. I need to separate it from my Tort because it's encrusting the Tort's base.

Here's an older pic close up that shows those areas---

[/URL][/IMG]

 

[007Bond]

Thanks Ed,...that's an interesting coral.---Rick

 

[Chris Lakies]

Ed, Your Corals look great! Because of you i switched to using the 2 B+ and 2 C+ in my T5 combo. Awesome.

 

[Big E]

Thanks Chris................there's a few local guys that are running them on their Sunpower fixtures and they've been happy so far.

 

[sahin]

Thanks Chris................there's a few local guys that are running them on their Sunpower fixtures and they've been happy so far.

LOL. Add a couple of International Reefkeepers to that list Big E. Myself and one other UK reefer have both copied your awesome tube combo.

I hope in 3 months time all my corals look as good as yours do.

 

[DiscusHeckel]

LOL. Add a couple of International Reefkeepers to that list Big E. Myself and one other UK reefer have both copied your awesome tube combo.

I hope in 3 months time all my corals look as good as yours do.

That's me (post #151). :wavehand:

 

[sahin]

That's me (post #151). :wavehand:

Yup, it was you I was referring to. LOL :lol:

 

[Big E]

I did some par readings on my fixture for anyone interested. I'm overdriving the bulbs on an ice cap ballast.

The new Apogee 200 was used set on "electric" mode.

The numbers are consistent front to back and end to end because I'm using just the two types of bulbs. The measurements are from the bottom up. In parenthesis is the actual distance from the bulbs.

The lights are 6 1/2" from the surface and total water depth is 18 1/2"

1" off the bottom-- 200 (24)
3"- 260 (22)
6"- 280 (19)
10"- 300 (15) This is mid level area of the tank.
11"- 325 (14)
12"- 360 (13)
11"- 325 (14)
12"- 400 (13)
14"- 430 (11)
15"- 470 (10)
17"- 500 (8)

I also took the probe and put it a 1/4" from the bulbs to get a reading to see how potent they were compared to each other.

Coral+- 1000
Blue +- 1100

 

[sahin]

Ed, those are excellent PAR levels. Perfect all types of acros; this is evidenced by the coral growth and colour in your tank already.

Any idea how many watts is being used by these 54watt tubes?

 

[Big E]

I don't know how much wattage they actually use. If I can get one of those kilowatt meters to borrow I'll post that info.

I've always used 200 in my mind as the cut off for acros, but honestly I think it's more like 250-260 after doing the par readings. Whenever I've put frags at the bottom of the tank floor they turn brown or aren't very brilliant. Of course some of this is coral specific.

I can tell my favias like that low 200 range.............they colors are insanely brughter lower in the tank.

 

[007Bond]

Hi Big,...That is some very good information! Thanks for the posting.---Rick

 

[Bobf216]

Thanks for the kind words.


Bob,

The tank looks like Sanford & Sons junkyard right now with racks and corals everywhere. It's hard to get any good pictures from the front as the tank is 25years old and scratched up.

I have a 80g rimless close to start up, plus I'm setting up a 45g frag tank to store all the frags and corals I don't want in the display. Once the 80g is set up I'll take some full tank shots.

Here's the sump that'll stay the same......it's very basic and accessible which is all I care about. A few extra pieces of rock, skimmer and a $20 top off system. The only controller I have is a Ranco temp controller which is under the stand. The sump isn't looks friendly but it's the type of setup used for a basemennt or fishroom away from the tank. This tank will be moved eventually, so nothing is going to be fancy or permanent.

I hooked up the Bubble Magus doser about 3 months ago and still haven't hooked up tha Calc pump. I've hand dosed for 5+ years before that & it took me a year to finally set up the doser.........old habits die hard I guess.

Notice how small my alk reservoir is...........even if the doser malfunctions I won't kill my tank. Paranoid, maybe, but I don't mind filling it up daily. I wanted the doser for stability of doses over 24 hrs. more than anything else.

[/URL][/IMG]

Pretty simple setup. I was running bio pellets on my tank which is 5 months old and i basically was starving the tank, the acros and millies were pale, my zoas were pale, basically everything was and i had little to no growth. last night my new skimmer came in. i have 50 gallons total water volume so i upgraded to a new Vertex 150 skimmer and took the bio pellets offline. we shall see how things start to change.

 

[sahin]

I don't know how much wattage they actually use. If I can get one of those kilowatt meters to borrow I'll post that info.

I've always used 200 in my mind as the cut off for acros, but honestly I think it's more like 250-260 after doing the par readings. Whenever I've put frags at the bottom of the tank floor they turn brown or aren't very brilliant. Of course some of this is coral specific.

I can tell my favias like that low 200 range.............they colors are insanely brughter lower in the tank.

Ed,

Your T5 tubes are 54watt 48inch (they are actually 46" long). So that makes it 4x54=216watts on standard ballasts.

On the Icecap ballasts, I read earlier today that it will overdrive the T5's to about 80watts each (producing 25-40% extra PAR).

Those PAR numbers you are getting suggests that the wattage must be somewhere in the 250+ region.

All very interesting.