Tank looks amazing!!! Just read through the whole thread and very impressive work! Few questions though. Do you QT your corals or just place them in the frag tank? How long do you leave them in your frag tank before adding them to the DT? Do you have problems with any of your fish nipping at corals? I ask because I had to remove a Foxface for this reason. And lastly, if you could go back and do anything differently what would it be and why? Once again, amazing system you have there!
Troy's 270 Gallon plus Fishroom
- Thread starter troyholl
- Start date
Great questions! I don't QT my corals.... but I do dip them and inspect them carefully. They then stay from a few days to a few weeks in the frag tank.
I had a cleaner wrasse that was eating my hammers/frog spawn & duncans. I've since gotten rid of him. The foxface and angel are model citizens and cause no problems.
Not sure what I would have done differently. So far I'm pretty happy. I do want to figure out a way to do a small water change daily via the Apex rather than one larger water change every week or so. Also need to mount the sterilizer better than I have it now, and I want to setup the QT so that its more automated than it is today. I guess the #1 things that would be better is the fact the tank is in my basement library and I'd love to have a larger tank more in the main area of the house where it can be viewed more often and as daily life goes on vs having to go downstairs to enjoy it. Our house just didn't lend itself to that...
That should be easy to set with the apex.
Lets try some deductive reasoning for a minute.
ATO -- Yes... Runs based on double float switch principle. One float to say LOW and one to say High... Be careful... I use one right now... I don't want it to sway salinity too much.
SO... We use that same principle but add a Virtual Switch to help control it.
Small daily change... Well we need to determine what pump and how long it runs to do a flip flop (remove and add)
We need to set the ATO to not engage if the WC virtual is set to ON. That will stop the ATO from adding water and messing up salinity too much. Then have the WC virtual turn off when complete.
So.. we determine a Time of Day (TOD) to do the WC.
Set the WC Virtual on and start pumping out.
Once it meets the LOW WATER switch we turn off pump #X and turn on pump #y. We also set WCFill to ON so the cycle does not repeat instantly.
Once it fills to High Water switch then we turn pump Y off and set WC virtual to off.
That way you will have, lets say, a 3-5 gallon change. WHAT... only 3-5... well... unless you want your return pump to go dry and suck up air... YEAH...
BUT... we do it a few times during the day... until we get to your designated water change amount. OK maybe 2 times.
Lets try some deductive reasoning for a minute.
ATO -- Yes... Runs based on double float switch principle. One float to say LOW and one to say High... Be careful... I use one right now... I don't want it to sway salinity too much.
SO... We use that same principle but add a Virtual Switch to help control it.
Small daily change... Well we need to determine what pump and how long it runs to do a flip flop (remove and add)
We need to set the ATO to not engage if the WC virtual is set to ON. That will stop the ATO from adding water and messing up salinity too much. Then have the WC virtual turn off when complete.
So.. we determine a Time of Day (TOD) to do the WC.
Set the WC Virtual on and start pumping out.
Once it meets the LOW WATER switch we turn off pump #X and turn on pump #y. We also set WCFill to ON so the cycle does not repeat instantly.
Once it fills to High Water switch then we turn pump Y off and set WC virtual to off.
That way you will have, lets say, a 3-5 gallon change. WHAT... only 3-5... well... unless you want your return pump to go dry and suck up air... YEAH...
BUT... we do it a few times during the day... until we get to your designated water change amount. OK maybe 2 times.
Padrino
New member
I can help you with that in fact I built a water change reactor and am using a AC3 to control the logic. I am working on creating a small simple standalone controller for it but so far its nice. I think i have some pictures of the base reactor in my build thread a few pages back from the current end. Once I finish building my cnc machine, I will be able to produce them much more quickly and produce more custom orders.
GREAT TANK!
Cheers
Rob
Yep, this logic is very close to what I was thinking with one twist. I intend to to move the old water to them QT tank and add new to the DT tank. That way they both keep cycled.
I'm not sure what your saying...
If my DT is contaminated the least of my concern is having DT water moved to the QT.
My water quality in the DT is great, and moving it to the QT makes the stress on the fish in the QT less for the day when they are moved to the DT as the water is 99.9% the exact same in both systems.
WHat I do today is move ~25 gallons from the DT to the QT and put 25 gallons of new water in the DT about weekly (probably 3 out of every 4). This equates to an ~8% water change weekly but makes for a 50% change in the QT. Essentially the QT has the exact same water as the DT at all times by doing so. The QT tank water never goes back into the DT, it goes down the drain.
What I want to do is make this automated and reduce the stress on both tanks by making a 2-3 gallon change daily..... this is likely my next project!
Newbie Aquarist
Reefing is my middle name
That is interesting as I also do the same between my DT and QT tank.
dca22anderson
New member
Troy, how's your tank coming along? Hope all is well for you buddy!:fish1::fish1:
Doing well. Pretty busy at work so I've not been online much.
dca22anderson
New member
We need some updates! Hope all is well for you buddy!
Dave,
To state the obvious I've been away for a while. Had a huge project at work last year that had me working around the clock for a long while. I'm just now recovering a bit and starting to focus back on the tank.
Couple big events (negative) with the tank. The 1st was aiptasia. Had a big outbreak in the middle of last year. Made the fateful mistake of putting in a Copperband who did do a good job on the aiptasia, but unfortunately started to attach my corals as well. I didn't have a lot of time to try and catch him and when I did I didn't have any luck. The tank looks a little sad now. Eventually I got him out, but now the aiptasia is coming back. Any suggestions would be appreciated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm going to start a big push to restock the corals soon as I'm just getting the water parameters all sort of back in alignment again. The fish are all okay so thats the good news and the tank has sort of turned into an anemone tank as those are going great and multiplying like crazy.
Hey thanks for the update. I had to scroll back to see what we had even talked about lately. Hopefully all is doing better (in real life) and the tank should rebound pretty quick.
Aptasia... just get some kalk and start injecting them. A little at a time. Make it therapy.
Aptasia... just get some kalk and start injecting them. A little at a time. Make it therapy.
Thanks!
A little to report now that I'm back and focused on getting the tank back into shape again.
To help control the aphasia in the tank I added an aphasia eating filefish. We will see how that works.
I also got around to a project that I've meant to do for more than a year. I hate doing water changes. I now have plumbed in a pump in the QT tank tied to the Apex, plumbed in a connection to my water manifold from the sump into the QT tank, and already have a pump from the salt-water mixing tank to the sump. Now with one click of a control in the Apex, and one twist of a valve and in 5 minutes I can change out 30-40 gallons (10%) without getting out any buckets, hoses, pumps, etc.... wahoo!!
I've also been messing with the beta of the Apex Fusion setup from Neptune. I have to say I LOVE now that my radian's are controllable from the apex and so far the beta software is working like a charm. I reprogramed my MP40's last night with it and it and the wizard/graphical setup works great!
I also did a deep cleaning of my fish room but thats pretty boring so enough about that!!
To help control the aphasia in the tank I added an aphasia eating filefish. We will see how that works.
I also got around to a project that I've meant to do for more than a year. I hate doing water changes. I now have plumbed in a pump in the QT tank tied to the Apex, plumbed in a connection to my water manifold from the sump into the QT tank, and already have a pump from the salt-water mixing tank to the sump. Now with one click of a control in the Apex, and one twist of a valve and in 5 minutes I can change out 30-40 gallons (10%) without getting out any buckets, hoses, pumps, etc.... wahoo!!
I've also been messing with the beta of the Apex Fusion setup from Neptune. I have to say I LOVE now that my radian's are controllable from the apex and so far the beta software is working like a charm. I reprogramed my MP40's last night with it and it and the wizard/graphical setup works great!
I also did a deep cleaning of my fish room but thats pretty boring so enough about that!!
