ltkenbo's 75 Gallon Reef Tank

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

Using epoxy to hold them together is definitely recommended. I didn't do it though. Another thing you ncan do to secure them nicely is to drill holes through them and use some pvc to connect them all. This way you get the exact aquascape you want, and they are in there very securely. Other then that, I love it.

Are you going to stay barebottom or adding sand later?

 

[ltkenbo]

Maybe i'll add some then, we'll see.

I do plan on adding sand, I just don't have any yet. The guy I bought the LR from said he would sell me as much as I want for $20.

 

[Aquarian]

Maybe i'll add some then, we'll see.

I do plan on adding sand, I just don't have any yet. The guy I bought the LR from said he would sell me as much as I want for $20.

That's kind of cheep, is it live sand?

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

Getting used sand is risky most times. Unless it was cleaned very well, during the removal and everything, lots of detritus and crap was stirred up and could cause a ammonia spike. Wash it REALLY well before using it. :)

 

[ltkenbo]

Hmmm yes that's a good point, maybe I'll just get some new then. What kind would you guys recommend?

An update on my tank. It was foggy before but has cleared up completely now :). My camera doesn't take the best photos so it's hard to tell but it looks great! I moved 1 or 2 of the rocks around and now I just need to epoxy putty a couple of them to make the structure more stable.

I cycled my tank with 2 large raw shrimp. I tested before I put the shrimp in and I had 0 ppm of ammonia and 0 ppm of nitrates. The next day after the shrimp had been in for about 20 hours I tested for both again and 0 ppm ammonia and 10-15 ppm nitrates! To be safe I'm going to wait just in case there are residual nitrites (I don't have a nitrite test kit). I pulled the shrimp out and have been keeping the lights off, but I put the protein skimmer in:

If anyone would like to see a video of my tank as well, check out the link below:

Comments appreciated!

 

[ltkenbo]

So last weekend I got 80 lb. of dry seaflor special grade sand and washed it and then put it in the tank. It was cloudy for a couple days but then finally cleared up:

Then on Tuesday I got 10 small hermit crabs and today finally 2 small clownfish :).

Here is with the sand and fish:

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

Looking good :)

 

[Marinne13]

that's a lot of powerheads lol

 

[ltkenbo]

Lol for real though do you think it's enough powerheads? I got 1 bigger and 1 smaller koralia extra when I bought this tank.

 

[Sakura2282]

Looking good! :)

 

[ltkenbo]

Do you think I need more powerheads? What about placement? What do you think?

 

[Sakura2282]

Do you think I need more powerheads? What about placement? What do you think?

I think you have enough powerheads, like 5 on your DT so you should be fine. If your fish are doing good and they look happy they you are OK.

 

[ltkenbo]

Ok cool, I had a little bit of diatoms the other day and now I'm starting to get some GHA, time to get some turbo snails...

 

[Sakura2282]

Ok cool, I had a little bit of diatoms the other day and now I'm starting to get some GHA, time to get some turbo snails...

You should check out this site http://www.reefcleaners.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=62&Itemid=91 some people here have order from them.

 

[kbuser92]

I wouldn't get turbos, I would go with ceriths and dwarf ceriths.

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

Turbos are like little bulldozers. Anything that isn't glued down (frags) get knocked over lol. They are good cleaners though.

 

[ltkenbo]

Sorry I got the turbos before you guys posted, I had them before, true they do knock things over but I have epoxied some of my smaller rocks together. I got 5 turbos and 1 Astrea snail. If they become a problem I suppose I could always trade them in later, since I don't have any corals yet, it's probably alright.

 

[AnthonyTheNewbie]

I like turbos. Just glue down frags and you'll be fine. They are great cleaners

 

[ltkenbo]

Yeah they've kept any algae in check pretty well, but it was just a small bloom I haven't had anything out of control yet. I'm getting good coralline growth spots on different rocks.

Anyways this last week I worked on an ATO system. I'm an electrical engineer and the company I work for designed a product and patented a technology just over 10 years ago that's used a lot in ice machines for control of ice and liquid level. I was talking with by boss a bout my reef tank and my ATO project and he told me about this board we have that would be perfect for it. So I set one of these up connected to a float switch and it triggers a relay that controls the pump. If you want to read about the actual patented technlogy on this board it's called dTRED:

http://www.appliancedesign.com/articles/print/83631-clear-signal

Here's some pics of the setup, I still need to mount the board in an enclosure to protect it from water.

Here's the pump and tubing that runs to the sump:

and the board:

Float switch with the bracket that I made to hold it:

Today I also have a new addition to the tank, a Royal Grama Basslet:

:)


I've gone into more details in this video if anyone wants to watch:

 

[ltkenbo]

So a lot has happened in the last couple of weeks. I had that new Royal Gramma, and a week later he went MIA. Has not showed up in over a week now, so I am assuming he is dead. I also added several corals to my system which I will show in the pics below.

Another big thing that happened was I had a small outbreak of dinoflagellates. I had dinos before in my old tank so I know what they look like. They were all over the sand and starting to get on portions of the rocks, brown stringy things with bubbles that form weird strings of dust and hover whenever the powerheads are turned off. Now this happened soon after the Royal Gramma disappeared, so what I assume is that he died and the nutrients spurred an outbreak, that and I believe I had been overfeeding. So I came up with this big plan I was gonna try all these things at once when I had some more money. However, I began simply reducing feedings, and guess what! Over the last 3 days they have almost vanished! Sand is clean again, and almost none on the rocks.

Pics below of my new corals and my tank, along with some coralline algae growth:

Good coralline growth:

Candy Cane Coral:

Zoanthids:

Green Star Polyps:

Hammer Coral:

and the clowns:

Here's a video if anyone's interested (may be still processing at first):

Comments appreciated!