Entropy

Anyone want to give me some SPS so I can take a picture of it?

I just use my 5 gallon jugs. I fill them with RO, add salt, and then shake them until the salt is disolved. On a new tank I would just add RO and then add salt with the tank pump(s) running until you are close to the salinity you want and then let it run for a day or two. After a day I would check the salinity again just to make sure it didn't shift any. This is how I did my 150g. I just ran the RO feed straight into the tank and let it run for two days.

Well it certainly looks better physically. At least it is not black with little chips of glass in it. It is a bit bluerer than the old one, but not by much. Thanks again! I will probably spend the money on a new one as soon as I have something in the tank to justify it.

The two things that come to mind are you had something stuck in the pump in which case it sounds fixed, or something internal is leaking/leaching into the water and the problem will be back. I am betting on the first case.

I'll PM ya.

Sweet! You home this weekend?

Anyone have a left over / spare / used up halide I can have? I am looking for a 20k preferably and something younger than the 3-4 year old bulb I am using now.

Turbo's have my vote. There may be stinkier, but I don't think much has that much smell for such a small package.

I am pretty happy with my Glass Cages tank, but I got it used for a lot less than I would have had to pay GC for new. The build quality is not that great to be honest, but it is solid and well built. They are pretty sloppy with the silicone and the tank is not 100% square. Mine is rimless, so they might be a little better with the normal tanks that have the plastic rim. Anyway I agree with the others. You are basically buying a standard 75g RR tank and it shouldn't be more than $200 IMO. The sump you can make yourself for a lot less than $165. Your best solution would be to move here and buy dustin21's tank. Even if you don't end up liking the tank, you'll be in Texas!

Wow! That is lower than the RO output at my old house. I was averaging 19 out of the RO.

I am guessing you are right on the two ballast theory. That should actually rule out the ballast and leave you with either the endcap or wiring, although if the four bulbs are wired together I am not sure why two are working and two are not, unless that side you are seeing is the neutral, and the hot is hidden on the other side (two bulbs per hot wire). Hopefully a wire just pulled loose or an endcap came apart and it will be an easy fix.

I need to pick up a TDS meter. I would be happy with 160 out of the tap. My old house in CA had 470 out of the tap.

That is a pretty odd wiring setup. How many ballasts are there? My first guess would be a ballast going south, but it might also be the wiring or a loose endcap.

So have I, but was that really him or just a paid actor?

I find it pretty humurous that I moved 1400 miles to the right just to end up in the same reef club situation that I left. My old club (MASVC) in Ventura CA was always in the shadow of MASLAC (Los Angeles) and we were invited to quite a few unique functions that MASLAC's size allowed them to put together, but I think it hurt our own clubs identity in a way because we never made the next step on club size. I guess this is a discussion for another thread, but I wouldn't change the date to the same weekend if you plan on changing at all. Anyone driving down to SA to attend their function will more than likely be burned out after that and probably not attend a meeting the next day at least IMO.

I am not sure if I am crazy or active (or any combo of those two), but I posted it in the announcements section and our club forum on RC.

I can be... Why?

Spring break and Benito Juarez's B-day.... Tough sell, but I will try to make it.

Are these out of your main tank? I wouldn't mind trying the blue milli, but I remember the purple monti I got from you didn't do to well under my lighting. My tank is a lot shallower now though so I might have a better shot.

I have an RK II. I probably wouldn't have bought new at the $300 price (shipped), but I picked mine up for $150 and feel it is well worth that. I use it to control my light cycle, temp, and my pumps. Yes, it is a basically glorified timer, but it is digital, has battery backup, and is extremely easy to program, plus it has overtemp safeties which timers do not. The pH probe is just a added perk (which I am currenlty not using since my probe went bad). I think having the controller send an email would be a great add on feature, but I don't really have a computer to spare, or want to leave one running 24/7 to accomplish this, and in most case there would really be nothing I could do with the information that my RK II isn't already going to do (namely overtemp protection). I would definately keep and eye out for used RKII. I just sold one a couple of weeks ago for $150 so they are out there. The only parts that I have seen go bad are the pH probe (which goes bad no matter what over time), and the backlighting. I guess the more elaborate (valuable) your setup the more you could justify in spending on a controller, but with my tank I just cannot justify it. Then again if my tank crashes I will be out about $200 in fish and a silly anenome so it really isn't the end of the world. If I had a tank like Cindy's I would probably fee different.

I have the Octopus DNW-150 recirculating skimmer and have been very impressed. I think they go for about $260 currently so with shipping and tax you should still be well below the $300 mark. It is bigger than your RS80 though so make sure you have the room in your sump. I feed mine of my drain and it puts out about half a cup of skimmate a day.

You want as much water volume in the sump as possible, while being able to hold every drop if the power goes out, while keeping all your chambers as close to even as possible. The reasons are pretty obvious, but most of the designs I see usually fail at least one of those goals. The biggest mistakes I see are return chamber volume being to small, the refuge chamber being so much higher than the return chamber that the water spilling into the return chamber cause bubbles, and finally the sump just being to small all together. Along those lines I think the best setup is the refuge chamber feeding the drain chamber and then the drain chamber feeding the return chamber. This way you can set the refuge wall as high as you want and you don't have to worry about bubbles getting into the return chamber since they have to get through your bubble trap. You still have to worry about noise in this setup if the refuge is a lot higher than the drain chamber, but that is a standard risk on any sump model. Anyway I have rambled enough and probably didn't help much, but maybe I have offered something to think about.

I only use T5's (recently) and VHO for actinic. I always use halides for the main lighting. IMO there is no substitute for halides currently. People talk about this and that, but I have yet to see the same look of metal halide from any other type of lighting. I am using a single 250w 20k halide currently.

Heater and the MH ballast with the power cord are spoken for.

Trying to empty out the garage a bit so I figured I would offer up some stuff from the "stuff I may need someday, but probably not" pile. EboJager 250w glass heater $5 Aquarium Systems Natural Wave Wavemaker $10 This is basically a six outlet power strip with three of them on a wavemaker. You can see the specs on Marine Depot. CoralVue 250w Metal Halide Eballast. $20 each Not pretty, but works great. Has a mogul socket, but no reflector. CoralVue 250w Metal Halide Eballast. $15 each Not pretty, but works great. Has a mogul socket, but no reflector. Does NOT have a power cord. VHO sockets prewired (two sets of two). $15 These were left over from a 4x110w VHO setup so they can stretch to four foot bulbs (probably longer) or any of the shorter bulbs. 39w T5 Actinic bulb Giesemann $1 This is a 36 inch bulb (33 inch actual I think). I used it for about six months. Batwing reflector $5 Old and weathered, but still serviceable.