BornToHula

I have a turf scrubber from Santa Monica Filtration. Unfortunately, (or fortunately) about the same time I purchased the scrubber my tank hit its stride and never had enough nutrients to start growing any algae in it. The scrubbers have a hard time becoming established if you are running bio-pellets.

I really like the idea of them, it has a lot of the benefits of a refugium in a compact space. However in my case, I've hard a hard time getting any benefit from it.

Battle Against the Ich: Part Deux: The Sequel!

Mine had bad usb cords and I would have to jiggle and switch them around... Eventually I had to just buy a high quality cord from Best Buy and that was never a problem again.

Try switching the cords and see if you gain access

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Ah that was it. The USB cord from the older unit does not work with the new unit. The new unit's USB cord works on both though.

Nice! All the fish look like they are settling in well. Now about that choice in music.... had to turn off the sound pretty quick haha.

Here's a picture with the Powermodules on. The iPhone isn't very good at taking pictures of blue light.

I was able to program the older unit with the ATI light program, but the newer unit ins't being recognized by the USB. Have to troubleshoot that tonight.

You're not supposed to use the sponge at all on the GFO. That may be one of the problems.

Juiceman is correct, if that's the BRS reactor then don't use a sponge with the GFO. I had one in there for a long time and had the same issue you have.

I'm glad I upgraded to two new 20 amp circuits. Just the two 500W heaters pull 7 amps !

I haven't plugged in the Powermodules to apex to see how many amps they pull, but I'm guessing around 4 amps each when all the T5s are turned on.

Luckily the skimmer and return pumps are pretty efficient, they draw less than 1 amp for both.

That's just the canopy. I didn't have time to install the lights last night, just got them all set up and ready for install tonight.

Managed to get the canopy on last night. Its not too heavy but when you have to lift it 6.5 feet it becomes a chore!

I also got all the exhaust fans wired and working as well as new t5 bulbs installed in each light fixture.

Went with the following bulb setup to see how they look. If its too blue I may switch out some Coral Pluses for Aquablue Specials, which despite the name apparently don't give off too much blue.

Blue Plus

Coral Plus

Blue Plus

Purple Plus

==LED==

Coral Plus

Blue Plus

Coral Plus

Blue Plus

Panduit is your friend.

Go take a trip to Altex and see what catches your fancy. Lots of management stuff to choose from.

Cool, thanks for the suggestion.

I'd make a terrible plumber.

I don't think I actually need a check valve, I have a ball valve right next to it. If I need to stop all the water flow I can just turn the valve. I think I can make a threaded bulkhead work now, just have to change my plumbing around a little bit.

Better now than with livestock in it!

True!

I had to order the bulkheads online, it appears I am the odd man out in needing slip bulkheads which no one carries. My return lines don't have room to turn for threaded. Also, for some reason my 1" check valve uses a non-standard union size . Have to order that too.

Hopefully as long as the water is kept circulating it will be fine until the replacement parts come in.

When I did the leak test with tap water everything was working perfectly.

Now that I filled the tank up with saltwater..... a return line bulkhead has a major leak!

Going to have to find a 1 inch bulkhead and do some emergency plumping fast!

I was hoping to make this, but I'm still staring at a desk with a mountain of work that has to be done by the morning. Have fun all!

I'm down for some beer and reef talk. This is the Leander side of me coming out, but I never knew Whole Foods had a bar in it.

Worst part of this hobby: Wire Management!

Also got the fancy bit of aquascape in the tank today

Finally got everyone eating! I guess ARC doesn't allow gifv format, but the first link shows the Blenny and Anthias

Blenny and Anthias

First round of fish are in from the Diver's Den and in quarantine! The Blenny is hiding behind the marinepure blocks but you can see his head poking out.

I have been trying to get the fish eating and have fed very small quantities of NLS pellets, mysis, brine shrimp, spirulina flakes and nori sheets.

The Blenny has eating everything I've fed except the nori.

The Anthias have eaten mysis and brine shrimp.

The Lemonpeel hasn't eaten anything yet

I have some mussels I will try next for the Lemonpeel. He's an active bugger so he is bound to be hungry.

Well I have decided that I don't like ordering fish online and this will likely be the last time I do so. It's too stressful waiting for UPS when they miss their morning delivery time and you have to be in the office during the afternoon.

One thing I thought of is possibly extending the visual inspection to a week or two. If your CP levels dropped at all while running the ich powder, you could have allowed ich to survive the treatment. Once removed from the CP, if any survive, giving the fish 1-2 weeks without medication allows you to see if it was masked by the medication and perhaps reappear.

Good idea on extending the visual inspection period. While I have the equipment, I don't think I am going to do the tank transfer method unless I see ich is present. My Quarantine tanks are 40g and 36g so that will be a lot of saltwater being used.

Well unfortunately the McCullochi Dottyback perished at the Diver's Den . Hopefully the get another specimen soon.

In the past I have only done a 21 day quarantine to visually inspect the fish before transferring into the display tank. I never found any signs of anything so no medication was ever used. This time around I want to be a little more proactive and pre-treat for Ich and other parasites.

What I have planned:

Prazi Pro treatment first (5-7 days)

Large water change/ Run carbon for 2 days

New Life Spectrum Ich Shield Powder treatment (21 days)

Visual inspection for a day or two and if it looks good into the tank they go.

Aquascape is progressing slowly, but I expect to have water in and start the cycling process this weekend

I also have my quarantine set up so new fish can start coming in. These guys will be coming in Thursday!

Nice! Looking good