SirReal63

Thanks Robb, it still has a ways to go before I will be completely happy with it. I am still fighting flow with the odd shape, the two 6100's and 6060 are doing the job but keeping sand in place has become a never ending nightmare.

I also retired my old ASM G3 in favor of a Vertex IN180 that I changed the pump on and converted it to a recirc. The pump is a Sicce PSK1000 and it appears to be a great fir for the Vertex body.

Nice and milky.

It was a fun little project and I am not unhappy with the results. It is a bit too much skimmer with my small bio-load, 5 small fish just isn't a lot but it is still doing an excellent job.

I also had a spawn event with my GSP, it was fun, the fish got massively fed.

It has been a while since I have updated this, so here we go. I have been playing with IrfanView and a white balance correcting plug in to try and get the colors closer to what the eye sees, and I have been fairly successful. Trying to do great photography with a 7 year old point and shoor is a challange, but a better camera will have to wait. The pics are still a little more pale than they are in person but it is a better representation. To supplement the 150 watt Radiums I added two 24" VHO SuperActintics and removed the Ecoxotic 445nm LED's. The difference has been fantastic. In order to fit in the VHO I had to replace the light canopy. I decided to build one that mimicked the tank shape and though it looks much better, access to the tank has suffered which has made tank maintenance a lot harder. I need to remove some rock and erradicate the Valonia on it.

VHO Only.

Good to see you Walter, I have made a fw changes and need to update this a little, I may have time tomorrow. :-)

Llano is about 30 minutes if Toni is driving, 40 minutes if I am. Coopers is great but there are great little BBQ places all over the place out here.

It is a great place to live, we moved here moved here in 1967 when I just a kid and it was a much different place but in many ways it is the same.

Thanks Ian, I appreciate it. I am hard on myself over the tank, it will never look good enough and my pathetic little point and shoot camera is woefully inadequate at capturing the true look.

Thanks, it has been a fun tank with a really weird shape that fits the spot it is in perfectly. My calcium reactor can easily outpace this tank, both of them can actually, I made a new one out of a NexReef MR1 but even the little MRC one was too much. I was having to run the ph at 7.2 to keep from from building alk which hit 14 at the high point before going to the kalk, I can consistently run a 9dkh again. I have changed to flow a little, currently running a pair of Tunze 6100's at the full voltage with 2-1/4" shrouds and a 6060 in a Tunze Rock. I went back to the 150 watt Radiums and 445nm Ecoxotic led's. I have time again to work on the tank (massive bathroom remodel #1 is done) and am going to do the floating canopy right and put in a single 250 or 400 watt Radium and a pair of VHO SuperActintics. While I don't have a problem with the dual 150's I want better spread so the LumenMax Large is going in their place. The canopy was only done as a temporary solution and it is time to do a better aesthetically pleasing one.

The tank still has a long ways to go but I would like to thank those here who graciously sold me some frags and remember, I am always looking for more. :-)

Time for a little update, it has been a little over a year since I
started this thread. The tank has continued to grow, I have had some
little issues to overcome, cyano, CaRx issues, too much light resulting
in bleached corals, etc etc. It is finally back on track and doing
well. I put the calcium reactor on the shelf for a while, I just do not
have enough demand yet to justify it. I am currently dripping kalk
with a peristaltic pump set to drip my daily evaporation. It has been
working as well as you may expect, perfectly, for now at least.

Enough of the drivle, on to some pics.

Great looking tank!

PM sent. :-)

Tangs ared funny, I had a 1-1/2" Scopas rule the tank and that included a Yellow the size of my hand. Which skimmer did you get? Roger is a great person to deal with.

I am sold on this sand, you can see how clear the water is after 24 hours, and that is with no mechanical filtration. The water did have some fines in it, but at no time did the tank get deeply cloudy. I only rinsed a few pounds and left the rest unrinsed. I am never easily impressed, this sand did it though.

In the next few weeks I will be going back to 10K bulbs and will accent with some Ecoxotic Panarama Pro LED strips. That should be fun. :-)

A few more...

I added sand yesterday afternoon and figured I should update this. I used the Tropic Eden, 30 pounds of Mini Reef flakes and 30 pounds of Reef flakes. This stuff was unbelievably clean, as I had heard, and it is true. I tried rinsing the Mini Reef flakes and got nothing coming out, so I just placed all sand without rinsing. It has been close to 24 hours and there was no milkshake, what little bit of fines did come off were quickly dissipated into the tank. I was very pleased, after using CaribSea (and Southdown in my first tanks) for many many years, and no matter how well you rinsed it, it clouded up the tank like crazy, this product lives up to the claims. I can still see a little in the water, but I am anal about having crystal clear water. :-)

Pretty cool Peter, the Tang will love the new home.

I stopped by that store on my way to the house in Marble Falls last Friday, prices are cheap but be careful with buying fish there, they are unpacked on Wed and sold out by Fri, nothing QT'd or acclimated, just dump and sell cheap. Not a bad thing if you know ahead of time that you need to watch them, the fish will be stressed and may need some special care. They had almost no live rock last week, maybe you got it all. :-)

Awesome, where are you getting rock from? I was so tempted to go with TBS for rock on the Pentagon, but did not have the luxury of time, I lost some Acro's and severely hurt others in the month it took to get everything set up and transferred over. That is a lot of pump, lol.

Nice to catch up with you here Peter. Looking forward to the progress. :-)

Jack

You can, and over the years many of us have and still do. It is as safe as you are in handling it. Diluted it is still caustic but not as dangerous as straight. Always dilute and don't leave plastic in it over night, plastic will begin to peel and swell. I had to learn that the hard way. :-) If you ever buy a used tank that is massively coated with coraline, 1:10 muriatic will be needed to clean the tank over night, vinegar would take many days and lots of scrubbing to work. As the calcium dissolves, it weakens the acidity, this is a problem with vinegar and heavy build up, but because the Muriatic is stronger it takes longer to weaken. As always, safe handling is a key here and when done tap water will nuetralize the acid.

The vinegar is no problem, with our hard water a simple rise will change it from being an acid to being the same ph as our tap water. Vinegar is safe and as stated above, many of us have dosed it for carbon and bacteria proliferation. One little tip, heat the vinegar and it will work faster, basic chemistry at work. :-) For really tough buildup you can also use Muriatic Acid (hydrochloric acid) diluted in water. I use 1 part Muriatic to 10 parts water. If anyone does this, use safe practices, nitrile gloves and eye protection and try to avoif breathing the vapors. Always add water to acid and never acid to water. For simple cleaning, vinegar works fine and there is no need to dilute it.

Sweet looking tank! I personally like the first rock layout you had in a semi-circle.

I did too but getting adequate flow into that semi circle was just not possible with the Tunze's on the back wall, I could not get good flow there so it was a dead spot, which isn't good for the SPS. :-) I will play with a couple of different layouts, but now it is two islands directly under the halides and the flow is is greatly improved. I will have a lawn of GSP in the back and sides for now. I need to find a PAR meter to borrow for a few days and check the PAR levels around the tank before I make anything permanent.

Bige...I love the neighborhood too. It is so quiet you can hear a cricket two blocks up and there is no ambient light, so it is pitch black, The quiet and darkness took a little getting used to, we didn't sleep the first few nights we were here. It was like being in a sensory deprivation chamber. I lived here from 1967 until 1980, always on lakefront property so i am a lake rat and it feels great to be back home.