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bimmerzs

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Posts posted by bimmerzs

    Arcohelia

    in Reef Keeping

    Posted

    My buddy in Dallas tried and failed with this species even though he has been successful keeping a few NPS gorg's alive and well in his mixed reef. Definately needs a dedicated NPS setup even though noone know's what type/size food it eat's exactly. It's been around for a year or more and I never see any frags for sale from hobbiest that have previously purchased it. If you get it and figure out how to make it happy then I call first dibs on a frag.dribble.gif

    Cheers,

    Adjusting a skimmer to be as efficient as possible

    in Equipment Discussions

    Posted

    Wet skimmate is the thin light green tea-colored solution collected when lots of air and a relatively high water column height is adjusted for in skimmers that are adjustable (MR-2 type skimmers). This removes a lot of seawater and requires that any auto-top-off devices be turned off during such operations. Failure to do so may result in dilution of salinity. As an alternative (especially in sumpless systems), the system may be overfilled with seawater and skimmed down to normal levels.

    Dry skimmate is the thick, concentrated skimmate collected when water column height is adjusted to about 3 or 5 cm below the collection neck (may be more or less depending on pump, skimmer brand, and venturi/air injection device) and the air injection is reduced to prevent excessive foam formation. This allows the skimmate to concentrate in the foam formed within the collection riser so that the skimmate collected in the cup is quite concentrated, relatively "drier" than the thin wet skimmate collected with less restrictive adjustments. This is usually the optimum setting for skimmers, as it does not remove large volumes of water while the system is unattended, yet effectively removes large amounts of DOC and particulates from the water column. This conservation of seawater helps to prevent fluctuations in salinity, especially in systems with automatic top off devices in operation.

    Wet skimmate allows for better rapid collection of particulates and some organics, but at the cost of collecting extra water (around 2 to 3 gallons every 30 minutes to an hour, depending on the adjustment settings.) This extra water collected can be added to the total for discard from water changes, and acts to clear the water column of suspended detritus. This is especially helpful while performing detritus siphoning/uspension and algal scraping of the glass and when blowing the rock with current to remove detritus. You'll need to keep track of the total amount of seawater removed from the system, and replace that amount with fresh seawater to maintain salinity parameters. If you use auto-top off, make sure to adjust the height of the water in the sump before restarting the auto-top-off to prevent changes in your system's salinity

    The quick and dirty on skimmate, hope this helps.

    Here's a bit more informtion from an online poster concerning the two methods of skimming. I usually prefer to dry skim however, I find that sometimes wet skimming is necessry depending on what I'm doing with my tank. Above quotes taken from this link. http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/f6/wet-skimming-vs-dry-skimming-49194.html

    Cheers,

    Gap Between Tank and Stand

    in Do It Yourself

    Posted

    Plane down the entire top surface until it is all level. Marineland will most likely not warranty this if it broke due to stress caused by a stand you built, insurance company could also reject any claim caused directly by your tank leaking.

    Cheers,

    going barebottom

    in Reef Keeping

    Posted

    If it's 1" - 2" I would do the filter sock idea. Before starting I would have a bottle of either some Dr.Tim's nitrifying bacteria or Fritz product(not a fan of fritz), enough water for a 50% water change, poly filter, cheap ammonia alert strip and a bottle of prime on hand. Start running polyfilter, suck out all of the sand returning the water back to the sump(so you don't remove more SW than you have onhand), perform 50% WC, add the Dr. Tim's and a bit of prime then turn the skimmer back on. I would do a normal waterchange in a couple of day's and check the poly filter color. Definately do this at least a week before leaving out of town and make sure that whoever is watching your tank, knows what they are doing.

    Cheers,

    automatic day/night LED?

    in Equipment Discussions

    Posted

    We have a premium 2 year warranty, and take care of all warranty service and repairs right here in the USA.

    Keep in mind that if you get these from a factory you are up a creek if something goes wrong. Even if they want to help, you will still pay for shipping + insurance there and back. The color spectrum's represented by these are quite good, the price is outstanding, they at least have namebrand led's(less bin data) and someone in the US believes they are worthy of a 2yr warranty, to me that alone is worth the $40 you save by buying direct as-is. As always....YMMV

    Cheers,

    turf algae eater?

    in Reef Keeping

    Posted

    duh! I need to get them in touch with John and have reefcleaners build an turf algae assault team. It is just like the turf on that guide.

    Thanks y'all. I'm learning a lot in this thread. They tried a foxface and he isn't helping. Personality of that fish. They have had some luck with urchins, but its a big tank and that would be a bunch of urchins. Which it might come down to.

    I brought in some of the red turf algae on a frag plug once, that stuff started spreading relatively quick even in a lower nutrient tank. This was a 130G tank and I put in two urchin's and 10 mexican turbo's, after a week or so you could see them making progress as more rock was uncovered. You really need something that can "scrape" off the algae from the surface, turbo's and urchin's have rasping type mouths that just work great on turf type algae's. Still gotta find the source because that stuff could possibly grow back if a tiny bit is missed or if you don't have enough critters to mow it down faster than it can regrow. YMMV

    Cheers,

    • Like 1

    turf algae eater?

    in Reef Keeping

    Posted

    Do you use lanthanum ?

    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

    I have used it in the holding tank I still have setup, I only suggest method's that I have personally tried and was very reluctant to initially try this stuff. I mix a very weak solution and drip very small amounts to my skimmer body(small like 1-2ml). I initially bought water from a local store, after measuring for phosphates with the hanna, I acquired another ro/di unit just for the apartment. While phosphate addition via quality food sources is still not very low, that can be quite magnified over a 10yr period, especially if lower quality flake food's etc., have been used in this tank. It would be nice to have a bit more history on the tank such as water source, food's used, MH light brand along with changout schedule, skimmer brand/type etc., etc.

    Cheers,

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