AlexKilpatrick

Make extra checks whenever you change your plumbing. I have had a couple of floods because of this. One was when a hose wasn't clamped on a pump tight enough after cleaning it. Another one was when I was siphoning out flatworms into a temporary filter sock in the sump. It seemed stable enough, so I left it alone for a while. I came back and *bam* the filter sock had slipped out and I had siphoned about 40 gallons of saltwater on the floor.

Also, invest in a $10-ish water alarm from Home Depot. Well worth it.

I have a PM redline and it works great. But it is really finicky on the adjustment. It seems like a tiny (like 1/16") turn on the adjustment pipe makes a huge difference.

I have a couple of tangs (kole, powder blue) who graze on the rocks all day. I am happy about that. I decided to put some Nori in today as a treat. I put some garlic extract on it as well.

They completely ignored it. I have had tangs in other tanks in the past and they always go crazy for nori. Is there anything I can do to make them interested? I'm at a loss.

GFCI

Seconding this. A tank crash is noting compared to dying.

You don't even have to hire an electrician for this. You can get a GFCI "extension cord" or a GFCI thing that plugs into a regular outlet. There is no excuse for not having one.

Humility is a big thing in this hobby. Yes there are many different opinions and ways to run a reef tank. However, the general rules are there for a reason. They are tried and tested. There is always someone that says I always/never do (fill in the blank) and have never had a problem. That maybe true, but either they have special circumstances, got really lucky, or the bomb hasn't dropped yet.

I have to disagree with this a bit. I think one of the things that has helped the hobby grow was people pushing the boundaries and ignoring the rules. When I started with saltwater in 1988, these were some of the rules everyone knew:

1. The absolute minimum tank size is 40 gallons
2. Undergravel filters are the best way to go
3. Corals are impossible to keep, except for the very elite

We are learning stuff all the time, and yesterday's rules are sometimes completely discarded. I remember when nanos were first getting started. People were saying "I am keeping corals and fish in a 10 gallon tank" and everyone else was saying "you got really lucky" and "then bomb is about to drop." But it didn't.

I think of it more along the lines of "If you are new to the hobby, you should follow what everyone has learned. You probably aren't going to be able to keep a tank in your 2 gallon nano." But if you have experience, you can push the conventional wisdom, and that's great.

To contribute to the thread:

If your skimmer is not producing skimmate, it isn't because your tank is pristine, it is because your skimmer isn't adjusted right.

I bought one since they were cheap, and I thought it might be interesting to see the data. A couple of things to note:

1) It takes about 2 weeks for them to become "broken in" This has something to do with the way the probe is made

2) They inversely vary with Ph, somewhat. Mine drops about 20 points (normal is ~350 for me) when then Ph rises during the day

3) It does seem to be somewhat of an indicator of water quality. When I have noticed it drop, there is usually something wrong with my skimmer

I'm not 100% convinced it is useful, but it is worth the small cost if you are interested.

Why is the water level so low on that sump? That's weird.

That's exactly how the one I saw was setup. It overflowed 4x in 6 months. Maybe the owner didn't have it dialed in right, but his companion got so sick of it overflowing, he got the go ahead to buy a bigger reef ready tank!

Well, just to provide a counter-point. I had this kind of setup wit a CPR overflow for over a year, and I never had a flood.

However, the general iffy-ness of the setup made me decide to get regular overflows so I wouldn't have to worry about it. On a tank with regular internal overflows, there isn't any single point of failure. Typically, one overflow can handle the load of the pump, so if one overflow gets clogged you are still ok. I have never had an internal overflow get clogged, though. The only thing I can think of is a really big snail.

With the air pump it is not about water movement just adding oxygen to the water.

Well, it still begs the same question :-) Does a small D-cell powered air pump add enough oxygen for a 100 gallon tank? My hunch is no, considering how the small column of bubbles looks lost in a big tank.

It would be nice to know how many are really needed.

Walmart and Academy have the D-battery powered air pumps for keeping minnows alive, they run $5-10 dollars. I have two that I keep on hand. Nice thing is that they hold 2 batteries but only run off one, so you always have a backup.

I think that is the same thing I was using. It would work on one battery. Do you know how long it will run on a pair of batteries?

However, I have no idea how to scale it. How many do you need to have enough water movement for a 100 Gal, etc.

I actually bought a cheaper version of that battery-powered pump at Petco today for $18. It works the same way -- you plug it in and it only comes on if the power goes out. It uses 2 D cells,so it is probably not as powerful. It did the trick in breaking up the surface, though.

Nevermind! Power finally came back on after about 6 or 7 total hours out. The tank only dropped a few degrees. Everything looks fine.

My power is still out for about 4 hours now. I have some battery powered air pumps. But it is going to start getting cold soon. How long before I have a major problem?

Anyone have a generator I can borrow?

I read some stuff on RC about doing effectively 100% water changes by changing 1 or 2 gallons of water every day. There was a big analysis about it, and it wasn't as ineffective as I would have thought. One 30 gallon water change is more effective that 30 one gallon changes, but not by a huge amount. And lots of smaller water changes are less stressful than big water changes.

You could mostly automate that, I expect.

I do 25 gallon changes every week on my 20. Some people say you can't change 25 gallons on a 20 gallon tank, but I take out all the water and then dehydrate the tank in the oven at 250 degrees for 6 hours. After the dehydration step, I have to add in 5 gallons before it even starts accumulating as water in the tank.

My corals are a little bleached, but my nitrates are always 0. Dilution is the solution to pollution, as they say...

Holy cow! $120 a month??? That's crazy. I have never understood why anybody would not use an RO/DI, even on a small aquarium. It is an easy equation with the cost, but the hassle is even a bigger factor. I hate lugging around bug heavy containers of water. I would go crazy if I had to make a trip to the store to get water, even if it was free.

One suggestion -- get a float switch with your RO/DI. It should only be a $15-$20 add-on. A float switch is a mechanical switch that you mount into your RO container (trash can, whatever) and it will shut off the water when it is full. If you don't do that, I *guarantee* you will forget about it and have a flood. Luckily, an RO flood is going to be small because the amount of water per unit time is small, but it is still a hassle.

People were actually asking you to drive down to Austin to deliver free frags? That's amazing.

Have you ever been skiing and gotten really chilled? And then you get into a hot tub and it feels wonderful?

Fish are the same way. I would recommend tanking some tank water and heating it up to about 120 degrees. Then, net your fish and drop them into their new "fish hot tub" It will really relax them and eliminate the stress of being cold all day.

Serious answer. If you think about it, corals/fish survive shipping pretty well, and I am sure it gets below 65, and in really poor water conditions.

http://www.reefs.org/library/talklog/d_warren_011898.html

Q: Can an aquarium enviroment withstand a rare spike increase or decrease in temperature in a short period of time?

Yes it can. As you should have been able to see from the data I have presented, a natural reef do experience such variations. The important things to show whether the corals will survive the spike are ... Length of the spike, the longer it is at the extreme temperature, the more damage that is done..... Size of the temperature change, the larger the change the greater the shock to the organism, and the more damage that will occur.. What you should be able to assertain from this is that you can have larger variations over a shorter time, without doing too much damage. I would not be too worried by a change of 3 ^o C over a day, on occasion but, just remember that a stressless organism is much healther than a stressed one, so you want to minimise the changes etc.

Just to clarify a little more.

Aggressive skimming means you skimmate looks kind of like tea. "Dry" skimming means it looks more like coffee. You should be able to tweak it by adjusting the water level in your skimmer.

Depending on your sump design, you may need to have an automated top-off in order to keep the water level consistent.

Thanks again to Mark for his great work organizing this. We should double your pay!

My PBT started eating as soon as he hit the tank. Looking good so far, and I am going to keep my fingers crossed.

(big green chromis, not small tang. They are both about 4" long.

Automated (or Automatic) Top-Off

Basically as float switch and a controller to automatically add RO water to replace evaporation.

I don't think the electricity on a tank is really all that significant in the big picture. I have a 156, and it has a measured energy consumption of 10 amps when everything is on. If I left everything on 24/7 (which I don't, of course), that would be about $2/day in electricity, or about $60 a month. In reality, it is closer to half that because I have a 10 hour light period -- call is $30/month. The bulk of that is MH (I have 2x 250 HQI), and a 215 would not be double that. But even if it was, that would be $60/month.

Not trivial by any means, but if $60 a month scares you away then you definitely should not be considering a large tank.

There are lots of expenses to running a reef tank, but I think people over-rate the significance of electricity.

What does a cleaning service do? I'm not interested in hiring one, but I am curious what they actually do. Clean the glass? Empty the skimmer?

is he skinny and starving? If so, he is gone unless you tube feed him.

What is this? I've never heard of it.

Didn't realize it was already time for the order. Just sent in my PayPal. If it is light, let me know. If it is over, please keep the difference.